When Your Grown Children Live Abroad

More and more grown children move abroad for study or work, leaving their parents, often in their fifties and early sixties, in a quieter home with the children in another time zone. A new study has looked at loneliness among these parents, and at something quite ordinary that can fill the evenings: watching one series after another.

When evening hours no longer overlap

Imagine, purely as an example, a parent in India whose son lives in Germany. Dinner is over and the kitchen is reasonably sorted out, so this would be a good time to sit down and talk, except that the son is still at work and can't stop just because the evening has begun at home.

Calling later might suit him better. By then, though, the parent may be getting ready for bed, and what could have been a leisurely conversation becomes a quick exchange before someone has to go.

With a daughter in Canada, finding that convenient moment may take a different arrangement again. Depending on where she lives, an evening in India may overlap with her working day. Both people can want to talk and still have trouble finding the time.

There are messages, of course. A photograph arrives, perhaps a little update or a question about something at home. It's good to hear from them, but reading a message doesn't take up much of an evening.

There's a series to finish, and once an episode ends the next one is available. Perhaps a call will come later, so it seems sensible to stay put, and anyway, there isn't anything else particularly pressing to do. Another episode starts.

An evening can pass quite pleasantly like this. When the next evening looks much the same, and the one after that too, it becomes easier to see why researchers might be interested in what fills these hours.

What the study found

The Hindu, a national newspaper in India, reported on a small, exploratory study by NIMHANS, the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences in Bengaluru, India. Researchers studied 64 parents aged 45 to 65 whose grown children had emigrated and lived away from home for at least two years. More than half had been in this “empty-nest” phase for over five years. You can read the newspaper report here.

Published in BMC Research Notes, a peer-reviewed scientific journal, the study linked loneliness with more psychological distress, more difficulty managing emotions and “problematic series watching”, meaning excessive or difficult-to-control viewing that interferes with everyday life. Twenty-two parents were in the higher-loneliness group. Mothers reported significantly more loneliness and distress than fathers.

Was watching a way of getting through the quiet? The researchers hadn't asked why people watched. Manoj Kumar Sharma, a professor of clinical psychology at NIMHANS, cautioned that the study measured these things at one point in time, so it couldn't establish cause or direction.

The long middle years of distance

During the Mature Middle-Aged Adult years, from 55 to 60, children may be settling abroad while parents are working or approaching retirement. These arrangements could be part of daily life for a long time.

Perhaps someone nearby could come over for dinner, or there could be a regular reason to go out, although how easily that happens will depend on friendships, mobility, the marriage and what is available close to home. The study's authors suggest strengthening social connections, but finding company on an ordinary weekday takes some working out.

Sources

• The Hindu (Indian national newspaper), report on NIMHANS study in BMC Research Notes