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Abstract Social epidemiological studies have long understood housing as a social determinant of mental health. However, most studies have focused on the formal housing sector and the conceptualisation of housing is limited to the housing per se. This study aims to bridge the gap by investigating the mental health impact of housing disadvantages concerning the migrant population in China, who are largely excluded from the formal housing sector. Drawing from recent writings on stress as the intermediary agent between modern city life and mental illness, the study examines the relationship between housing and neighbourhood conditions, perceived stress and mental health status. Using a large-scale survey conducted in twelve Chinese cities in 2009, this research found that informal housing tenants have the highest level of perceived stress and worst mental health status compared to dormitory tenants and formal housing residents. Poor housing conditions are significantly associated with perceived stress but not with mental health, while the neighbourhood social environment significantly predicts both perceived stress and mental health. The paper concludes by calling for more ethnographic research on migrants' resilience and stress-coping strategies and more attention in urban planning and housing policy to address the vulnerability and adversity of migrant settlements. Highlights • Proposing a conceptualization of housing stress for migrants in urban China • Explaining the theoretical links between housing, stress and mental health • Exploring the impact of migrant housing on their mental health • Calling for more ethnographic data to understand migrants' stress-coping strategy [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the central role of households in motivating and implementing migration, this paper argues that the "householding" and split-household approaches are fundamental and essential for migration research, by drawing from original research on rural-urban migrants in China and four published studies on Asian migrants. Translocality and household-splitting that enable the earning of remittances or help meet other family goals such as children's education, set in motion processes of gender and intergenerational divisions of labor that involve both the migrants and the left-behind, and have implications for urban development in large cities as well as cities near rural areas. Hundreds of millions of rural migrants in China circulate between their home villages and host cities, and large numbers of women from Southeast Asia work overseas. Likewise, skilled migrants from South Asia and East Asia maintain transnational households that straddle their home and host countries. Household biographies and interviewees' narratives from these examples highlight two strategies of migrants and their family members: their flexibility and frequent changes of location, work, activity, and household arrangement; and their reinventing women's and men's responsibilities without challenging traditional gender ideology. These stories underscore the importance of householding and split-households for informing contemporary migration theories and research. • Both international and internal migrants pursue "householding" and split-household strategies. • Both migrants to cities and the left-behind contribute to sustaining and maintaining the split households. • Members of split households change frequently their location, work, and household arrangement. • Migrants and the left-behind reinvent their family responsibilities vis-à-vis gender norms. • Experiences of Asian migrants to cities are important for migration theories and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]