that in 1980 48.4 percent of adult children over eighteen were living at home. That number rose to 52.6 percent in 1986, with researchers believing the trend will continue to increase (Stockman & Graves, 1989, p.23).
Research further points to the fact that it is usually a combination of parental behavior that influences adult children to postpone their own adulthood. Most parents want their children to have a better life than they did. The demographics show that most parents of adult children in the 1980s (children who are eighteen or over by 1980) grew up in the Depression, the period of World War II, and started their families after postwar posterity was assured. Sociological factors such as instant gratification, the rise of consumerism, and increased economic expectations allowed parents to provide greater amounts of material
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