Study | Quality grades assigned by reviewers (NS/TJ) | Confounders/variables analysed | Limitations/strengths | Findings |
Adolescent and youth health outcomes | ||||
Crowder and Teachman, 200428 | Sound/sound | SE, age, race, single parenthood, year of observation | L: Attrition, described as low, but no details given. S: Longitudinal design, analysis of key confounders | No of moves and neighbourhood measures of disadvantage associated with teenage pregnancy |
DeWit, 199829 | Adequate/sound | SE, sex, location, no of siblings, parental employment education, alcohol abuse, depression, and childhood abuse; parental marital conflict and conduct disorder | L: long period of respondent recall in cross-sectional design. Recency and reasons for moves not considered. S: attrition analysed. Comprehensive analysis of confounders | ⩾4 Moves associated with early initiation of drug abuse and drug-related problems (for marijuana), but not alcohol abuse: accelerated time to first use marijuana by 11.8%, and time to marijuana-related problems by 49% |
Adam and Chase-Lansdale, 200230 | Adequate/adequate | SE, age and marital status of caregiver, adolescent perceptions of current relationships and neighbourhood | L: Attrition to study, highly selective: limited generalisability. S: Considered moderating factors at family and neighbourhood levels | RM associated with adjustment problems, adolescent girls. Moderated by maternal relationship quality, availability of adult kin support and perceived neighbourhood quality |
Gilman et al, 200331 | Adequate/adequate | SE, family history of mental illness, maternal age, child’s age, ethnicity | L: Lack of clarity on attrition from cohort; not representative of population (acknowledged by authors). S: Longitudinally collected data | ⩾3 Moves before 7 years of age: depression: OR 1.36 (1.05 to 1.78); onset depression under 14 years. OR 2.62 (1.46 to 3.91); remission: OR 1.65 (1.10 to 2.47) |
Stack, 199432 | Adequate/suboptimal | SE, age, region, father’s education, measures of social control | L: Self-report bias; attrition to study not reported. No information on recency of last move; data from 1976. S: Social control factors included | RM increased risk of premarital sexual behaviour in adolescent girls. Each move associated with partial odds ratio increase of 1.04. A weak effect overall |
Mundy et al, 198933 | Suboptimal/suboptimal | None | L: Huge potential for bias in this highly selective sample. Problems inherent in archival chart review | 31% Adolescent inpatient psychiatric patients sample had moved ⩾5 times |
Adult health outcomes | ||||
Bures, 200334 | Suboptimal/suboptimal | SE, sex, family structure | L: Highly selective population limiting generalisability; confounders not fully accounted for. S: Longitudinal data | Mortality rate over 26 years of follow-up: childhood residential moves not independently associated with increased mortality |
Juon et al, 200335 | Adequate/suboptimal | SE, family stability, ethnicity, marital status in adulthood, income, education, community supports, no of children | L: Respondent recall, often over long periods of time. Self-assessment of most key variables. “Poverty rate” 3.3%; limited generalisability | “Residential stability” associated with self-assessed global health in adulthood: residentially stable vs residentially unstable: OR 1.42 (1.18 to 1.72). Mental health—not statistically significant |
L:, limitations; OR, odds ratio followed by 95% confidence interval in brackets; RM, residential mobility; S:, strengths; SE, socioeconomic factors or measures.