(1) “Household” means— (A) an individual who lives alone or who, while living with others, customarily purchases food and prepares meals for home consumption separate and apart from the others; or (B) a group of individuals who live together and customarily purchase food and prepare meals together for home consumption.

(2) Spouses who live together, parents and their children 21 years of age or younger who live together, and children (excluding foster children) under 18 years of age who live with and are under the parental control of a person other than their parent together with the person exercising parental control shall be treated as a group of individuals who customarily purchase and prepare meals together for home consumption even if they do not do so.

(3) Notwithstanding paragraphs (1) and (2), an individual who lives with others, who is sixty years of age or older, and who is unable to purchase food and prepare meals because such individual suffers, as certified by a licensed physician, from a disability which would be considered a permanent disability under section 221(i) of the Social Security Act ( 42 U.S.C. 421(i) ) or from a severe, permanent, and disabling physical or mental infirmity which is not symptomatic of a disease shall be considered, together with any of the others who is the spouse of such individual, an individual household, without regard to the purchase of food and preparation of meals, if the income (as determined under section 2014(d) of this title ) of the others, excluding the spouse, does not exceed the poverty line, as described in section 2014(c)(1) of this title , by more than 65 per centum.

(4) In no event shall any individual or group of individuals constitute a household if they reside in an institution or boarding house, or else live with others and pay compensation to the others for meals.

(5) For the purposes of this subsection, the following persons shall not be considered to be residents of institutions and shall be considered to be individual households: (A) Residents of federally subsidized housing for the elderly, disabled or blind recipients of benefits under title I, II, X, XIV, or XVI of the Social Security Act [ 42 U.S.C. 301 et seq., 401 et seq., 1201 et seq., 1351 et seq., 1381 et seq.]. (B) Individuals described in paragraphs (2) through (7) of subsection (j), who are residents in a public or private nonprofit group living arrangement that serves no more than sixteen residents and is certified by the appropriate State agency or agencies under regulations issued under section 1616(e) of the Social Security Act [ 42 U.S.C. 1382e(e) ] or under standards determined by the Secretary to be comparable to standards implemented by appropriate State agencies under that section. (C) Temporary residents of public or private nonprofit shelters for battered women and children. (D) Residents of public or private nonprofit shelters for individuals who do not reside in permanent dwellings or have no fixed mailing addresses, who are otherwise eligible for benefits. (E) Narcotics addicts or alcoholics, together with their children, who live under the supervision of a private nonprofit institution, or a publicly operated community mental health center, for the purpose of regular participation in a drug or alcoholic treatment program.