text: In contrast, 40% of emerging adults do not attend college but live independently and work full-time. Additionally, around 66% of emerging adults in the United States cohabitate with a romantic partner. Regarding school attendance, emerging adults are also extremely diverse in their educational paths (Arnett, 2000, p. 470–471). Over 60% of emerging adults in the United States enter college or university the year after graduating from high school. However, the years that follow college are incredibly diverse – only about 32% of 25- to 29-year-olds have finished four or more years of college. This diversity comes from differences in personality, culture, financial and relationship situations, and other circumstances. An emerging adult's experience may be very different from another emerging adult's experience. However, there tends to be a gap for emerging adulthood when students finish school and have yet to seek employment and romantic relationships.
  This is because higher education is usually pursued non-continuously, where some pursue education while they also work, and some do not attend school for periods of time. Further contributing to the variance, about one third of emerging adults with bachelor's degrees pursue a postgraduate education within a year of earning their bachelor's degree. Because there is so much demographic instability, especially in residential status and school attendance, it is clear that emerging adulthood is a distinct entity based on its demographically non-normative qualities, at least in the United States. Some emerging adults end up moving back home after college graduation, which tests the demographic of dependency. During college, they may be completely independent, but that could quickly change afterward when they are trying to find a full-time job with little direction as to where to start their career. Only after self-efficiency has been reached and after a long period of freedom has experienced, that is when emerging adults will be ready to become adults and take on the full responsibility.