Characteristics and Dynamics of Homeless Families with Children

A Reanalysis of the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being Study

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Contents

1. Introduction
2. Methodology
   1. Database Description
   2. Defining the Sample for Reanalysis
   3. Creating and Describing Residential Outcome Groups
   4. Potential Risk and Protective Factors
3. Descriptive Analyses and Results
4. Predicting Residential Stability and Homelessness
5. Discussion
   1. Summary of Results
   2. Caveats and Qualifications
   3. Filling Knowledge Gaps
   4. Guiding the Typology Development
   5. Directing Future Research

Introduction

As noted in Chapter 4, through an extensive review of existing data sets, a data set was identified with potential for informing the development of a typology of homeless families. The Fragile Families and Child Well-Being Study (Reichman, N.E., Teitler, J.O., Garfinkel, I., McLanahan, S., 2001) follows a birth cohort of new parents and their children over a 5-year period beginning in 1998. This sample is at high risk for homelessness in that pregnancy is one of the major risk factors found to precede homelessness (Weitzman, 1989) or loss of housing (Rog and Gutman, 1997). In addition, because the study oversampled unmarried women, the sample contains a higher proportion of women potentially more vulnerable to residential instability. Furthermore, Fragile Families is a national longitudinal panel study that includes measures of residential instability and risk (e.g., being evicted, having utilities turned off), as well as the incidence of being doubled-up (i.e., staying for at least one night with others) and literal homelessness (i.e., staying at least one night in a literally homeless situation).⁽¹⁾ These data thus afford the ability to track families over time and to examine the role of various risk or protective factors on residential stability.

This chapter describes a reanalysis of the Fragile Families data set focused on the following research questions:

• What are the risk and protective factors that differentiate, among a cohort of poor families, those families who:
  • Experienced homelessness and those who remained stably housed?
  • Experienced homelessness and those who become doubled up or residentially unstable (i.e., at risk of homelessness)?
  • Became doubled up or residentially unstable and those who remained stably housed?

The reanalysis is intended to inform our conceptualization of a typology of homeless families. As a multisite database of high-risk families, it provides an opportunity to examine the incidence of homelessness over multiple geographic areas, over time, and in contrast to a comparison population of poor families experiencing a range of residential arrangements.⁽²⁾

The chapter begins with a brief description of the data set, the sample selected for the re-analyses, the creation of residential groups and other relevant measures, and the analyses performed. Then, the results of the reanalysis are provided, followed by a summary of the findings and a discussion of the study's implications for filling knowledge gaps, guiding typology development, and directing future research.

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Methodology

Database Description

The Fragile Families and Child Well-being Study, also referred to as the "The Survey of New Parents," is designed to track a cohort of new parents and their children over a 5-year period. The purpose of the study is to provide new information on the strengths, conditions, and relationships of both wed and unwed parents and how Federal and state policies affect family composition and child well-being. The study is a stratified random sample of U.S. cities with a population of 200,000 or more, designed to provide a representative sample of nonmarital births in U.S. cities with populations over 200,000. Mothers were approached and interviewed at the hospital within 48 hours of giving birth, and fathers were interviewed at the hospital or elsewhere as soon as possible after the birth.

Eventually, four waves of data will be available. Baseline data were collected between 1998 and 2000, and followup interviews were conducted at 1 year, 3 years, and 5 years after the baseline. Currently, three waves are available for reanalysis: baseline, Year 1 followup, and Year 3 followup. Baseline data are available on a sample of 4,898 families (3,712 nonmarital births and 1,186 marital births). One-year followup data are available on a total of 4,365 mothers and 3,367 fathers, and Year 3 followup interviews are available on 4,231 mothers and 3,299 fathers. At least one wave of followup is available on 94 percent of the mothers, while 82 percent of the mothers were interviewed at both followups.⁽³⁾ The database constructed for this reanalysis focuses on the mother, with data about the father given where appropriate.

Defining the Sample for Reanalysis

The Fragile Families data set includes families from diverse income backgrounds, ranging from those far beneath the income poverty level to those who have relatively high levels of income. For an analysis examining the risk factors for homelessness, it is important that the groups being compared have an equivalent probability of experiencing the condition. Therefore, an income limit (i.e., household income at or below 50% of national poverty) was used to define the sample. In addition, the sample was limited to families in which the mother was 18 years of age or older. Finally, the sample was selected based on the families completing the Year 1 interview (n = 4365) because residential information was only collected during the followup interviews. A total of 838 families (19.2% of the Year 1 Fragile Families data set) met the income and age criteria and constitute the primary sample used for this study.

