




































AUSTRALIAN POPULATION STUDIES  2019 | Volume 3 | Issue 1 | pages 1-12 

 

 

© Parr 2019. Published under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial licence 3.0 Australia  
(CC BY-NC 3.0 AU). Journal website: www.australianpopulationstudies.org 

 

Understanding the motivations for 
return migration in Australia 

Angélique Parr*  The University of Queensland 

* Email: angelique.parr@uqconnect.edu.au. Address: PO Box 77, Drummoyne, NSW 1470 

Paper received 15 February 2019; accepted 19 May 2019; published 27 May 2019 

Abstract 

Background  

Return migration is often overlooked by traditional analyses of internal migration. Why people return 

has received even less scrutiny. Relatively few migrants make a return move, so there is clearly 

something noteworthy about these people and their circumstances that trigger such a move. 

Aims 

This paper explores why people make return moves in Australia. 

Data and methods 

Migration histories were collected using semi-structured in-depth interviews; content analysis of 

interview transcripts was undertaken. 

Results 

People return for a wider range of reasons than is indicated by neoclassical economic theory. Some 

of the moves are linked to significant life events such as post-school education and employment. 

Returns also occur for less tangible factors such as amenity and climate, connections to family, 

friends and the extent to which a place “feels like home” are equally important. 

Conclusions 

A broader explanatory framework is required to explain why people return. The integration of 

migrant stories into more traditional migration analyses enriches the story of internal migration. 

Key words 

Internal migration; return migration; motivations; Australia. 

 

  

http://www.australianpopulationstudies.org/
mailto:angelique.parr@uqconnect.edu.au


2 Parr Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 

 

1. Introduction  

Australia’s internal migration system is complex, comprising many types of moves over differing spatial 

and temporal scales. One type of move that is usually overlooked by traditional analyses is that of 

return migration. It is the event where people who moved to a new place of residence return to live at 

their former home or region at a later date (Bell and Hugo 2000). In some contexts it can be better 

conceptualised as part of circular migration rather than a discrete form of migration in its own right. 

Return migration acts as a counterbalance to the dominant direction of migration flows between areas, 

and previous research has established that return migrants are a distinctly different group compared 

with other migrants in terms of both their demographic character and motives for moving (Da Vanzo 

and Morrison 1981; Long 1988; Newbold and Liaw 1990). Our understanding of return migration is 

bound by the data used to observe it. In Australia this is the census, and returns to a previous place of 

residence are observed over the five-year intercensal period. But returns may occur after an absence 

almost as long as a life span. While the use of geo-political boundaries can obscure its true spatial 

extent, migration must cover a sufficiently large distance to change the activity space within which a 

person functions on a daily basis (Boyle et al. 1998; Parr 2018). 

Five dimensions (intensity, who moves, where, when and why) are recognised as fundamental 

perspectives in migration studies (Bell 1992; Long 1988), but one dimension, ‘why people move’, has 

received far less scrutiny than the other four. Given that relatively few migrants make a return move 

(Bell 1996a; Parr 2018), there is clearly something noteworthy about such individuals and the specifics 

of their circumstances that trigger such a move. Drawing on the results of a recently completed analysis 

of return migration in Australia (Parr 2018), this paper begins to fill out the missing “why” in the return 

migration story.  

The paper begins with a summary of recent research on the motivations for return migration. It then 

outlines the explanatory framework, the dataset and methods used in the analysis. The body of the 

paper recounts the stories of a group of Australian residents who have made return moves. The paper 

concludes with a brief discussion of the implications of the findings for both migration theory and 

methods. 

2. Background 

Substantial insight into the motivations for return has derived from studies of international 

migration, particularly the movement of labour migrants (Lidgard and Gilson 2002; Reagan and Olsen 

2000; Stalker 1994). Comparatively little has been written in relation to internal migration, although 

the reasons for international and internal returns appear to have many similarities. King (1996) found 

there are many reasons, which change over the life course. A Swedish study looking at people who 

returned to rural areas where they grew up is the most comprehensive so far (Amcoff and Niedomysl 

2013; Niedomysl and Amcoff 2010). Return migrants were more likely to report social reasons for 

moving than reasons related to employment or education. Moving close to friends was important for 

divorcees and people returning to sparsely populated areas. Studies of the impact of out-migration 

from rural Scotland found that people return for a range of personal and employment-related 

reasons (Stockdale 2002, 2006). Other work reveals a multiplicity of motivations to return, with social 

connections a major factor (Alexander 2005; Bijker et al. 2012; Stockdale 2006; Wang and Fan 2006). 



Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 Parr 3 

 

 

An Australian study of young people who returned to Tasmania noted the importance of lifestyle and 

being close to family (Easthope 2006). Having a sense of community and belonging, or ‘a place to call 

home’ appears to influence the decision to return (Stockdale 2002). 

Return moves may be linked to significant life events. In this paper such events are categorised into 

four types: economic, education, family-related and ageing. But if life events alone are responsible, 

the probability of returning would be considerably higher than is observed in Australia (Parr 2018). 

The reasons for return must therefore be much broader in scope than those offered by the 

traditional neoclassical framework, which has been criticised for not adequately explaining the 

reasons for internal migration (Long 1991). They may range from macro-scale social, political and 

economic forces to micro-scale individual behaviour and preferences. The emphasis here is to gain 

an understanding of the motivations of the individual migrant, which can change over the life course 

(Jeffery and Murison 2011; King 1996; Lundholm et al. 2004). 

This study draws upon four explanatory frameworks to understand the motivations for return. A life 

course perspective has been combined with Lee’s push–pull model (Lee 1966), Wolpert’s (1965) 

place utility model and Faist’s (2000) theory of meso-scale factors to argue that significant life 

events, in combination with other factors, will result in return migration. People tend to migrate to 

familiar places (Boyle et al. 1998 p. 64) and the personal ties, familial ties and social networks that 

connect a migrant in some way to a place where they have lived in the past will have an additional 

strong pull (Mulder and Malmberg 2014). This paper proposes that such meso-scale considerations 

are just as important as other factors in explaining the selective nature of return migration. They 

create connections or moorings that act more strongly to draw a migrant back to a previous place of 

residence than other factors that would have them move to a new location. 

3. Data and Methods 

Motivational factors associated with internal migration are seldom captured in traditional data 

sources (Stillwell and Garcia Coll 2000). In particular, Bell (1995) pointed to the lack of information 

about why people move as a major deficiency of Australia’s census. Most previous studies of return 

migration have inferred the reasons from migrant characteristics (Bell 1996b; Currie and Hallie 1988; 

Long 1988) and it is only recently that research has begun to look at this directly. Understanding 

more about the motivations for return migration can only be achieved by looking elsewhere to 

alternate data sources. This study has taken an important step by using detailed migration histories 

to examine this issue directly.  

Qualitative research methodologies that study human behaviour and the social world are used to 

understand why people move. This paper reports on information from the migration histories of 22 

people who returned to a former place of residence from elsewhere in Australia. Applying a 

purposive sampling approach, the study participants were recruited from the 50+ registry of the 

Ageing Mind Initiative at the University of Queensland, and networks at the New South Wales 

Department of Planning and Environment. Eligible participants had changed residence in Australia at 

least twice, with one of these moves being a return to a place they had lived in sometime in the past. 

No constraint was placed on the type of place to which they returned, such as the participant’s place 

of birth or where they grew up. But any change of residence had to be of at least six months’ 



4 Parr Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 

 

duration and across a sufficiently large distance to alter the spatial patterns of the participant’s day-

to-day life. The size of the study group ensured that the diverse range of behaviours and underlying 

motivations would be revealed from the migration histories. This group was not selected as a 

representative sample of return migrants in Australia. 

Detailed migration histories and associated stories about people’s lives were collected using a semi-

structured questionnaire. Participants recounted the places they had lived in from birth to the time 

of the interview, and the life events or other circumstances associated with any moves. As an aide 

memoire, a life grid (Bell 2005) was concurrently used during each interview to create a written 

record of information provided. A content analysis of the interviews revealed the migration pathways 

of these people, a wealth of information about the life events linked with these moves, and the 

underlying motivations as recounted in the migrant’s own words. Information from the interviews 

was indexed and categorised to identify both similarities and differences. This did not follow a pre-

set coding frame, but one that was developed while reviewing the transcripts (Flowerdew and Martin 

2005). The study group ranged in age between 25 and 88 years and lived throughout Australia, 

including metropolitan regions and smaller towns (see Figure 1). Up until the time of the interviews, 

the 22 migrants had made more than 230 moves in total, including 55 returns. 

 

 

Figure 1: Reference map of places where study participants lived at the time of interview 

Source: the author 

  



Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 Parr 5 

 

 

4. Results: reasons why people return 

The migration histories used in this study revealed the complex nature of human mobility and the 

extent to which changes of residence affected, or conversely were influenced by events, people and 

places. The names of all participants cited here have been changed to maintain anonymity; their age 

given in the text was as at the time of the interview. 

