This dissertation project is located in the research field of spatial mobility and family. The connections of parental long-distance commuting and children's well-being are analysed - focusing on Germany. For the analyses, the German Family Panel is used.

Duration:
01 August 2015 - 15 December 2018

Research Team:
Dr. Christine Borowsky (Head of project)

Abstract
Employment patterns have become ever more specialized and are changing in western societies. Among these changes is the rapidly rising extent of commuting times: People bridge greater distances to get to their workplace, thus commuting many hours to get to work.

Previous research found that parent commuting can have an influence on the well-being of their offspring. However, research is still scarce: We know little about the relationship of parental commuting and children’s well-being or strategies to handle best the new demands of commuting. This dissertation project will fill this gap by using the German Family Panel for the first time in family-commuting research to create a more extensive operationalisation of the concepts needed to understand how commuting affects children. Thus, this study will contribute new knowledge.

Using the German Family Panel the association between parental long-distance commuting and children’s well-being is analysed across time. I hypothesize that in addition to a direct effect then, commuting time also affects child’s welfare indirectly, by first affecting the parent-child relationship, which in turn affects the child’s well-being. I hypothesize that this relationship is not the same for different levels and types of childcare, social support, financial means of the household, and flexible work arrangements. Structural equation models will show how all the variables are related, while the time is taken into account via additional fixed effects models.

With the results we will understand whether and how parental commuting and children’s well-being are associated.

Supervision
Prof. Sonja Drobnič, Ph.D. (University Bremen)
Prof. Dr. Michael Feldhaus (University Oldenburg)

Duration:
01 August 2015 - 15 December 2018

Research Team:
Dr. Christine Borowsky (Head of project)

Project Type:
Qualification project