Is there a relation between residential mobility and well-being among elderly people?

Kræn Blume, June 2005

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As people become older they experience both positive and negative age-related impacts on subjective well-being. One response to an age-related change in well-being may be to change residence.

Investigation of this potential relation between well-being and residential mobility is the main topic of the present paper, where subjective well-being is defined along five dimensions: feeling out of sorts, worried, depressed, afraid and/or lonely. The analysis carried out exploits the richness of both survey data and data originating from Danish administrative registers as they are combined in the Longitudinal Study of Elderly People (LSEP). The data cover the period 1997-2002. By estimating models for changes in the well-being among 4,496 elderly people in Denmark, the relation between well-being and residential mobility is investigated. The analysis reveals a positive relation between well-being and residential mobility. Especially changing residence to a cheaper residence or to a residence closer to family members has a positive impact. Furthermore, negative impacts on well-being from other factors are reduced as they coincide with a change of residence. The analysis also shows that deteriorating health, reduced activity of daily living and being recently widowed all have a negative impact on the well-being.

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