Creating and Describing Residential Outcome Groups

Detailed residential information was collected on participants in the Fragile Families study at the Year 1 and Year 3 followup surveys. This residential information found in each survey included:

• # — Moves: Number of moves since birth of child/last interview;
• Residential Risk Indicators: Indicators of residential risk in past 12 months (i.e., had not paid full amount of rent or mortgage; had been evicted from home or apartment; had not paid full amount of a gas, oil, or electric bill; had phone service disconnected because payments were not made; had to borrow money from friends or family to help pay bills);
• Doubled-Up: Whether the family was currently living with family or friends and paying no rent, or had moved in with other people even for a little while due to financial problems in last 12 months; and
• Homeless: Whether the family was currently living on the street, in temporary housing or a group home, or spent at least one night in a shelter, abandoned building, automobile, or other place not meant for regular housing in the past 12 months.

For descriptive analyses, each mother was categorized into one of four residential groups at Year 1 and Year 3 based on the pattern of responses to these residential indicators (# moves, residential risk indicators, doubled-up, homeless).

As Table 5-1 shows, residentially stable households in Year 1 and Year 3 were defined as having less than two moves, no residential risks, and had not been doubled-up or homeless during the prior 12 months. At-Risk households reported two or more moves and/or one or more residential risks, and also had not been doubled-up or homeless in the last 12 months. Doubled-up households were ones that were currently or recently doubled-up and had not been homeless, regardless of the number of moves or residential risks they reported in the past 12 months. Homeless households were ones that reported currently living on the street, in temporary housing or group home, or had spent at least one night in the past 12 months in a shelter, abandoned building, automobile or other place not meant for regular housing.

In addition to categorizing households into one of these four residential groups at Year 1 and Year 3, a combined residential group was also created based on the most severe residential category experienced in the two waves. A family who was residentially stable during Year 1 but doubled-up at Year 3, for example, would be classified as doubled-up. In order to be considered residentially stable, a family would need to meet the stable criteria for both Year 1 and Year 3. Conversely, to be put into the homeless group a family only had to report being homeless in Year 1 or Year 3.

Potential Risk and Protective Factors

Variables to be examined were selected in part based on characteristics that were found to be important in past research along with those proposed by members of an Expert Panel, convened to guide the conceptualization of the typology (a detailed meeting summary is included in Chapter 3). Demographic and background variables were examined, including the mother's age, race, and whether her first birth was as a teenager, as were several household characteristics, such as the number of children in the household and whether the mother was living with her spouse/partner, living with her own mother, or living with other adults (not including her spouse/partner). Variables were also examined that allow us to describe services used by these households, including receipt of health services, employment training, child care, and housing-related services, such as living in public housing or receiving housing assistance. Changes in health status, alcohol and substance use, and mental health have also been examined. Reports of whether the mother had recently been hit or slapped by her partner/spouse/child's father were also combined to create a measure of domestic violence. Table 3-1 provides a complete list of the variables that were examined.

Descriptive analyses, described below, were conducted with all of the variables shown in Table 5-1. Only those variables that showed substantial variation between housing groups (e.g., there were statistically significant differences between stably housed or homeless and at least two of the three other groups) or were considered important background and demographic characteristics, however, were included in the multivariate analyses.

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Descriptive Analyses and Results

Descriptive analyses were conducted with all of the variables shown in Table 5-2. These analyses were conducted to examine differences among the combined residential groups on the range of variables listed in Table 5-2. Alcohol and drug use were combined to create a single substance use variable. Several measures of mental health status — currently feeling sad or depressed, recently lost interest in hobbies/work, or recently feeling tense/anxious — were also combined into a single mental health indicator. Means, standard deviations, percentages and other descriptive statistics were computed for these variables for each residential group. The appropriate comparative analysis — chi-square, t-test — was then used to determine if the residential groups statistically differed on each of these variables. These analyses allow us to determine how these individual groups compared and contrasted.

The number of families in each residential group varies, both over time and when combined. At Year 1 and Year 3, for example, over one-third of families can be classified as residentially stable (35% and 42%) or at-risk (39% and 37%), while approximately one-fifth were doubled-up (21% and 16%) and only one-twentieth were currently or recently homeless (6% and 5%). When the two years are combined, however, the number of residentially stable families declines to only 22%. The percentage of families at-risk across both time periods increases to 41%, and Doubled-Up to 28%. The percentage of families ever homeless also increases to 8%.

The tables found in Appendix E provide the descriptive comparisons of the four combined residential groups for households at or below 50 percent of the poverty level on all key variables. The table also shows statistical differences between and among the groups.

This section provides a brief summary of these findings, highlighting the patterns of differences among the groups. First, as has been found in past studies (see Chapter 2), there were no demographic and background differences between the various residential groups. The mother's age at baseline, for example, was almost identical between the four groups (24 to 25 years old, on average), and comparable percentages of women were African-American (61% - 70%). There were also no major differences in the percentage of women with a high school degree (45% - 49%), currently attending any school or training (14% - 20%), or working (34% - 38%).

