Edging out of the nest: Emerging adults' use of smartphones in maintaining and transforming family relationships

Caroline Marchant, Stephanie O'Donohoe

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The transition to adulthood, often accompanied by an emptying of the family nest, has implications for family relationships, identities and consumption practices. Despite this, the voices and experiences of emerging adults are largely missing from the literature on family consumption. Emerging adult families typically combine digital natives and digital immigrants, but little is known about how their interactions around digital communications technology relate to emerging adult preoccupations with affiliation and autonomy. This interpretive study explores how emerging adults' smartphones are bound up with a complex network of family communication and consumption practices, often across household, geographic and generational boundaries. Affiliation and autonomy emerged as intertwined rather than competing dimensions of participants' smartphone use, contributing to the distribution and development of family as the nest empties.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1554-1576
Number of pages22
JournalJournal of Marketing Management
Volume30
Issue number15-16
Early online date22 Jul 2014
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 3 Nov 2014

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

  • emerging adults
  • family relationships
  • smartphones
  • consumption
  • life-course transitions
  • affinity/autonomy

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