| dc.description.abstract | Living arrangements is part of welfare economics that collects the familial and non-familial relationships of a person to all other people with whom they usually reside, indicating the need to choose where to live and with whom. Living arrangements have important implications for children’s emotional, social and physical health. The environment the child is raised from and all the factors that predict living arrangements have consequences for the wellbeing of children. It is an extremely essential aspect to learn living arrangements of children to address their necessities, troubles and fulfill their urgent needs, especially the children who are needy and under the care of the child headed households as they likely have limited sources and less access on economic resources. It is also important that parents and their children utilize social and economic resources together. Therefore, this study aimed at examining the factors affecting children`s living arrangement in Uganda using the UDHS, 2016 data set. The data was analyzed at three levels that is to say univariate, bivariate and multivariate analysis.
From the study findings, results indicated that more than a quarter (28%) of children were not living with their parents, more than a half (69%) of the children were less than one year, less than a quarter (21%) of the mothers were in the age groups of 30-34 years and 35-39 years respectively, more than three quarters (84%) of the respondents resided in rural areas of Uganda, more than a half (63%) of the respondents had acquired primary education as their highest level of education, almost a half (41%) of the respondents were Catholics, almost a half (46%) of the respondents were poor and more than three quarters (86%) of respondents were currently working. All the selected factors were found to be influencing children`s living arrangements since the chi-square p-value was less than 0.05. The results indicated that child`s age, respondent`s age, education level and wealth index were the determinants of children`s living arrangement in Uganda.
In conclusion, with child `s age being a factor affecting children`s living arrangements, it was observed from the findings that the more the child grows, the less likely to stay with their parents. This could be due to the fact that less time will be allocated to children whenever they grow up. Parents then devote most of their time in productive activities meaning less time will be available to stay with their children. This is evident as employment status of the parents was one of the factors affecting children`s living arrangements. Therefore, demographic factors, social factors and economic factors were found to be the factors influencing children`s living arrangements | en_US |
