Homebound: The Long-Term Rise in Time Spent at Home Among U.S. Adults
[READ IN FULL AT SOURCE, the open-access publisher PDF] Sharkey, P. (2024). 'Homebound: The Long-Term Rise in Time Spent at Home Among U.S. Adults.' Sociological Science 11, 553-578. doi:10.15195/v11.a20. SOLE AUTHOR, Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. Replication package deposited at the Harvard Dataverse. Abstract: 'from 2003 to 2022, average time spent at home among American adults has risen by one hour and 39 minutes in a typical day. Time at home has risen for every subset of the population and for virtually all activities.' Results: 'Over the full period from 2003 to 2022, average time spent at home increased by 99 minutes, roughly 10 percent of the average daily time spent at home in the baseline year of 2003.' The estimate comes from a model controlling for changing economic and demographic characteristics, and the simple weighted means for 2003 and 2022 give an identical difference, so the trend is not an artefact of a changing population. SHAPE: rising steadily from 2003 to 2019, a sharp jump in 2020, a slight decline in 2021 and 2022, so the pandemic accelerated a trend already nineteen years old. HIS LIMITATION, WHICH GOVERNS ANY USE OF THE FIGURE, verbatim: 'One major limitation of the ATUS is that the survey does not have precise questions that track the amount of time on smartphones or social media. It is plausible that the rise of time spent on social media plays an important role in explaining the rise in time spent at home as well as the shift in the location of different activities, such as socializing. More research using alternative data sources is needed to assess the relationship between smartphone use, social media use, and time spent at home.' HE ARGUES AGAINST THE SIMPLE READING IN HIS OWN VOICE, verbatim: 'The findings showing that many different types of activity are more likely to take place at home, including activities that seemingly have little to do with new technology, complicate any simple explanations focusing on the Internet or social media. Mobile phones and laptops have made it easier to use the Internet and social media outside the home, for instance, and it is not inherently the case that these technologies would mechanically lead to more time spent at home.' HIS NAMED ALTERNATIVES: fear or discomfort in public space, including the rise in gun violence since the pandemic and the long-term rise of mass shootings, and increases in the size of homes. 'It is beyond the scope of this analysis to identify the causal effect of the rise in time at home.' ALSO: work-related activity done at home rose two percentage points from 2003 to 2019 and remained 14 points higher in 2022, and education-related activity at home rose 12 points from 2003 to 2019, before the pandemic. ONE FURTHER FINDING WITH HIS OWN HEDGE ATTACHED: 'Preliminary analysis indicates that time at home is associated with lower levels of happiness and less meaning', and he says the data cannot establish whether being at home has a causal effect on wellbeing. Report it as he labelled it or not at all.
[READ IN FULL AT SOURCE, the open-access publisher PDF] Sharkey, P. (2024). 'Homebound: The Long-Term Rise in Time Spent at Home Among U.S. Adults.' Sociological Science 11, 553-578. doi:10.15195/v11.a20. SOLE AUTHOR, Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. Replication package deposited at the Harvard Dataverse. Abstract: 'from 2003 to 2022, average time spent at home among American adults has risen by one hour and 39 minutes in a typical day. Time at home has risen for every subset of the population and for virtually all activities.' Results: 'Over the full period from 2003 to 2022, average time spent at home increased by 99 minutes, roughly 10 percent of the average daily time spent at home in the baseline year of 2003.' The estimate comes from a model controlling for changing economic and demographic characteristics, and the simple weighted means for 2003 and 2022 give an identical difference, so the trend is not an artefact of a changing population. SHAPE: rising steadily from 2003 to 2019, a sharp jump in 2020, a slight decline in 2021 and 2022, so the pandemic accelerated a trend already nineteen years old. HIS LIMITATION, WHICH GOVERNS ANY USE OF THE FIGURE, verbatim: 'One major limitation of the ATUS is that the survey does not have precise questions that track the amount of time on smartphones or social media. It is plausible that the rise of time spent on social media plays an important role in explaining the rise in time spent at home as well as the shift in the location of different activities, such as socializing. More research using alternative data sources is needed to assess the relationship between smartphone use, social media use, and time spent at home.' HE ARGUES AGAINST THE SIMPLE READING IN HIS OWN VOICE, verbatim: 'The findings showing that many different types of activity are more likely to take place at home, including activities that seemingly have little to do with new technology, complicate any simple explanations focusing on the Internet or social media. Mobile phones and laptops have made it easier to use the Internet and social media outside the home, for instance, and it is not inherently the case that these technologies would mechanically lead to more time spent at home.' HIS NAMED ALTERNATIVES: fear or discomfort in public space, including the rise in gun violence since the pandemic and the long-term rise of mass shootings, and increases in the size of homes. 'It is beyond the scope of this analysis to identify the causal effect of the rise in time at home.' ALSO: work-related activity done at home rose two percentage points from 2003 to 2019 and remained 14 points higher in 2022, and education-related activity at home rose 12 points from 2003 to 2019, before the pandemic. ONE FURTHER FINDING WITH HIS OWN HEDGE ATTACHED: 'Preliminary analysis indicates that time at home is associated with lower levels of happiness and less meaning', and he says the data cannot establish whether being at home has a causal effect on wellbeing. Report it as he labelled it or not at all.
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Sharkey, P. (2024). Homebound: The Long-Term Rise in Time Spent at Home Among U.S. Adults. Sociological Science, 11, 553-578. doi:10.15195/v11.a20