• Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.359-385
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• 2013

The study looked into the effect of internet utilization (utilization frequency and utilization ability in internet) on the life satisfaction level for the elderly in depth. In order to verify the correlation of two variables, a mediating model structured by ego integrity was used which gave out the Seoul welfare panel data created by Seoul welfare foundation in 2010. The total sample size was a group of 1862 elders aged over 60. When it came to our research methods, structured equation analysis was applied to verify the mediating effect and theoretical background. The findings are as follows: First, elderly's utilization frequency in internet is not an influencing factor to life satisfaction and elderly's utilization ability in internet is an influencing factor to life satisfaction. Second, the level of social activity did function as partial mediator on relationship between elderly's utilization ability in internet and life satisfaction. This study indicates theoretical and practical interventions to promote elderly's utilization in internet.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.35
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• pp.51-83
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• 1998

This study is designed to find out the determinants of housewives' caregiving behavior to their elderly parents-in-law. For this purpose, a tentative path model, constructed with major socio-demographic variables in the caregiver's family as exogenous variables, is proposed to account for caregiver's behavior to elderly parents-in-law. The model is estimated with data collected from a probability sample of housewives in Kwangju, Korea. Estimation of the model, separately for caregiver's fathers-in-law and mothers-in-law, in terms of maximum likelihood(ML) procedures in LISREL8 reveals that housewives' educational attainment, father-in-law's age, father-in-law's health status, and family size have statistically significant causal. effects on care giving behavior to fathers-in-law, and that housewives' educational attainment, mother-in-law's age, family size, and caregiving attitude have significant causal effects on caregiving behavior to mothers-in-law. Comparison of the two estimated models indicates caregiver's educational attainment, caretaker's age, and family size are prominent determinants of caregiving behavior that can be commonly generalized to the two models. Except for these common determinants, however, a nonnegligible amount of differences is identified between the two models. The findings are discussed and interpreted with suggesting some salient theoretical and policy implications.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.56 no.4
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• pp.57-78
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• 2004

The economic crisis in $1997{\sim}1998$ caused massive unemployment and unprecedentedly increased the number of the poor in Korea. As many unemployed families fell into poverty, the poverty rate skyrocketed to higher than 10 percent. Not later than 2000, unemployment late got back to normal and real average income among urban households approached to the income level prior to the economic crisis. Although the economic crisis has been passed through, poverty was not decreased to the low level prior to the crisis by 2000. Why does it remain high? This study attempts to provide an answer to this question by analysing the poverty trend over the 1990s. Data come from the National Survey of Household Income and Expenditures 1991, 1996, and 20001. Results show that poverty was rapidly reduced in the first half period of the 1990s. This reduction in poverty is largely explained by steady and rapid economic growth. Modest improvement in income inequality also contributed. In contrast, the poverty rate considerably increased in the latter half of the 1990s. Average income was not fully recovered to its prior level, which reflected the economic crisis and the subsequent economic stagnation. Worsened income inequality led to higher poverty rate too. In addition, demographic changes increased the share of economically vulnerable types of families, such as families headed by single parents and the elderly. The most significant factor in explaining the higher poverty rate was extended income differential among non-elderly adults, while the next was the increased number of the elderly families. Yet, findings a little differ depending on which concepts of poverty to adopt. In the analyses based on the concept of absolute poverty, economic growth the most significantly affected the poverty trends in the 1999s. Changes in income inequality played the most important role in explaining the trend in relative poverty. Adopting the concepts of quasi-absolute poverty, which is preferred in this study, results show that rapid economic growth significantly reduced poverty in the first half of the 1990s and both worsened income inequality and stagnated economic growth increased poverty in the latter 1990s.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.553-565
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• 2016

Population aging has been an increasing social issue and the elderly health has become one of the most urgent public attentions in Korea. The aims of this paper are to compare the subjective health status according to the personal characteristics, social networks, and daily leisure activities of the urban-rural elderly, and to analyze the influencing factors of their subjective health status. Using 2011 elderly survey data, ordered logit Model was established to extract influencing factors of the elderly health status. The results show that socioeconomic and demographic characteristics of individual as well as frequent social contacts and daily activities within neighborhood environments influence the level of health status of the elderly. The most significant factors affecting the elderly health are personal economic conditions such as the education achievement level and household income. The elderly who visit an elderly welfare center in Seoul has almost 1.82 times higher odds of increasing health status level than not to visit an elderly welfare center. This study may give some important policy implications of the elderly health promotion strategy in urban-rural communities.

• Design Convergence Study
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.1-15
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to identify the characteristics of aging-friendly technology that can be integrated into future smart homes in an aging society. The literature survey and content analysis method were used to collect and analyze data. Papers of the international journal ICOST (International Conference on Smart Homes and Health Telematics) that professionally deal with converged technologies were analysis units. Sixty-five papers among 215 papers published from 2007 through 2014 were selected on the basis of end-users orientation. Totally, out of 65 papers 76 technology items were extracted. Characteristics of those technologies were analyzed focusing on purpose and application methods. As results, in terms of purpose, the technologies were oriented to provide both of psychological and physiological support to the users, focusing on the safety, convenience, health and entertainment to extend independent life of the elderly. Among the application method such as building structure, furniture, product, wearable device and free movable robot, product were dominant. Through those results, the aging-friendly technology is expected to alleviate a wide range of issues in aging society.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.235-251
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• 2019