Economic Factors 

Family and economic factors were the most frequently stated reasons for return. Economic factors 

related mainly to employment, but employment was seldom the only reason for a return move – 

multiple reasons could be identified. A job often facilitated the return, rather than being the key 

reason for it and often explained a considerable time lag between the decision to move, and the 

actual return. 

Transfers with the same employer facilitate returns. William, now 58 years old, moved frequently 

with his job in the armed forces to military bases scattered across Australia. His employer had an 

expectation that staff would move about every couple of years, sometimes returning to a previous 

posting. Natalie was one of the more mobile young people interviewed. She moved several times 

between Melbourne and Canberra, with the first return to Canberra occurring after graduation. She 

found work using networks:  

‘I had a casual job when I was studying and basically, I just walked straight back into that. So, 

I made sure I had that before I moved back and just moved back into the job. So, I guess it 

wasn’t [about going] back … unemployed and looking for a job. I went back to that casual job 

and then started looking for a permanent job when I got back there.’ (Natalie, 33) 

Previous research concluded that return migrants were often unemployed (Morrison and Da Vanzo 

1986). This was not evident from the interviews undertaken for this study. Being unemployed may 

have contributed to the decision to return, but people were seldom unemployed when they moved; 

many had already found a job. 

Housing was another economic factor, especially for younger participants. Natalie’s recent move 

back to Melbourne had motives other than a job transfer: 

‘I had planned to get into the property market for a while. I’d wanted to buy a house and it 

was a bit out of my reach in Canberra, whereas Melbourne offered quite more options in 

that respect. So that was, I guess, my main motivation.’ (Natalie, 33) 

Economic necessity has forced some people to return. Melanie was a young professional living in 

Sydney who moved home in her mid-thirties because:  

‘ … I was pregnant … There was no maternity leave. … There was no income going to be 

coming in, so … no way of supporting myself. I’m a single mum. So, it wasn’t planned [that I] 

move home with Mum and Dad at 38. That’s the last thing I wanted to do ... [but] I need their 

support at this point in time with babysitting and everything.’ (Melanie, 41) 



6 Parr Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 

 

Family-related 

A variety of family-related reasons featured strongly in the decision to return. Naomi returned to 

Melbourne with her husband after several years in Brisbane because:  

‘… we were at the point in our life where we were starting to think about having kids. And we 

decided that it would be best to be around family … for the support network. … The only 

thing that would have kept us [in Brisbane] would have been if my mum and dad had moved 

up.’ (Naomi, 33) 

Faye grew up in regional Victoria and moved numerous times. Her first return to Ballarat was at the 

age of 35 with her young family, because of her ageing parents. 

‘We needed to be closer to them ... They came and looked at some places [in Melbourne] but 

they didn't want to come. They didn't want to move.’ (Faye, 82) 

Returns have also taken place because people missed family and wanted to see them more often, or 

as in the case of Ellen, because they were homesick. 

‘I came back to Melbourne because I was really homesick. I didn't really adjust to Sydney 

very well … A lot of bullying, a lot of hostility, it was quite bizarre.’ (Ellen, 48) 

Education 

The third dimension, education, was a contributing factor when people returned as younger adults. 

Ellen first left Melbourne aged 20 to follow a boyfriend to Sydney but returned a few years later to 

start a writing course at Deakin University. Thelma left Brisbane in her early twenties to attend Bible 

College in Melbourne but returned a few years later to complete her accountancy qualification. 

Wendy returned to Brisbane because of a desire to send her children to the same school that she had 

attended. 

‘I enrolled my girls [at my old high school] when they were very young; I wanted them to get 

a good education, to get more attention based on their merit rather than socio-economic 

disadvantage.’ (Wendy, 56) 

Ageing 

Returns related to ageing did not feature as much as expected; and returns were usually made to 

care for elderly parents, rather than because the return migrants themselves were aged. As well 

wanting to put her children through high school, Wendy returned to Brisbane to help care for her 

elderly mother. 

