• 한국노년학
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.109-126
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• 2005

Recently it has been encouraged in developed countries that labor force participation of the elderly is one of the means to cut down the cost of social welfare for them. However, empirical studies have rarely explored how work in later life contributes to national economy. Especially, even though 56.6 percent of elderly workers aged 65 and older engaged in agriculture and forestry in Korea, their contribution has been socio-economically overlooked. This study aims at examining the effect of farming labor in later life on social welfare expenditure. For this purpose, social welfare expenditure was defined as social benefits provided for the elderly by the social security in public sector and measured as transportation allowance, pension, livelihood aid, medical aid, and health insurance in 2003. Data were obtained from National Health Insurance Cooperation and 37 town/village offices and analyzed by 3 age groups; 65~74, 75~84, and 85 and over using SPSS/PC windows program. Results showed that both livelihood and medical support in all age groups were expended more to non-farm than to farm workers. The amount differences per person between them were 113,959~361,132 won in livelihood support and 15,644~51,418 won in medical support. Also, participation in farming influence reduction of livelihood expenditure for the group 65~74 and 75~84 and that of medical expenditure only for the group 65~74. Based on these results, it was estimated the amount of social welfare expenditure reduced by farming labor in later life. The limit of this study and the policy implications of the results are discussed.

• 한국노년학
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.767-793
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• 2011

This study aims to explore how older adults construct their life-world in their ecological and socio-cultural context of rural communities and to understand what meanings they give to the life experiences they have had within their life-world. Two rural villages in Sunchang County in North Jeolla Province, South Korea were selected for this study and ethnographic fieldwork was conducted for about 2 months to gather the data. Despite the fact that rural communities face restructuring and economic decline, older adults in this study gave positive meanings to their life experiences. Doing agricultural labor particularly in later life let them maintain independence and continuity in life, and provided them with plenty of opportunity to interact with nature. Also, they had a sense of control over their physical and social environments where they had been familiar with for a long period of time. Furthermore, older adults had various memories of contributions to families and communities have been created. This research shows older adults in rural communities are active agents of their life-world, dismantling stereotypical notions of older adults as dependent, isolated, and marginalized. Implications of the study are discussed in detail.

• 한국노년학
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.867-881
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• 2009

This study's goal is to compare influencing factors to life satisfaction and sport participation of the elderly in the rural and urban area. And it is to provide basic information that is appropriate to the local peculiarity. In the research, we used the 2006 KLoSA, got the following result through the more than 60 years old 502 peoples in the rural area and 1129 in the urban area. There were significant differences of factors related to the life satisfaction between rural and urban elderly, and the most sport participants have higher life satisfaction than non-participants. Through the probit analysis, the result shows that significant factors affecting sport participation for the rural elderly are gender, age, working/retired, and for urban elderly, the education level and income are added. About the participation, there were also significant differences on the participation frequency for the rural elderly and on the participation hours for urban elderly. The significant factors of life satisfaction for rural elderly are the education level, subjective health, and sport participation, and for urban elderly were the education level, income, subjective health, and sport participation. Overall, it shows the urban elderly have higher life satisfaction than the rural elderly. The welfare system to improve the sports participation and life satisfaction needs the differentiated support reflecting the social demographic characteristics.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.171-180
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• 2020

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of the characteristics of the elderly living community in rural areas on the life satisfaction of the elderly. The subjects of study were 670 elderly people living at the living communities in Jeollabuk-do. In order to achieve the research purpose, multiple regression analysis model was applied using community characteristics as independent variables and life satisfaction as dependent variable. Among community variables, programs, mutual support, pysical space satisfaction, community consciousness and conflict, household labor burden are significant variables for life satisfaction. Among the personal characteristics, subjective health, monthly average income, marriage status(bereavement) are found to have a significant effect on life satisfaction. These results suggest that the influence of community characteristics as well as individual characteristics are important on the life satisfaction of the elderly living in the group life. The results of this study suggest such as policy implications that living community features such as interactions among seniors, programs, and their relationship with local residents are the important intervention points for improving life satisfactions of the elderly living community in rural area.

