Abstract

This study aims to investigate the influence of self differentiation and coresidence with unmarried adult-child on parent's mental health. A total of 406 parents (193 parents who coreside with unmarried adult-child and 213 parents who do not) completed the questionnaire. Self differentiation, coresidence with unmarried adult-child, family relationship, and parent's perceived stress and mental health were included in the hypothetical path model, and this model was tested using AMOS version 19.0. The goodness fit of the model was acceptable with various indices (GFI=0.99, AGFI=0.99, RMSEA＜0.01, NFI=0.99). Self differentiation was found to have a significant direct effect on coresidence with unmarried adult-child and family relationship, although it only affected parent's perceived stress and mental health indirectly. It was identified that the family relationship could be a significant factor connecting self differentiation and parent's mental health. However, contrary to previous studies, coresidence did not have any influence on family, parent's stress and mental health. No effect of coresidence on parent's psychological aspect might be due to Korean culture which is common for parent to live with unmarried adult-child. (Korean J Str Res 2011;19:137∼145)

• Keywords: Mental health, Self differentiation, Family relationship, Stress, Adult-child