‘I’ve got two brothers who are really busy. ... So, there’s no one really to look after mum and 

rather than park her in a home, which we didn’t want to do, it was about meeting her needs, 

and meeting my girls’ [education] needs [at the same time].’ (Wendy, 58) 



Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 Parr 7 

 

 

Erin was one of the few cases whose return was a lifestyle choice related to ageing, rather than a 

necessity. In 2003 she moved with her young family to Adelaide to live closer to her father. Although 

only in their early forties, Erin and her husband were starting to think about where they wanted to 

be living, as they got older. They decided to settle in Adelaide until 

‘One day my husband came home and said, “You know what, I don’t imagine retiring down 

here [in Adelaide]” … so he started looking for a job and six months later we moved back to 

Sydney’. (Erin, 47) 

The migration histories of the oldest study participants support Litwak and Longino’s (1987) findings 

that the onset of age-related disability does not result in return migration. Returns had occurred 

some years earlier, in early retirement. The most recent moves were generally local moves into aged 

care facilities. 

Ties to place 

A variety of factors were consistent with Faist’s (2000) meso-scale explanations for return. The links 

to family and friends who remained behind were a particularly strong motivator. Karen was a young 

child when her parents moved the family to Dubbo, a regional city in central New South Wales. But 

the family soon returned to Sydney. 

‘… [My parents] missed family and friends, and both their parents were getting on and my 

grandparents were getting sick, … so they wanted to go back ... They were thinking that they 

needed to return home to be closer with the family there.’ (Karen, 46) 

Family and friends can take pressure off the return move, providing a place to stay or some other 

form of support as migrants settle back in after a return move. Links with other networks, 

particularly social ones or with previous employers also made resettling an easier process. Erin and 

her family found their return from Adelaide to Sydney easier “… because we kept all the relationships 

going with friends and stuff. We just started up with where we left off.” (Erin, 47) 

Another strong theme to emerge was the sense that the place to which people had returned was 

somewhere that was very familiar and where they felt happy. Such places were often where people 

had grown up. Thinking about the places she had lived other than Sydney, Karen remarked: 

‘Sydney felt like home … the surroundings [in Cairns and the Central Coast] were so different 

to what I remember in Sydney as a child. I think your understanding of a place starts from 

when you’re a child and yeah, as you get older that anchors you to the way you think and 

react to certain things and I think that’s – it just was different … This isn’t where I grew up. 

This isn’t my familiar place’ (Karen, 46) 

Having ties to a place, or a sense of identity, was a strong theme that featured repeatedly, among 

migrants of all ages.  

‘Melbourne is my home; it’s where my friends and family are’ (Leslie, 58) 



8 Parr Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 

 

‘Melbourne’s my home and I love my footy’ (Ellen, 48) 

‘Sydney is always home’ (Vivian, 59) 

‘Once a Queenslander, always a Queenslander’ (Henry, 74) 

Karen is also an example of someone whose ties to a place carried across the generations. Although 

she had many good memories of living in Dubbo: 

‘My parents brought the family back to Sydney because Dubbo didn’t feel like home. They 

never felt at home there. … So yeah, back to where they felt was home.  … the job promotion 

[in Dubbo] was good, young children, cheaper housing, all those things, but they just felt 

they wanted to come back home to the bigger city.’ (Karen, 46) 

Amenity 

Another strong consideration was amenity. Natalie’s frequent returns to Canberra were not just 

about work or education:  

‘I really liked the lifestyle in Canberra. I was living quite far out of the [central] city in 

Melbourne, so I was really feeling the distance and the lack of convenience which is not an 

issue at all in Canberra. … I guess I’m not much of a city person so [Canberra]’s got a country 

atmosphere but with all the advantages of living in a city … if you do feel the need for a bit of 

city contact, you’ve got Sydney just up the road as well. So, I feel like Canberra’s very well-

placed in a lot of respects … it had everything I could want … And I actually liked the weather 

as well, despite what everyone says about it.’ (Natalie, 33) 

Sharon (56) moved between Melbourne and Darwin on several occasions, for a series of short-term 

and contract jobs. Two reasons had her looking back to these two cities time and again. The 

Melbourne seaside suburb in which she lived had a comfortable familiarity, a sense of being home. 

Many locals also had similar values to her. The other factor, common to both Darwin and Melbourne, 

was her affinity with the natural environment. She loved being near the ocean and living in 

neighbourhoods with lots of palm trees. On another occasion, Sharon had lived in Canberra but soon 

returned to Melbourne because “… two to three years was enough. I was disoriented as I was too far 

away from the sea.” 

The climate of a location was mentioned by other participants as an influence on the decision to 

return. For example, William and his wife were happy to have a return posting to Darwin as they 

liked the city’s climate. But climate could also push people away, encouraging a return to a previous 

place of residence. In 2009 Leanne and her husband moved from Perth to Brisbane to be with their 

granddaughter but left two years later because “it rained all the time … so we were glad to come 

back to Perth. The weather played a huge part on our decision to come back” (Leanne, 55). 

