Trends in Distance Between Non-resident Parents and Minor Children Following Separation: Analysis of the Belgian Case, 1992-2018.

Geographic distance between a child and their non-resident parent is a key aspect of the reorganization of the family following parental separation. The increasingly equal involvement of both parents in the upbringing of their children is expected to translate into increasing geographic proximity between children and non-resident parents. So far, there has been no evidence about the time trends in geographical distances between minor children and non-resident parents outside of the Swedish context. In this study, we investigate these trends across Belgian separation cohorts from 1992 to 2018 and the extent to which they differ according to parental socioeconomic status and child's age at separation. Overall, we observed a very small decrease in distance between children and their non-resident fathers and a somewhat larger decrease for non-resident mothers. The distance increased for very young children (0-2 years) and children with low-educated fathers. These findings point to inequalities in certain parent-child dyads.

Moving Closer for the Grandchild? Fertility and the Geographical Proximity of a Mother and Her Adult Daughter in a Dynamic Perspective.

Recent research has analyzed how the geographical distance between mothers and adult daughters influenced the daughters' fertility transitions. The inverse relationship has received less attention: that is, whether a daughter's fertility-her pregnancies and the ages and number of her children-is affected by her geographical proximity to her mother. The current study helps to close this gap by considering moves by either adult daughters or mothers that lead them to live nearby again. We use Belgian register data on a cohort of 16,742 firstborn girls aged 15 at the beginning of 1991 and their mothers who lived apart at least once during the observed period (1991-2015). Estimating event-history models for recurrent events, we analyzed whether an adult daughter's pregnancies and the ages and number of her children affected the likelihood that she was again living close to her mother and, if so, whether the daughter's or the mother's move enabled this close living arrangement. The results show that daughters were more likely to move closer to their mothers during their first pregnancy and that mothers were more likely to move closer to their daughters when the daughters' children were older than 2.5 years. This study contributes to the growing literature investigating how family ties shape (im)mobility.