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Temporary youth mobility: motivations and benefits from a life-course perspective

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posted on 2021-10-06, 16:40 authored by Lucas Haldimann, Marieke Heers, Brian Kleiner, Patrick Rérat

Temporary mobility experiences, such as linguistic stays, volunteering, or backpacking have become popular among young adults. This article takes a life-course perspective to understand young adults’ motivations for becoming temporarily mobile, as well as the perceived benefits. We analyse data from an almost entire cohort of Swiss men (N = 40,503) and a representative sample of 2,000 young women. First, we provide a descriptive analysis of young adults’ motivations for and perceived benefits of temporary mobility. Second, we focus on the young men and establish a typology of motivations, revealing utilitarian, hedonistic, and opportunistic dimensions. Three groups of young adults with different motivations and perceived benefits are identified: the Professionals, the Curious, and the Pragmatic. Our results highlight that motivations relate to young adults’ life-course trajectories and vary mainly according to previously accumulated mobility capital. Many young adults with low mobility capital seek to accumulate it in order to gain professional advantage.

Funding

This work was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation under Grant Nr. 100017_165726.

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