There were, however, distinguishing characteristics for each of the groups. Stable families were most distinct from all other families on a full host of health, mental health and substance use variables. Compared to each of the other groups, families who were residentially stable both years reported statistically:

• Better health
• Less alcohol use
• Less drug use
• Less smoking
• Less daily interference from drug and alcohol use
• Less depression or other mental health issues
• Less likelihood of being hit or slapped by a spouse/partner

The other area of pronounced difference between stable families and all other groups of families involved resources. Of all four groups, those stably housed were most likely to have a spouse working and have someone who could co-sign for a loan. They were least likely of all groups to receive food stamps or free food in the past year, to report going hungry, and to apply for the Earned Income Tax credit. Although there are other differences between the residentially stable groups and others, the patterns of resources and problems are the strongest and most consistent.

Among the groups, at-risk families were the least likely to have lived with their mother at any interview time point, had the fewest number of adults in the family, and were most likely to have received a housing subsidy since the baseline. Doubled-up families, not surprisingly, are the most likely of all groups to have more adults in their household. Compared to at-risk families, doubled-up families are more likely to live with their mother, less likely to have a spouse or partner working, but more likely to have another adult working in the household, and less likely to have a housing subsidy.

Homeless families, compared to all groups, are most likely to have received free food in the past year, yet also most likely to have gone hungry, least likely to have someone in their family offer a place to live or to have someone who could co-sign a loan, and most likely to report using drugs and report mental health symptoms.

These descriptive comparisons show a variety of differences between the groups, but most clearly show differences between the groups on household composition, resources and receipt of benefits, and on health, mental health, and substance use.

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Predicting Residential Stability and Homelessness

A second set of analyses were performed to answer the questions:

• What are the risk and protective factors that differentiate homeless families from all others?
• What are the risk and protective factors that differentiate residentially stable families from all others?

To answer these questions, statistical procedures (logistic regressions) were used that could test for the effects of all relevant variables at one time (rather than one at a time, as in the descriptive analyses). By looking at all variables simultaneously, it is possible to identify variables that are relatively more important in distinguishing residentially stable families from all others or those that are relatively more important in distinguishing homeless families from all others. The variables that set residentially stable families apart from others may be considered "protective" factors for homelessness and residential risk, while the factors that distinguish homeless families from all others can be considered potential "risk" factors for homelessness.

Logistic regressions were computed for Year 1 groups, Year 3 groups, and the combined residential groups. Only those variables that showed substantial variation between housing groups (e.g., there were statistically significant differences between stably housed or homeless and at least two of the three other groups) or were considered important background and demographic characteristics were included in these analyses. Each logistic model began by entering all of the variables in the model, and then removing non-significant variables⁽⁴⁾. Tables 5-4 and 5-5, which show the results from these logistic analyses, list all of the variables that were initially included in the model (e.g., non-shaded variables), but parameter estimates are only shown for those variables that were statistically significant at the .05 level in the final models.

Three models examined the factors that related to a family experiencing recent homelessness at Year 1, Year 3, and at either time-point. Three additional models examined the factors that related to a family remaining residentially stable at Year 1, Year 3, and at both time-points.

Homelessness. Table 5-3 presents the results of the three homeless models (Year 1, Year 1 and 3, and Year 3). The Nagelkerke R2 (a pseudo- R2 statistic that measures the amount of variance explained by the model) for the Year 1 and Year 1-3 models are both less than .2, indicating that neither model is doing a very good job of fitting the data. The Year 3 model has a Nagelkerke R2 of .333, however, indicating that this is a better fitting, more powerful model (closer to Cohen's definition of a medium effect).

Only one variable, income, is significant in all three models. Families with relatively higher household incomes were consistently less likely to experience homelessness, an effect that was strongest for the Year 3 model (parameter estimate of -.303).

A few variables were significant in two of the three models. Receiving housing assistance (local, state, or Federal) appears to be a protective factor. People who reported receiving housing assistance at baseline or Year 1, as well as those who obtained housing assistance during the followup period, (having a negative coefficient for the change score) were also less likely to experience homelessness.

Mental health issues, substance abuse issues, and reports of domestic violence were also somewhat related to a greater likelihood of experiencing homelessness. Finally, receipt of TANF was positively related to the likelihood of becoming homeless, but was likely a proxy for need and lack of income rather than a predictor of homelessness.

Stably Housed. The descriptive analyses showed that it was often the Stably Housed group that differed the most from the other residential groups. Table 5-4 presents models that examine factors to predict who was residentially stable at Year 1, at Year 3, as well as Year 1 AND Year 3. The overall fit of all three models is fairly consistent and low; Nagelkerke R² of .221 for the Year 1 model, .183 for the Year 3 model, and .197 for the Year 1-3 model (all would be considered small effects). Table 5-4 presents the results for the stably housed group.