• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.37 no.5
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• pp.827-835
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• 2017

With the rapid progress of ageing several issues concurrently occur, and one important social issue that must be resolved is accidents involving Elderly drivers. Efforts to reduce the frequency of such accidents is a must in order to be prepared to face a superaged society. Currently people aged 65 or older are prescribed as an "Elderly person." Therefore, various studies concerning accidents involving Elderly drivers apply this age criteria to separate regular drivers and Elderly drivers. However, there is no criteria to practically discern Elderly drivers with certain physical features as vulnerable road users based on a level of acceptable accuracy. Therefore, this studies intends to compare the possibility of accidents by age group of Elderly drivers by correlation analysis to analyze the accident characteristics by age group. Results showed that for drivers aged 75 and older, their influence on major accident characteristics by vehicle type increased with higher age groups. In particular, passenger cars had a relatively low accident frequency rate for drivers aged between 70 and 80, but for drivers aged 75 to 84, they had higher influence on accidents for the same vehicle type. This demonstrates that as ageing progresses and the average life expectancy increases, the age span of elders continues to increase, meaning that characteristics differ by age group among the aged. This study confirmed that the influence on the possibility of accidents differs by age group among the aged.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.113-144
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• 2020

Throughout various data sources, it is widely observed that air quality in South Korea has become improved. Koreans, however, insist that their health status and economic burden due to worsened air quality get degenerated. This study aims to explain the mismatch between perception and measured data, air pollution-led medical expenses, and consumption behaviors in the economics perspectives. First, we demonstrated data-driven evidence of mismatch in the perceived severity of air pollution and its enhancement in measured data. Second, using the health demand model, we theoretically derived and empirically showed a co-rising relation between air pollution severity and medical expenses. Last, we analyzed that the perception led to increased defensive expenditures in consumption. This result implies the possibility of overestimation in air pollution impacts on socioeconomic losses and its possible reverse interpretation from increased social benefit after improved air quality. Our results recommend policy consideration to strengthen air quality standards, to support socially vulnerable groups regarding defensive expenditures, and to improve the accessibility and credibility of air pollution information.

• Korea journal of population studies
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.63-95
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• 2005

In the era of globalization, a significant number of young students go abroad to learn English. By reviewing the trends and characteristics of this phenomenon, this study will focus on the adjustment of young Korean students in Australia. During June and July 2002, two questionnaire surveys were conducted for year 7 to year 12 Korean students at the Saturday Schools in Sydney Australia and for the youth group at the Sydney Catholic Church. More data was collected from interviews with 31 Korean teachers at the Saturday Schools and Linfield Korean school, as well as observations of the students in the Sydney area. The study divided the students into four groups: 1) Korean immigrant students, whose parents immigrated to Australia; 2) Individual Korean students who went alone to Australia to study; 3) Students whom live in Australia with one parent (usually their mother), whilst the other parent (usually their father) who provides financial support by working in Korea; and 4) students who accompanied their parents whom were dispatched for temporary employment or study in Australia. Moreover the study focused on the following; their academic performance, school activities, motivation, social relations, and their overall satisfaction with their studies and their stay in Australia. The findings indicated that the temporary overseas Korean students, especially those that are not with their parents do not adjust as well as the Korean immigrant students. The students who were not accompanied by their parents to Australia had the most difficulties adjusting as they were more vulnerable and fell behind with their studies. Therefore, the results support the concerns of Korean teachers in Australia about parents sending young students alone abroad.

• 한국노년학
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• v.39 no.2
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• pp.213-229
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• 2019

The purpose of this study was to examine various factors influencing the needs of Seoul's newly implemented outreach community services for older adults, and to suggest the direction of the outreach community health services in Seoul. A multi-level regression was conducted using data collected by face-to-face interviews from 1,000 individuals aged 65 and 70 in 17 districts, where participated in the Seoul's outreach community services. The results demonstrated that socioeconomic status (higher income and living alone), health status (having multiple chronic conditions and depression, lower health literacy), limited experience of the outreach community services, and low government trust at the individual level were associated with higher unmet need for the community outreach services. In addition, shorter participation period of the outreach services and financial independency at the district level were associated with higher unmet need for the services. The findings from this study implies the need for improving the quality of services by focusing on vulnerable groups such as individuals with lower income and worse health status. In addition, the outreach community health services may need to target individuals aged 66 to increasing efficiency of the services through utilizing results of life-cycle health checkup by the National Health Insurance Corporation.

