ABSTRACT
This chapter explores domestic transitions in the broader relational sense, through focusing on negotiations of intimacy amongst single young people in their twenties and early thirties. It considers the debates on the transformation of intimacy in the context of 'the second demographic shift'. The chapter explores the housing experiences of four single young people, all of whom were involved in recent research on non-student shared household living. It draws on the work of Beck and Giddens, whose writings on risk and individualisation have been widely debated within the context of transitions from school-to-work. The chapter focuses on the networks of intimacy of a group of single young people whose status as independent adults is often perceived as being particularly ambiguous. It uses the term 'intimate relationships' to describe relationships characterized by a level of disclosure: 'an intimacy of the self rather than an intimacy of the body, although the completeness of intimacy of self may be enhanced by bodily intimacy'.
