Abstract
In this chapter, the authors use the Journeys Home longitudinal data set to examine the relationship between housing insecurity and wellbeing. Using information on accommodation type, start date and duration of accommodation spells, the authors construct a sequence spanning some 2.5 years for 369 individuals, where similar sequences are grouped for analysis of individuals’ characteristics. The authors present a unique perspective with findings that are of significance for the many countries struggling with homelessness and ageing populations.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
- 2.
- 3.
Australian Government, Living Longer, Living Better, Aged Care Reform Report, Department of Health and Ageing, 2012.
- 4.
In this application, we aggregate in some instances for presentation purposes and/or to preserve confidentiality due to sample size issues specific to our chosen data set.
- 5.
These routines do not currently support the use of weights, so all analyses are unweighted.
- 6.
From a statistical perspective, it is important to note the small sample size for typology 2 in this age group of 56 individuals.
References
ABS. (2012). Census of population and housing: Estimating homelessness. Canberra: ABS.
Batterham, D., Mallet, S., Yates, E., Kolar, V., & Westmore, T. (2013). Ageing out of place: The impact of gender and location on older Victorians in homelessness. Melbourne: Hanover Welfare Services.
Bevitt, A., Chigavazira, A., Scutella, R., Tseng, Y., & Watson, N. (2014). Journeys home user manual. Melbourne: Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research.
Blossfeld, H.-P., & Rohwer, G. (2002). Techniques of event history modeling: New approaches to causal analysis (2nd ed.). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Brzinsky-Fay, C., Kohler, U., & Luniak, M. (2006). Sequence analysis using Stata. Stata Journal, 6(4), 435–460.
Chamberlain, C. (2014). Homelessness: Re-shaping the policy agenda. Melbourne: Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute.
Chamberlain, C., & Johnson, G. (2013). Pathways into adult homelessness. Journal of Sociology, 49(1), 60–77. https://doi.org/10.1177/1440783311422458.
Chamberlain, C., & McKenzie, D. (1992). Understanding contemporary homelessness: Issues of definition & meaning. Australian Journal of Social Issues, 27(4), 274–297.
Chamberlain, C., & McKenzie, D. (2008). Counting the homeless 2006. Canberra: Australian Bureau of Statistics.
Clapham, D. (2005). The meaning of housing: A pathways approach. Bristol: Policy Press, University of Bristol.
Cobb-Clark, D. A., Herault, N., Scutella, R., & Tseng, Y.-P. (2016). A journey home: What drives how long people are homeless? Journal of Urban Economics, 91(Suppl. C), 57–72. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jue.2015.11.005.
Cobb-Clark, D. A., & Zhu, A. (2017). Childhood homelessness and adult employment: The role of education, incarceration, and welfare receipt. Journal of Population Economics, 30(3), 893–924. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00148-017-0634-3.
Cornwell, B. (2015). Social sequence analysis: Methods and applications. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Crane, M., & Joly, L. (2014). Older homeless people: Increasing numbers and changing needs. Reviews in Clinical Gerontology, 24(4), 255–268. https://doi.org/10.1017/S095925981400015X.
Crane, M., & Warnes, A. M. (2010). Homelessness among older people and service responses. Reviews in Clinical Gerontology, 20(4), 354–363. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0959259810000225.
Diener, E., & Chan, M. (2011). Happy people live longer: Subjective well-being contributes to health and longevity. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, 3(1), 1–43. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1758-0854.2010.01045.x.
Evans, G. W., Kantrowitz, E., & Eshelman, P. (2002). Housing quality and psychological well-being among the elderly population. The Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 57(4), P381–P383. https://doi.org/10.1093/geronb/57.4.P381.
Ferrer‐I‐Carbonell, A., & Frijters, P. (2004). How important is methodology for the estimates of the determinants of happiness? Economic Journal, 114(497), 641–659. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0297.2004.00235.x.
Fiedler, J. (2013). Home at last: Time for action on housing services and options for older people. Parity, 26(7), 30–32.
Fitzpatrick, S., Bramley, G., & Johnsen, S. (2012). Pathways into multiple exclusion homelessness in seven UK cities. Urban Studies, 50(1), 148–168. https://doi.org/10.1177/0042098012452329.
Fry, J., & Boulton, C. (2013). Prevalence of transition pathways in Australia (Productivity Commission Staff Working Paper). Canberra.
Haug, M. R., Wykle, M. L., & Namazi, K. H. (1989). Self-care among older adults. Social Science and Medicine, 29(2), 171–183. https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-9536(89)90165-2.
