• Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies
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• v.47 no.4
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• pp.151-181
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• 2016

The objective of the study is to identify the sub-path of entry into homelessness of young men and enhance understanding them. In specific, homeless risk factors were extracted through their experiences, and based on which the entry paths into homelessness were drawn. The homeless young adults were divided into two groups of those who became homeless in their adolescence and those who entered into homelessness after 19 and their differences were analyzed. As a results, the most prominent differences between the two sub-groups included individual and social factors; most of those who entered homelessness after 19 had physical or psychological problems, while the other group showed delinquency factors in adolescence and adulthood. As for social factors, the former group experienced more financial damage in the process of achieving independence before being homeless, while the latter group had relatively more experience of physical and psychological damage such as bullying, harassment and violence before being homeless and financial frauds. As for investigating the causality relationship of key homeless risk factors by adding a variable of time, and based on which, a constant pattern of entry paths toward homelessness was drawn among each sub-group of homeless young adults. For policy on homelessness, it is required to develop according to the characteristics of homeless young adults. Especially, a specific approach is necessary for the different homeless pathways by sub-group. Furthermore, the study indicated that management and preemptive responses for various homeless risk factors that homeless young adults experienced throughout their lifetime could be important prevention policy against homelessness.