For decades, the share of U.Southward. children living with a unmarried parent has been rise, accompanied by a decline in marriage rates and a ascent in births exterior of marriage. A new Pew Research Center study of 130 countries and territories shows that the U.S. has the world's highest rate of children living in single-parent households.

Most a quarter of U.S. children under the age of xviii live with one parent and no other adults (23%), more than than 3 times the share of children effectually the world who do so (vii%). The study, which analyzed how people's living arrangements differ by organized religion, also constitute that U.South. children from Christian and religiously unaffiliated families are about equally likely to live in this type of arrangement.

In comparison, 3% of children in People's republic of china, 4% of children in Nigeria and 5% of children in India live in single-parent households. In neighboring Canada, the share is xv%.

About a quarter of U.S. children live in single-parent homes, more than in any other country

While U.S. children are more likely than children elsewhere to live in single-parent households, they're much less likely to alive in extended families. In the U.S., 8% of children live with relatives such every bit aunts and grandparents, compared with 38% of children globally.

Researchers have dissimilar ways of categorizing single-parent households. In this written report, single-parent households have a sole adult living with at least one biological, pace or foster child under historic period 18. Some other organizations, including the U.South Demography Bureau, also include households that take grandparents, other relatives or cohabiting partners present.

Economic well-being a factor in household size

Effectually the world, living in extended families is linked with lower levels of economical development: Financial resource stretch further and domestic chores such equally childcare are more easily accomplished when shared amidst several adults living together.

The U.S., like other economically advanced countries, specially in Europe and northern Asia, has relatively small households overall. The average person in the U.S. lives in a habitation of three.4 people – which is less than the global boilerplate of 4.ix, but slightly higher than the European average of 3.1. In the U.Due south., Christians (3.4), the unaffiliated (3.2) and Jews (three.0) live with roughly the same number of household members.

However, household sizes vary by age – the average U.Due south. kid under 18 lives in a household of 4.6 members, while the average adult age 60 or older merely lives with 1 other person.

In early adulthood, Americans proceed to alive with their parents at relatively high rates. Developed child households business relationship for 20% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 34. (Adult child households are defined as at least ane parent living with one son or daughter 18 or older and no minor children or other family members.) Young adults in the U.Due south. are like to their Canadian counterparts in this regard, and North America has a higher share of young adults who alive in this arrangement than any other region.

U.Southward. differs in living arrangements for older adults

Americans too differ from others around in the world in their living arrangements afterward historic period sixty. Older adults in the U.S. are more likely than those around the world to age alone: More than a quarter of Americans ages threescore and older live lone (27%), compared with a global average of 16%. There are only fourteen countries with higher shares of older adults living lonely, and all are in Europe. They include Lithuania (41%), Denmark (39%) and Republic of hungary (37%).

The near common system for older U.Due south. adults, however, is to live as a couple without whatsoever other children or relatives. Almost one-half of U.S. adults ages 60 and older live in such households (46%), compared with a global average of 31%. Conversely, older Americans are much less likely to alive with a wider circumvolve of relatives. Just 6% of older U.South. adults live in extended-family households, compared with 38% of adults ages lx and older globally.

Globally, 38% live in extended-family homes, but in the U.S. only 11% do

Living in smaller households after age 60 is often tied to national rates of economic prosperity and life expectancy. Older adults are more likely to alive lone or as couples in countries where an average person tin look to live more than seventy years. In countries where lives are shorter, adults 60 and older tend to live with other family members instead. Life expectancy is often linked to other markers of prosperity within a land, so older adults who can await to live into their 80s likewise tend to alive in countries where living alone is more than affordable.

And in countries where governments provide fewer retirement benefits or other safe nets, families often face greater responsibility to support aging relatives. Cultural norms as well play a role, and, in many parts of the world, it is expected that adult children will care for their aging parents.

Despite these many differences, U.S. household patterns are also like to those in other countries in some means, and a few of these commonalities are tied to gender.

Women ages 35 to 59 in the U.S., for case, are more probable than men in the same age group to live equally single parents (9% vs. 2%), a pattern mirrored in every region and religious grouping effectually the world.

And women, on boilerplate, are younger than their husbands or male person cohabiting partners in every country analyzed. That age gap is 2.2 years in the U.S. and in the rest of the world ranges from 2 years in the Czech Republic to fourteen.v years in Gambia. Within the U.S., Jewish partners are closest in age, with only one yr between them, while Christians and the unaffiliated have an equal gap (2.2 years).

Coupled with women'due south longer life expectancy, this tendency helps explain some of the differences in how older men and women in the U.Southward. live.

More than half of U.South. men ages 60 and older (55%) live with a partner and no ane else, while roughly four-in-10 women (39%) exercise. And nigh a third of women ages 60 and older live lonely (32%), while this is true of one-in-five men in the aforementioned age grouping (20%).

Note: Come across full methodology.

Stephanie Kramer is a senior researcher focusing on religion at Pew Research Center.