• Journal of Family Resource Management and Policy Review
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.131-148
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to examine the allocation of time between work and leisure by the rural elderly in Korea. The data used for this study are collected from fm households during the peak ($17^{th}\;to\;30^{th}$ June) and off-peak ($28^{th}$ November to $10^{th}$ December) farming seasons of 2005 using time diary. The sample for this study consists of 120 elderly over 65 years old living in rural area in eight provinces. The major findings are as follows. (1) The time spent of farm work by rural elderly in much longer than average work hours of elderly in general regardless of farming season. The indicates that the elderly farmers are the sustaining forces of agriculture as the urban industrial sector absorbs the younger labor force rural area. (2) There are significant differences in the work time(including form work, housework, and farm work plus house work) by gender, age, education, marital status, living arrangements. (3) The rural elderly spends less time in leisure compared to the elderly in general even during the off-peak season. (4) Especially during the peak season, time allocation between work and leisure by the rural elderly is heavily skewed, resulting in an inadequate amount of time for reproduction of labor. (5) There is only significant age difference in the amount leisure time regardless of farming season. (6) Male elderly farmers work approximately 30 minutes to 1 hour longer on farm than the females do, but the total work time (farm work plus housework) of female elderly is longer than that of the male elderly. There is no significant gender difference in the amount of leisure time during the peak season, whereas the men have more leisure than the women during the off-peak season. To conclude, the gender differences in time allocation among the rural elderly are minimal. However, the rural elderly of both genders suffers from excessive work hours and heavy workload compared to the urban counterpart.

• 한국노년학
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.419-437
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• 2011

The purpose of this study is to compare on the productive activities and life satisfaction between rural and urban elderly. Economic activities and caring labor activity had a negative effect on life satisfaction. but, community participation had a positive effect. In other words, the concept of productive activities in life satisfaction has multidimensionality. Therefore, using multiple indicators to measure is inappropriate. And, according to Chow test, coefficients that describe the structure of life satisfaction were different between the elderly living in rural and urban. The self-actualization needs of the elderly can be interpreted as due to be implemented differently, because of the different cultures of urban and rural areas. And, In life satisfaction, we have found that individual volunteer activity is more effective than volunteer through groups.

• 한국노년학
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.569-592
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• 2018

This study purported to investigate the current state of human rights of older adults residing in rural areas of Korea. The study utilized, as an analytic framework, 4 priority directions (1. "older persons and development", 2. "rural area development", 3. "advancing health and well-being into old age", and 4. "ensuring enabling and supportive environments") with 13 task actions recommended by Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing (MIPAA). Furthermore, the study examined gender differences in all items included in the analytic framework. Data was collected by the face-to-face survey on 800 subjects aged 65 and over. Statistical analyses were conducted using STATA 13.0 program. The main results were summarized in order of 4 priority directions as follows. First, average working hours per day were 6.2, and men reportedly participated in economic activities and needed job training more than women, while women participated in lifelong education programs more than men. Awareness of fire and disaster prevention facilities was low in both genders. Second, accessibility to the support center for the elderly living alone as well as protective services for the vulnerable elderly was found to be low. IT-based services and networking were used more by men than women, and specifically, IT-based financial transactions and welfare services were least used. Third, medical check-ups and vaccinations were well received, while consistent treatments for chronic illnesses and long-term care services were relatively less given. In addition, accessibility to mental health service centers was considerably low. Fourth, although old house structures and the lack of convenience facilities were found to be circumstantial risk factors for these elders, experiences of receiving housing support services were scarce. The elderly were found to rely more on informal care, and concerns for their care were higher in women than men. Plus, accessibility to elderly abuse services was markedly low. Based on these results, discussed were implications for implementing policies and practical interventions to raise the levels of the human rights for this population.

• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.44 no.4
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• pp.42-55
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• 2011

The basic approach of this study was to take the theory of cultural fluctuations to investigate the early modern and modern patterns of the use of ox carts and@ the social and economic appropriateness and cultural significance of ox carts. The study chose a village that was the only place that used ox carts in Bugye-myeon. The findings will help to understand how traditional cultural elements would continue or change according to the natural, geographical, economical, and cultural characteristics of a village. Located in Gaho-2-ri, Bugye-myeon, Gunwi-gun, Gyeongbuk Province, Dongrim Village started to use ox carts during the Japanese rule and replaced the traditional version with an improved one in 1972 when a reservoir was built. Until the 1970s, they used ox carts to carry agricultural products and luggage and to visit the markets in distant Bugye-myeon or Gunwi-eup. In the early 1980s when a cultivator was first introduced into the village, ox carts gradually disappeared in the village and eventually remained as a mere means of transportation. As the younger generations were active in introducing modern means of transportation, a cultivator became the main means of transportation in the village in the 1980s and a truck since the latter half of the 1990s. Despite those changes, however, the elderly in their seventies or older continued to use ox carts. With aged labor and inability to use modern means of transportation, they grew cows and oxen to cultivate the inclined fields and gain easy access to fields distributed in distant locations and continued to ox carts through reform. In Dongrim Village, the heritage of using reformed ox carts is the practice of appropriate technology by the old farmers and a cultural representation of an aged agricultural society. That is, the elderly recognized the appropriateness and practicality of traditional culture and renewed a traditional means of transportation called an ox cart. The phenomenon of the old men and women frequently using ox carts in an agricultural village in the mountain with geographical limitations has settled down as a cultural representation of the elderly in Dongrim Village. The continuing usage of ox carts in Dongrim Village is attributed to the fact that ox carts well suit the natural, geographical, and economic aspects of the village and the cultural inertia of the elderly with the aging of the farmers. Thus it is once again shown that human beings transmit and alter culture according to their overall situations and conditions.

• Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.291-302
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• 2009

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to identify and relationships among quality of life, perceived health status, pain and difficulty of daily activity with degenerative arthritis living in island residents. Methods: The participants were 601 degenerative arthritis patients. Data were collected using structured questionnaires from June 23th to Oct. 08th, 2008 and analyzed using the SPSS 12.0 program. and it included descriptive statistics, t-test, $x^2$-test, Pearson correlation coefficient. Results: The mean quality of life score was 115.87, perceived health status was 4.40, pain was 6.31 and difficulty of daily activity was 77.62. On the demographic variables, age, living arrangement, level of economics showed significant difference for the quality of life and sex and age showed significant difference for the perceived health status, pain, difficulty of daily activity. On the disease-related variables, duration of disease, use of analgesic drug showed significant difference for the dependent variables. There was a significant positive correlation among the quality of life, perceived health status, significant negative correlation pain and difficulty of daily activity. Conclusions: These results suggested that nursing intervention program including pain reduction, enhancing the perceived health status, ADL abilities and quality of life were necessary for the osteoarthritis patients in island residents.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 1976

This study was conducted in order to observe some descriptive epidemiological findings and causes of life-long labour force loss in the rural population of Korea, and to consider, on the basis of these observations, some principles of the necessary control measures. The total number of subjects in the study was 27,172, all family members of 4,174 households. The study population was located in the 81 counties, out of a total of 138 counties, where the college students conducted service activities during the summer of 1974. In each village area where these service activities were conducted, one household per student interviewer was randomly selected. Student interviewers were instructed on the contents of the questionnaire prior to the survey. The main contents of the questionnaire form included address, name, sex and age of each family members, and present life-long labour force loss, if any, of each family member. In cases of current labour force loss, the age of onset and causes were recorded. Of the total households surveyed, 8.9% had family members (1-4 in number) with life-long labour force loss. Of the total persons surveyed, the crude prevalence rate for life-long labour force loss was 15.1 per 1,000; and the age-standardized prevalence rates for male and female were 16.3 per 1,000 and 13.4 per 1,000, respectively. The rates, in both sexes, were gradually increased as the ages were increased. The prevalence rates per 1,000, in order, for life-long labour force loss by the causes were 10.2 for senility, 2.4 for impairment of extremities, 1.2 for chronic diseases of internal organs, 0.5 for other conditions of muosculoskeletal system, 0.4 for blindness in both eyes, 0.2 for impairment of spine, 0.2 for psychoses, and 0.1 for epilepsy. Among them the causes of impairment of extremities were stroke, poliomyelitis, accidents, arthritis and injury due to war operation, in that order of higher relative frequency. The frequency ratios by age of onset were also observed by the causes and sex.