The purpose of this study was to investigate the single-person household's demand for a wearable healthcare system that provides the ischemic heart disease and cardiopulmonary alarm to be developed. In this study, in-depth interviews were conducted with six unmarried individuals in their thirties who were in the workplace and the results were interpreted by Giorgi's phenomenological analysis method. The study results indicated that although the wearable healthcare system was implemented with high-technology functions that serve the intended purpose, it is necessary to comprehensively consider factors such as aesthetics, comfort, and ease of washing. In this study, we found that the variables influencing the interviewees' intent to accept healthcare services are complex and cannot be attributed to one factor alone; this study has also shown a variety of interpersonal correlations. In addition, although health-care research focusing on the elderly has been conducted in the past, it is suggested that younger generations such as those in their thirties can also be studied as health care service adopters.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.14 no.11
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• pp.63-70
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• 2016

In this study, the correlation between convergence factors including social, environmental, psychological and physical factors and the health-related quality of life was examined using a structural equation model to find a practical alternative for improving the quality of life in the elderly people living alone. This study targeted 13,771 seniors from single households aged 65 and over, who were subject to the community health survey in 2014. Social capitals, stress, subjective health conditions and EQ-5D of the subjects were analyzed using SPSS 23.0 and AMOS 23.0. The analysis findings are as follows. The results of the model fit was good value with CFI=.906, GFI=.955, RMSEA=.074. In conclusion, these results demonstrate that for maintaining health and improving the quality of life in the elderly people living alone, families and local communities need to increase social capitals by providing care service for the elderly people living alone and grounds that they can participate in.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.244-253
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• 2020

This study aimed to assess the factors affecting the level of happiness and a sense of happiness among senior men and women, including sociodemographic characteristics, health behavior, subjective health level, and healthcare utilization, using the 2017 Community Health Survey (CHS). A total of 67,835 older adults were enrolled for the study, 27,979 males and 39,856 females. The results showed that education level and total household income affected the happiness in female elderly, while having a spouse increased happiness in male elderly. In addition, both male elderly and female felt a great of happiness when they had good health behaviors, perceived themselves to be in good health, and had no restrictions with healthcare utilization. Subjective health status and healthcare utilization seem to have a substantial impact on happiness because older adulthood is a period marked with increased physical vulnerability compared to other age groups due to diminished physiological functions. Based on these results, the government should expand subsidies for welfare for the aged to provide lifelong education opportunities and the existing elderly education and programs in health-related organizations should reflect the characteristics of the elderly. Furthermore, social service systems and programs related to the elderly should be re-evaluated so as to develop services and programs tailored to the elderly to promote their happiness more effectively.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.43 no.6 s.208
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• pp.113-131
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• 2005

The purpose of this study was to investigate older people's planning for estate distribution by examining the factors associated with their will-holding status. This study used data from the 1994 Assets and Health Dynamics among the Oldest Old (AHEAD) Survey, Wave One. The objectives of this study were (a) to establish profiles of older people who have a written will and to compare their financial portfolios across will-holding status; (b) to identify factors that influence the decision to make a will, and (c) to draw implications for family economists, financial educators, planners, and policy makers. The results suggested that a household's financial resources (i.e., liquid and illiquid assets, housing equity, and household income) positively influence the probability of having a will. Older people who resided in a community property state and who were in poor health were less likely to be will-holders than their counterparts, holding financial resources and other variables constant. Demographic characteristics such as age, education, and race, and behavioral characteristic also were significant determinants of the likelihood of having a will. Volunteer participation and charitable contribution, which are proxies for altruism, increased the likelihood of having a will. The probability of having a will also was higher among those who had life insurance and had gwen inter-vivos gifts of more than $\$5,000$ to their children or grandchildren in the past 10 years. On the other hand, the likelihood of having a will declined with increasing number of biological children. From the findings, implications for financial planners and educators were suggested along with directions for future research.

• Journal of Nutrition and Health
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• v.48 no.4
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• pp.371-379
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• 2015

Purpose: This study was conducted to evaluate the factors influencing inadequate energy intake among Korean elderly. Methods: Our study included 1,869 elderly people (over 60 years old) who completed a dietary survey from the fifth Korean NHANES (2010). Factors that could affect the nutritional status of the elderly included age, family status, socio-economic factors (education, family income, livelihood security, employment), and health related factors (having chronic disease, functional status, diet therapy, depression, and suicidal thoughts). Energy and protein intake were assessed using the dietary intake data from 24hr recall method. Results: The percentage of people who consumed energy less than 75% of EEA for Koreans was 23.7% in men, 31.1% in women. The carbohydrate contribution to the total energy intake in the inadequate energy intake group was significantly higher than that in the adequate intake group (p < 0.05). Factors significantly related to inadequate energy intake after adjusting for age, family status, education, family income, employment, functional status, and suicidal thoughts were education (OR: 1.480 in men, 1.614 in women) and employment (OR: 1.751 in men, 1.464 in women), age 70 years or older in men (OR: 1.475), and living with family but without spouse in women (OR: 1.496). Conclusion: In summary, the results imply that energy intake of elderly would be affected by the status of social environment with aging and nutrition-related policy for Korean elderly should be based on the social status as well as health related conditions.