Fourteen young men and women, who as teenagers had run away from home, were subjects of an intensive clinical case study which was a followup of a larger-scale survey of runaways conducted in the early 1960s. A major purpose of the research was to determine how the former runaways had fared as adults and whether or not their early behavior had foreshadowed later adjustment problems. Intrafamily comparisons between the runaways and a sibling were also made. Two factors seen to be most prominently associated with differential long-term outcomes--whether or not the youthful act was a repeated or an isolated occurrence, and the individual's social class. In general, repeaters most nearly fit a model of running away as a sociopathic act, indicative of severe disorders. A single act of running away was associated with little long-term disability. Siblings of runaways, with one exception, had made successful adjustments to adult life. Discussion centers on the prognostic value of repeated running away for the prediction of psychosocial disability, the contribution of individual psychology to the outcomes observed, and on the finding that premature separation from adult authority may lead to a prolonged and ambivalent dependence on it. (Author)