• Journal of the Korean Society of School Health
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.1-11
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• 2024

Purpose: The purpose of the study was to conduct a descriptive survey to examine the knowledge, infection prevention behaviors, and health beliefs regarding COVID-19 and to identify factors that influence infection prevention behaviors in elementary and middle school students based on the Health Belief Model. Methods: The study included 388 elementary and middle school students in Seoul, Gyeonggi, and Jeonbuk provinces. Data were collected from September 1 to September 15, 2023. The questionnaire consisted of 10 questions about COVID-19 knowledge, 13 questions about infection prevention behaviors, and 15 questions about health beliefs. The collected data were subjected to multiple hierarchical regression analyses. The cronbach's α of infection prevention behaviors was 0.83, the KR-20 of COVID-19 related knowledge was 0.68, and the Cronbach's α of COVID-19 related health beliefs was 0. 78. Results: In Model 1, females showed higher levels of infection prevention behaviors than males (β=.14, p=.006) and middle school students showed lower levels of infection prevention behaviors than elementary school students (β=-.10, p=.037). In Model 2, among COVID-19-related health beliefs, barriers had a significant negative effect on infection prevention behaviors (β=-.20, p<.001) and cues to action had a significant positive effect on infection prevention behaviors (β=.14, p=.037), indicating that lower barriers and higher cues to action were associated with higher levels of infection prevention behaviors. Conclusion: The results showed that prevention behaviors were associated with lower barriers and higher cues to action among COVID-19 health beliefs. Elementary and middle school students in Korea spend a lot of time in groups at private academies or school, which are closed spaces with poor ventilation, making them vulnerable to new infectious diseases such as COVID-19. Unlike adults, infectious diseases can have serious impact on their mental and social health. Therefore, it is necessary for schools to provide accurate and timely health education about COVID-19 to increase cues to action for elementary and middle school students in order to improve their infection prevention behaviors.

• Journal of Industrial Convergence
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.149-162
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• 2024

This study is a longitudinal study of female older adults living alone, one of the most vulnerable groups in our society, to determine how their depression changes over time and what factors affect their depression. At the same time, considering that there is a large difference in age among the same older adults, this study divided the female older adults into the young-old and the old-old to see how the predictors of depression in each group differ from each other. The main findings are as follows First, depression among female older adults living alone appears to have a declining pattern over time. In the conditional model, factors affecting the initial level of the depression trajectory among women living alone were found to be associated with lower initial depression values among those living in metropolitan areas rather than non-metropolitan areas, better subjective health, and those who did not exercise. Next, we examined the factors affecting rate of change (slope) in depression among female living alone older adults and found that the higher the age, the larger the metropolitan area, the better the subjective health, the less socializing, and the more socializing, the greater the decrease in depression level. Finally, there were some differences in the pathways affecting the initial value and slope of depression among female older adults living alone between the early and late older adults. Specifically, the higher the initial level of participation in social activities, the greater the change in depression among the late older adults, while there was no significant relationship among the early older adults. In the early older adults, better initial subjective health was associated with a larger change in depression than in the late older adults. Only in the late older adults did those who regularly exercised in the early years have higher initial depression values than those who did not. Based on the results of the above analyses, suggestions were made to reduce depression among female older adults living alone.

• Journal of dental hygiene science
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.225-234
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• 2016

The purpose of this study was to determine the oral health condition and behavioral status of Korean adults according to occupational status. The subjects were 7,676 adults, aged between 19 and 64 years, who completed both oral examination and questionnaire survey, among those who indicated that they were currently participating in economic activities, according to the data from the Fourth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Occupational class and employment status were selected as measures of occupational status. Complex-samples logistic regression models were used to assess the associations among oral health, behavioral, and occupational statuses. We found a significant occupational class-related difference in the oral health and behavioral statuses of both the men and women. In particular, the prevalence odds ratios of untreated dental caries in manual workers were 1.19 and 1.67 times higher than in non-manual workers, for men and women, respectively. As for oral health condition and behavioral status according to employment status, the health risk in temporary employment workers was higher than that in permanent employment workers. As for the prevalence odds ratios of the risk of dental caries, the highest values were observed for tooth brushing fewer than 3 times per day, not undergoing oral examinations, and chewing difficulty complaints. The risk of dental caries for agricultural, forestry, and fishing workers for both men and women was found to be the highest among other workers. Thus, strategies to promote workplace oral health in the microscopic and macroscopic perspectives should be developed to constantly monitor oral health problems, and to identify vulnerable social groups within occupational groups and the related factors that mediate oral health differences.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.141-155
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• 2024

