“Boomeranging” is a term used to describe the situation whereby a post-secondary student leaves their parents’ home only to return later, signifying a reversal in the transition to adulthood. According to Houle and Warner, 2017, some of the most recent statistics on young adults pursuing higher learning are indicating higher levels of boomeranging when compared with previous generations. Accordingly, there has been a substantial amount of hypothesizing that has questioned the causal mechanisms that may underlie this trend. Broadly speaking, academics have considered boomeranging’s connection to the students’ post-secondary education experiences.
More specifically, previous work has considered the link between student debt and boomeranging.
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In one sense, the NLSY-97 is an effective study for the researchers to use due to its longitudinal nature. Within the social sciences, longitudinal studies are infrequent in general, due to their time intensive and money intensive nature (4.1 slide 8). Just like a cross sectional design, a longitudinal design finds strength in its ability to measure correlations and possess external validity. However, the element that makes a longitudinal design objectively better than a cross sectional design is that these types of studies can be used to establish the temporal precedence of events, which means a longitudinal study can carry a higher degree of internal validity. For example, with the longitudinal design, Houle and Warner will be able to truly show whether a students’ failure to complete their college degree precedes the event of boomeranging. By comparison, with a cross sectional design, it is impossible to determine which variable occurs first. Therefore, based on the results of their longitudinal study, Houle and Warner will be able make claims and arguments with some more …show more content…
Based on the fact that the youths are being studied, they may change their behaviour between studies and adjust their answers to make them more consistent with what they believe is the researcher’s intended goal. Certain questions, particularly the ones regarding student debt on the NLSY-97, could lead to the students shifting their answers over time. With regard to the debt-related questions, the students may simply have difficulty recalling information regarding their debt level. As well, if they have a high debt level, perhaps they will be dishonest about their answers because they do not want to feel stigmatized or socially undesirable. This is a fundamental issue with self-report studies that should be taken into