The Transition of Young People in a Transitional Society: The Case of Serbia

Attitudes on transition to adulthood among young people in Serbia

“…In two earlier papers (Tomanovic, Ignjatovic 2004;2006), we aimed at understanding the practical side of transition (timings, synchronization of life events, etc. ), and we used median ages of passing the life events (such as getting married, getting a job, etc.)…”

“…There are many possible reasons for that: fear of solitude, traditional pattern of gaining independence through transition to family of orientation, and finally, they might be rationalizing the reality which does not ----13 See S. Tomanovic and S.Ignjatovic (2004;2006) on pace of gaining independence: young people in Serbia become independent much later than young Europeans, for cultural, social and psychological reasons.…”

“…This distribution reflects an objective reality: 77% of younger (17-24), 64% of middle (25-30) and 41% of older (31-35) respondents live in their parents' home. Also, half of young families of orientation live in joint households with their parents, while the majority of unmarried young people live with their parents even in the oldest age group (Tomanovic, Ignjatovic 2004;2006). Young people from all three generations underline "marriage"/"living with a partner" as an important prerequisite for autonomy (the older the respondents, the strongest their affiliation to marriage and cohabitation).…”

“…The rare exception is research on attitudes on particular domains of adulthood, such as marriage and parenthood (Blagojević 1988;1993a;1993b). Since we explored the transition to ---- 10 Galland also refers to desynchronization of path to adulthood in his study of young people in France (Galland 2001) adulthood in detail in the CPA survey (Tomanovic, Ignjatovic 2004;2006), it is our intention in this article to set, by using data available from that survey, an explanatory basis for the future in-depth study on young people's constructions of adulthood.…”

“…Our study of young people's transition in Serbia documented that even the most basic marker of transition -gaining independence from parents, is fairly undeveloped (Tomanovic, Ignjatovic 2004;2006). Structural features, notably those that are contextual, still have a considerable impact on shaping young people's biographies.…”