Background: This study aimed to identified the relationship between the risk of obstructive sleep apnea, subjective health, and health-related quality of life among the middle-aged and elderly population in Korea. Methods: Adults aged 40 or older were extracted from the total 22,559 respondents to the 2019-2020 Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey VIII, and secondary analysis was conducted on a total of 6,659 middle-aged and elderly people with no missing values. Logistic regression analysis and multiple regression analysis were conducted to examine the relationship between obstructive sleep apnea risk factors and subjective health as well as quality of life. Results: The subjective health status decline in the high-risk group compared to the non-risk group for obstructive sleep apnea was statistically significantly higher, with an odds ratio of 1.84 (p<0.001). The health-related quality of life was also statistically significantly lower by 0.02 points (β, -0.02; p<0.001). As a result of subgroup analysis on specific variables, the association between the risk of obstructive sleep apnea and subjective health and health-related quality of life was statistically significant depending on gender, sleep time, presence of depression, household income, and number of household members. Based on the obstructive sleep apnea risk group, women had a higher correlation with low subjective health and lower health-related quality of life scores than men. Sleeping time of more than 8 hours or less than 6 hours was more associated with low subjective health and lower health-related quality of life score than sleeping time of 6-8 hours. Patients with depression were more likely to have low subjective health than those without depression. The lower the household income level and the smaller the number of household members, the higher the association with low subjective health and the lower the health-related quality of life score. Conclusion: It is essential to recognize that the risk of obstructive sleep apnea not only directly affects sleep disorders but also impacts individuals' subjective health and quality of life. Consequently, social support and education should be provided to raise awareness of this issue. Particularly, programs for preventing and managing obstructive sleep apnea should target vulnerable groups such as women, individuals in single-person households, low household income, and those with depression, aiming to improve their subjective health and quality of life.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.117-140
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• 2019

As the aging phenomenon accelerates and various social problems related to the elderly of the vulnerable are raised, the need for effective elderly care solutions to protect the health and safety of the elderly generation is growing. Recently, more and more people are using Smart Toys equipped with ICT technology for care for elderly. In particular, log data collected through smart toys is highly valuable to be used as a quantitative and objective indicator in areas such as policy-making and service planning. However, research related to smart toys is limited, such as the development of smart toys and the validation of smart toy effectiveness. In other words, there is a dearth of research to derive insights based on log data collected through smart toys and to use them for decision making. This study will analyze log data collected from smart toy and derive effective insights to improve the quality of life for elderly users. Specifically, the user profiling-based analysis and elicitation of a change in quality of life mechanism based on behavior were performed. First, in the user profiling analysis, two important dimensions of classifying the type of elderly group from five factors of elderly user's living management were derived: 'Routine Activities' and 'Work-out Activities'. Based on the dimensions derived, a hierarchical cluster analysis and K-Means clustering were performed to classify the entire elderly user into three groups. Through a profiling analysis, the demographic characteristics of each group of elderlies and the behavior of using smart toy were identified. Second, stepwise regression was performed in eliciting the mechanism of change in quality of life. The effects of interaction, content usage, and indoor activity have been identified on the improvement of depression and lifestyle for the elderly. In addition, it identified the role of user performance evaluation and satisfaction with smart toy as a parameter that mediated the relationship between usage behavior and quality of life change. Specific mechanisms are as follows. First, the interaction between smart toy and elderly was found to have an effect of improving the depression by mediating attitudes to smart toy. The 'Satisfaction toward Smart Toy,' a variable that affects the improvement of the elderly's depression, changes how users evaluate smart toy performance. At this time, it has been identified that it is the interaction with smart toy that has a positive effect on smart toy These results can be interpreted as an elderly with a desire to meet emotional stability interact actively with smart toy, and a positive assessment of smart toy, greatly appreciating the effectiveness of smart toy. Second, the content usage has been confirmed to have a direct effect on improving lifestyle without going through other variables. Elderly who use a lot of the content provided by smart toy have improved their lifestyle. However, this effect has occurred regardless of the attitude the user has toward smart toy. Third, log data show that a high degree of indoor activity improves both the lifestyle and depression of the elderly. The more indoor activity, the better the lifestyle of the elderly, and these effects occur regardless of the user's attitude toward smart toy. In addition, elderly with a high degree of indoor activity are satisfied with smart toys, which cause improvement in the elderly's depression. However, it can be interpreted that elderly who prefer outdoor activities than indoor activities, or those who are less active due to health problems, are hard to satisfied with smart toys, and are not able to get the effects of improving depression. In summary, based on the activities of the elderly, three groups of elderly were identified and the important characteristics of each type were identified. In addition, this study sought to identify the mechanism by which the behavior of the elderly on smart toy affects the lives of the actual elderly, and to derive user needs and insights.