Moving, or residential relocation, occurs frequently in childhood and adolescence as well as in adulthood, yet little scientific consensus exists on its impact upon health outcomes. This paper summarises the available literature on this broad topic and explores the currently known factors of importance surrounding residential relocation. There is already evidence to support an increased risk of suicidal ideation, psychiatric disorders including substance use disorders, functional impairments and future general medical health impairments in children, adolescents and adults with histories of residential relocation. Intrapersonal factors, such as personality type and the availability of coping skills, as well as interpersonal factors, such as family composition and system strengths, attenuate risk and are integral to additionally assess. While there is support for the contribution of residential relocation in the onset of youth psychopathology that warrant consideration of residential relocation in the standard assessment of a patient, further studies are needed to better explore this factor in select populations.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.