This publication introduces the special collection in Demographic Research titled ‘Spatial Mobility, Family Dynamics and Gender Relations,’ organized by Guest Editors Sergi Vidal (Centre for Demographic Studies, Barcelona) and Johannes Huinink (University of Bremen).
The special collection addresses relevant intersections across three interrelated areas – spatial mobility, family life courses and contexts, and gender relations. It combines new research perspectives that extend our existing horizons through rigorous and innovative empirical studies. Conceptually, these contributions extend the dominant approaches that focus on nuclear families and household members to incorporate non-coresident family ties into spatial mobility research. The research papers offer new evidence on the role of gender in family migration decision-making processes. They also offer insights into the spatial constraints on women and the commuting behaviour of family households as well as the nonlabour market outcomes of family relocations for men and women. Insights from these studies not only clarify concrete associations, but also offer roadmaps for revealing the mechanisms that explain them.
Altogether, contributions to this special collection highlight the importance of putting family and gender centre stage in spatial mobility research.
Sergi Vidal 