Kertesz, G. S., Larson, J. M., Horton, J. N., Winter, H. M., Saitz, H. R., & Samet, H. J. (2005). Homeless chronicity and health-related quality of life trajectories among adults with addictions. Medical Care, 43(6), 574–585. https://doi.org/10.1097/01.mlr.0000163652.91463.b4.
Kessler, R. C., Andrews, G., Colpe, L. J., Hiripi, E., Mroczek, D. K., Normand, S. L. T., … Zaslavsky, A. M. (2002). Short screening scales to monitor population prevalences and trends in non-specific psychological distress. Psychological Medicine, 32(6), 959–976. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0033291702006074.
Lennon, M., McAllister, W., Kuang, L., & Herman, D. (2005). Temporality and intervention effects: Trajectory analysis of a homeless mental health program. New York: Columbia University.
May, J. (2000). Housing histories and homeless careers: A biographical approach. Housing Studies, 15(4), 613–638.
McAllister, W., Lennon, M., & Kuang, L. (2011). Rethinking research on forming typologies of homelessness. American Journal of Public Health, 101(4), 596–601.
McVicar, D., Moschion, J., & van Ours, J. (2015). From substance use to homelessness or vice versa? Social Science & Medicine, 136–137, 89–98. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2015.05.005.
Minnery, J., & Greenhalgh, E. (2007). Approaches to homelessness policy in Europe, the United States, and Australia. Journal of Social Issues, 63(3), 641–655. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.2007.00528.x.
Oswald, F., Wahl, H.-W., Schilling, O., Nygren, C., Fange, A., Sixsmith, A., … Iwarsson, S. (2007). Relationships between housing and healthy aging in very old age. Gerontologist, 47(1), 96–107. https://doi.org/10.1080/11038120601151615.
Petersen, M., & Parsell, C. (2015). Homeless for the first time in later life: An Australian study. Housing Studies, 30(3), 368–391. https://doi.org/10.1080/02673037.2014.963522.
Robinson, C. (2003). Understanding iterative homelessness: The case of people with mental disorders. Melbourne: Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute.
Scutella, R., Johnson, G., Moschion, J., Tseng, Y.-P., & Wooden, M. (2013). Understanding lifetime homeless duration: Investigating wave 1 findings from the Journeys Home project. Australian Journal of Social Issues, 48(1), 83–110. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1839-4655.2013.tb00272.x.
Sosin, M., Piliavin, I., & Westerfelt, H. (1990). Toward a longitudinal analysis of homelessness. Journal of Social Issues, 46(4), 157–174. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.1990.tb01804.x.
Steptoe, A., Deaton, A., & Stone, A. A. (2015). Subjective wellbeing, health, and ageing. The Lancet, 385(9968), 640–648. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(13)61489-0.
Stergiopoulos, V., & Herrmann, N. (2003). Old and homeless: A review and survey of older adults who use shelters in an urban setting. The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 48(6), 374–380. https://doi.org/10.1177/070674370304800603.
Toro, P. A. (2007). Toward an international understanding of homelessness. Journal of Social Issues, 63(3), 461–481. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.2007.00519.x.
Westmore, T. (2011). Responding to the needs of the elderly homeless—Ageing in what place? Parity, 24(9), 33–34.
White, H. (1980). A heteroskedasticity-consistent covariance matrix estimator and a direct test for heteroskedasticity. Econometrica, 48(4), 817–838. https://doi.org/10.2307/1912934.
Wooden, M., Bevitt, A., Chigavazira, A., Greer, N., Johnson, G., Killackey, E., … Watson, N. (2012). Introducing ‘journeys home’. Australian Economic Review, 45(3), 368–378. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8462.2012.00690.x.
Acknowledgements
This chapter uses unit record data from Journeys Home: Longitudinal Study of Factors Affecting Housing Stability (Journeys Home). The study was initiated and is funded by the Australian Government Department of Social Services (DSS). The Department of Employment has provided information for use in Journeys Home, which is managed by the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research (Melbourne Institute). The findings and views reported in this chapter, however, are those of the authors and should not be attributed to DSS, the Department of Employment or the Melbourne Institute.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Elkins, M., Farrell, L., Fry, J. (2020). Investigating the Relationship Between Housing Insecurity and Wellbeing. In: Awaworyi Churchill, S., Farrell, L., Appau, S. (eds) Measuring, Understanding and Improving Wellbeing Among Older People. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-2353-3_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-2353-3_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-15-2352-6
Online ISBN: 978-981-15-2353-3
eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceEconomics and Finance (R0)