Shannon Yospa is one of the lucky ones.

After living on her own for a year after college, she's joining the ranks of the roughly 4 million Americans between the ages of 23 and 34 who have moved back to their parents' homes. But unlike many of her fellow "boomerangers," as the media have called them, she has a father who realizes he and his wife aren't gaining a daughter, they're gaining an adult roommate. And he had the wherewithal to do something about it.

Martin Yospa knows that Shannon needs her privacy -- as do her parents -- so he's renovated the basement of his Owings Mills house for his daughter.

"Even though her old bedroom is still there, I thought that was a bit much," he says. The only house rule is that if she's not coming home she'll leave a message for her parents so they won't worry about her.

In a recent article News-week labeled young men and women who have moved back home "adultolescents," a term as awkward as the situation itself can be for everyone involved.

Before the 20th century the phenomenon was so common as not to be noteworthy; but in the course of the last century, Americans came to value autonomy. After World War II, the expansion of housing and new education benefits stimulated early marriage; children left home at a young age and for the most part permanently. In the '60s and '70s the median age of marriage started to rise again, to today's all-time high of roughly 27 for men and 25 for women, says Frank Furstenberg, a sociologist who directs a MacArthur Foundation project studying the transition into adulthood.

"There's a later passage to adulthood," he says, "and at the same time it's less orderly. There's more moving in and out" as young people go back to school -- increasingly necessary these days -- and try out entry-

level jobs before settling on a career. Good jobs are scarce, and housing is expensive.

The return to the nest has been in the news lately, partly because it's the time of year when college students are graduating, partly because of a recent survey by job-search Web site Monster.com. In the survey, more than half of the 1,600 college students polled planned to move home after college. Not a huge sampling, but enough to startle baby boomer parents who had been thinking about turning their child's bedroom into a study.

True, many of them still love rock 'n' roll, shop at the Banana Republic, and think of their children as friends. They plan to welcome their kids with open arms.

"We're thrilled," says Sandy Crosier of Annapolis, whose daughter, Jennifer, moved home after college even though she had a job as a teacher. "We know the time will come when she'll leave, and that will be OK too."

But when reality sets in, some parents may find they have an adult on their hands who still wants Mom to cook his meals and do his laundry. The child, used to being independent, may resent being asked to account for his comings and goings. These young adults have sometimes been portrayed as coddled youngsters content to move back to the nest with no social stigma attached. For many of them, this simply isn't true.

"My dad was very supportive when I came home, but he was as ready for me to leave as I was when I did," says Stephanie Langsam, who lived with her father for about a year after college. (Her mother had died two years before.)

The most difficult part, she says, was feeling like a teen-ager again. "I was falling back into old patterns. I felt like I didn't have the freedom I had in college."

She and her father are still close; but if she had to do it again, she'd sit down with him and go over the house rules. She'd be clearer about what she needed and what her boundaries were. Parents, too, she thinks, should take the opportunity early on to voice their expectations and concerns.

Falling back into old, immature patterns is a danger for everyone involved, say the experts. There's a gap between where these young adults think they should be and where they are, points out Terri Apter, author of The Myth of Maturity (W. W. Norton, 2001). They can feel humiliated, both in relation to their parents and to their friends.

"Little comments like 'Where are you going?' have a very long history," she says. "Mom can say it as she would a friend, but the 'thresholder' " -- as Apter calls young adults -- "hears it differently, and feels like he did when he was 15."

Because of the weight of the past, some young adults report they find it more difficult to be self-motivated at home, which leads to parental nagging. The children, of course, hate to be nagged; it reminds them that they're grown-ups living like kids.

As for the parents, they usually like having their children at home again -- probably more than the adult child likes being back. But there are drawbacks they might not be prepared for (such as food disappearing from the fridge and a general increase of noise in the house).

The biggest problem, Apter says, can be with a stepparents, who have found that when the child left the first time, they had a chance to interact more with their spouse as a couple. Even loving stepparents may wonder why family resources are still going to a grown kid who isn't theirs.

Parents may also worry that something's wrong with their child if he can't find a job that would allow him to live independently -- or that there's something wrong with the way they've brought him up.

"Both parents and kids have to realize it's part of a trend," says Apter, "not a personal failure."

In today's economy, it's not unlikely that college grads will have trouble getting more than a modestly paying job -- if they get one at all. Now a real estate analyst living in Falls Church, Va., Steve Swiecicki spent about three months looking for work around his college before he finally returned to his parents' home in Baltimore. He quickly found that his college habits, such as staying up till 2 a.m. watching TV, weren't going to cut it at home.

"With roommates at school I didn't have to be the most courteous person in the world," he says, adding that although it depends on the flexibility of the parents, "ultimately it's their house and the better you get along, the easier it is to transition out when you get a job."

Parents who have been paying the college bills for the last four years may not think of their kids as independent, but they should realize that their kids do. Because he was so used to working on his own, Swiecicki, 25, says, it was hard for him to take advice when he moved back home, even when it was constructive.

"But once you get out there, and the real world kicks you in the butt," he adds with a laugh, "You begin to think, 'Mmm, it wasn't so bad at home after all.' "

Saul Lindenbaum, an Owings Mills psychologist who specializes in children and families, says that when the situation has come up in his practice, it takes care of itself if family members are courteous, respectful, and considerate of each other. The parents can say, "If I'm three hours late, I don't have to tell you, but I will, or you'd be worried. I'll do that. You don't have to report, but I hope you will."

"Ninety-five percent of the time that takes care of it," Lindenbaum says. "Nobody's giving orders."

He believes that the family should sit down and figure out what they expect from each other -- a "contract," even if it's not written down. Everyone should contribute in some way, not necessarily financial.

And because it is the parents' house, he feels, they should be able to make some rules, such as no smoking.

Shannon Yospa agrees. After all, she's not going to have to pay rent for her new digs in the basement of her parents' home. And she's talked her stepmother, who's afraid of cats, into letting her keep hers.

There is a tradeoff. "I've been on my own for five years, and I'm used to coming and going as I please," she says. "But they want to know where I'll be. I'm under their roof, and I have to respect them."

Ground rules

Here's a checklist for both parents and children to consider if young adults are returning home:

* Even in the best situation, parents will have to fight the urge to treat the young adult as a minor child.

* Conversely, the grown child may have the tendency to start acting like a rebellious adolescent again.

* Set the house rules before there's an emotional explosion.

* The child should make clear what his boundaries are.

* Negotiate the young adult's contributions to the household, either financial or in terms of sharing the work load.

* Parents should offer advice instead of telling the adult child what to do.

* Better still, don't give advice.

* Don't forget financial considerations, such as adding the adult child to the car insurance policy and working out health insurance.

* And finally, remember what author Terri Apter says: "Sometimes it's surprising to parents how much the young adult needs their faith in the person the kid will become."

-- Elizabeth Large