havesomeseichel, you are majorly overgeneralizing. Independence has to do with a lot more than whether someone went away for a year. A lot of it is personality and how you were raised. I personally was always independent. B”h my parents raised me that way. I have also tried to be as financially independent as possible even when single.
As I heard a wise person say (actually I think it was a comment posted on this site or another one), who is more independent? A sem girl who’s living it up on her parents credit card for a year, shnorring shabbos meals from people, and calling home on her cell 2x a day, or a girl who’s going to sem at home while starting training for a career so her parents won’t have to support her as much when she gets married?
Traditionally, Jewish girls never went away from home for a year – this is not the criteria and should not be the criteria of who will be more capable of being a good wife and mother.