Testing a Behavioural and a Developmental Model of Migration: A Reevaluation of Migration Patterns among the Elderly and Why Older People Move

Abstract

The author examines the types of relocation made by older people in six rural Welsh communities over sixteen years. By analysing data from the Bangor Longitudinal Study of Ageing (BLSA) she tests the proposition that two of the typologies that have been used to categorise older people's moves are not supported by empirical evidence from the BLSA. It is hypothesised that the best-fitting model has a greater number of types of move than the three proposed by Litwak and Longino in their behavioural model, but fewer than the eight suggested by Wiseman in his developmental model. By using latent class analysis the author develops a classification of types of move from the relationships between combinations of observable factors. Probabilistic equations are devised to give the relationship of factors to each other, and a set of theoretical statements are formulated to describe each category of migration. The two aforementioned models are rejected in favour of a five-class model in which moves are classified as long-distance amenity, wide-choice local amenity, narrow-choice local amenity, low levels of assistance, and high levels of assistance.