Italy is notoriously a nation of mammoni or "Mummy's boys".
And Italian men seem to be reinforcing that stereotype by failing to leave the nest, according to the latest European Union statistics.
Figures from Eurostat show more than 67 per cent of Italians aged between 18 and 34 were still living with their parents in 2015, up from 65.4 per cent in 2014.
The number of young adult Italians clinging to home, dubbed bamboccioni or "big babies", is well above the EU average of 47.9 per cent and rises further among sons, with nearly three-quarters unwilling to leave despite 40 per cent having full-time jobs.
"It is true that the family is being identified more as the place of security," Vittorino Andreoli, an Italian psychiatrist, told Corriere Della Sera.