Another reason why Karen’s parents brought their young family back to Sydney from Dubbo was that 

they did not like the temperature extremes. 



Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 Parr 9 

 

 

‘Summer, Dad used to say was stinking hot and the winter freezing, and they remembered 

the toilet would block up, it would freeze.’ (Karen, 46) 

Other factors 

Besides climate, a desire for a change of pace can underpin a return move. Thelma spent more than 

20 years living in Sydney and was finally able to return home to Brisbane with her family: 

‘I married a Sydney fellow. I produced three Sydney children. And there was no way, even 

though I would have loved to come back to Queensland, there was no way I would have 

initiated that. I didn't feel I had the right, to do that. But my husband was a service technician 

and he was driving all over Sydney. It drove him barmy and he wanted to get out.’ (Thelma, 

72) 

For her part, Karen was very pleased to return to Sydney:  

‘I was very happy to move back to Sydney because I grew up there and it was familiar and it was 

convenient and I was young and I had the culture and the food and the shops and my work 

friends and that whole lifestyle. It was good.’ (Karen, 46). 

5. Discussion and Conclusions 

The aim of this paper was to supplement the often overlooked, but now growing, body of work about 

the reasons for return migration. Migration histories are a rich source of information concerning 

return moves of people living in Australia. Findings revealed that people return for a wider range of 

reasons than is indicated by neoclassical economic theory and support the suggestions from other 

researchers (Bell and Hugo 2000; Cromartie and Stack 1989) that a broader more inclusive 

conceptual framework is needed to explain the selectivity of people who return. The framework used 

in this paper, which combines a life course framework with macro-scale and meso-scale 

explanations, is a good starting point. 

Results reveal that the reasons why people make a return move are as varied as the people 

themselves. Some of the moves are linked to significant life events such as post-school education and 

employment. Returns are also linked to other, less tangible, factors such as amenity and climate. The 

connections to family, friends and other networks and the extent to which a place “feels like home” 

are just as important. These less tangible factors are much harder to measure using conventional 

data sources and are outside the realm of the frameworks normally used to explain return migration 

in developed countries such as Australia. The meso-scale framework developed by Faist (2000) is a 

very useful way to explain more of the reasons for return migration revealed in the migration 

histories.   

The motivations for return have similarities with the motives for internal migration in general. Work 

is not always a critical reason for moving in either case. Social and environmental considerations are 

important and the reasons for moving can be complicated. Some of the motivations revealed in this 

paper may also explain why return migrant selectivity is not always distinct. The reasons for the 



10 Parr Australian Population Studies 3 (1) 2019 

 

return may bear no connection to the socio-demographic character of the return migrant. For 

example, returning to care for elderly or sick family members may not be related to age, gender, 

occupation or income. It may have more to do with the strength of family ties and a sense of duty to 

care for others in the family. 

The histories used in this study were not intended to be representative of the people and patterns 

revealed by census analyses. Rather, the aim was to illustrate what could be revealed about return 

migration in Australia using alternative methods and different data sources. The collection of 

migration histories is always fraught with issues. Difficulties with recall of the timing of events were 

evident with some of the older participants and post-facto rationalisation of the choices people make 

is a known problem. It has been suggested that people look at their past with rose-tinted glasses to 

justify their decisions. There is no obvious way to get around this, but these issues need to be 

recognised. Limitations aside, the wealth of information provided by migration histories 

demonstrates that this is an extremely rich source of data about return migration. It also 

complements the precision of quantitative analysis habitually undertaken by demographers and 

population geographers. The value of integrating this material with the findings derived from 

conventional census-based analyses is strongly encouraged and broadens our understanding of 

Australia’s internal migration system. 

Key messages  

 Understanding why people return to a place helps explains the patterns of movement. 

 The reasons why people make a return move are as varied as the people themselves. 

 A job is not the only reason why people return. Some returns are linked to significant life events. 

Ties to place, family and friends, the climate and environment are also important factors. 

 That a place “feels like home” is also an important reason why people return. 

 Migration histories are a rich source of information about why people return. They enhance 

research that traditionally relies on data from Australia’s census. 

Acknowledgements 

This research forms part of a larger study supported by the Australian Research Council Discovery 

Grant DP 0451399: Understanding the structure of internal migration in Australia. I am grateful for 

the helpful comments of the anonymous reviewers on an earlier draft of this paper. 

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