• Nuclear industry
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• v.27 no.1 s.287
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• pp.61-71
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• 2007

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.289-310
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to examine how political interest, political ideologies, and information-searching goals influence the amount of information voters search, the ways in which people search for information about political candidates, and the type of information they select. The results showed that the participants under accuracy goal searched much more information and the participants under the high level of interest were not affected by conservative ideology, but the participants with the low level of interest were influenced by the liberal ideology and viewed substantially more information. And most of participants had the attribute-centered searching pattern. The social policies were accessed most, however, the information about party and personal background of a candidate were found least.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.103-128
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• 2006

The present study investigated individuals' perception of important social issues in Korea. Based on previous research(Hahn, 1994; Hahn & Kang, 2000), a checklist containing 370 social issues was created. This checklist was administered to 1600 Koreans(812 college students, 788 adults) residing in 5 regional areas in Korea during the period of December 2004 and February 2005. Data were analyzed by the respondents' age, sex, and residing areas, and findings were compared to those of the two previous studies conducted in 1994 and 1999. Major findings of the study are as follows. First, across the three surveys, over 50% of the respondents consistently indicated the following four items as important social issues in the Korean society: political corruption, environmental pollution, the education system that is driven too much for college entrance, employment difficulty for local college graduates. Second, more than 50% of the respondents in the current survey indicated the following 12 items as important social issues that must be resolved: high unemployment rate, political corruption, environmental pollution, education system, overall difficulty of getting jobs, the nation's distrust in politics, hardships of life among the working classes, political incompetence, people with defective personal credit standings, employment difficulty for local college graduates, political instability, corruption of public servants. Third, analyses on the top 30 social issues across the three surveys revealed a positive and significant rank-order correlation for a five-year period(i.e., 1994-1999, 1999-2004), but not for a ten-year period(i.e., 1994-2004). Implications of the study and directions for future research are discussed.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.87-108
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• 2013

With questionnaires conducted for 613 adult Koreans in Seoul, the present study examined how their social features (income level, political party identification, political values, values of capitalism and egalitarianism) exercise influence on attitudes toward income polarization and their evaluation of government policies. Two groups of participants (high vs. low) for each social feature were formed first. Then their attitudes toward income polarization (liberal vs. conservative) and evaluations of policies (liberal vs. conservative) exercised by government (Participatory vs. Practical) were compared. Results indicated that liberal value was strengthened by liberal value, anti-capitalistic, and conservative value was strengthened by egalitarian values, and party identification. It was also found that party identification partial effect on the judgment of policies exercised by Participatory Government. These findings were discussed in terms of their implications for Korean society and measures for communication constructive for settlement of income polarization were suggested.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.137-170
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• 2002

The present paper reviews the development of democracy in the West and Korea. The first part of the paper provide a cultural framework for understanding the development of democracy in West and Korea. In the second part of the paper, an empirical study conducted in Korea will be presented. A survey questionnaire was developed to assess respondents' conception of political participation, political efficacy, trust, leadership, and social relations and it has been administered to national stratified sample in Korea (n=1,000). The results indicate that Korean respondents support the basic ideas of liberal democracy, such as the right to vote, participate in political organization, freedom of speech, and criticize government. At the same time, Korean respondents supported collective values, such as harmonious family life, harmonious social relations, and governmental welfare programs. Although Koreans trusted close ingroup members, such as family members and friends, they were less likely to trust their colleagues and outgroup members and were not likely to trust political and governmental institutions. Moreover, Korean respondents showed a low degree of political participation and efficacy and a high degree of political alienation. As for leadership, Koreans preferred moral and strong leaders. The overall results indicate that in Korea, although the basic ideals of democracy are valued, the method of implementing these ideals is different from the West. Detailed analysis of the results and implications of the study will be presented.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.529-552
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• 2013

This study examines how individual attitudes towards government and society are affected by political conservatism and liberalism. With survey data from 533 adults(M=249, F=284) who live in Seoul and surrounding areas, we examine the general attitudes towards society, expectation on general government and differences in attitudes towards the Roh Moo-hyun Gov't and the Lee Myung-bak Gov't between liberals and conservatives. Results show that liberals and conservatives vary by age and residence, whereas attitudes towards the general government and society are not. By contrast, liberals and conservatives are distinctly different evaluating governments with specific political tendency. Liberals are more positive to the Roh Moo-hyun Gov't than conservatives whereas the evaluation appears conversely on the Lee Myung-bak Gov't. These differences of attitudes are more distinctive when dividing liberals and conservatives by subjective judgement and political party preference than conceptual measurement of political ideology. These findings suggest that political conservatism and liberalism is the factor that has powerfully affected individual attitudes in the specific political context rather than a consistent ideological framework in Korean society.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.447-467
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• 2009

Lakoff's (2002) 'nation-as-family' metaphor suggests that conservatism and liberalism in the United States are based respectively on two different sets of morality, i.e., "strict father" morality and "nurturant parents" morality. He argues that values associated with respective metaphors and political principles derived from them tend to determine certain political attitudes and policy endorsement. Using the priming technique, this study attempted to examine whether "strict father" and "nurturant parents" morality are indeed what underlie very different positions conservatives and liberals take towards people in need. The results supported the Lakoff's idea and demonstrated that, compared to priming "nurturant parents" morality, priming "strict father" morality actually led people to derogate character of those in need and to attribute more responsibility onto them for their economic predicament. This research leads us to reconsider what constitutes politically conservative and liberal attitudes and emphasizes the malleability of political attitudes.

• Survey Research
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.51-78
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• 2004

This paper examines political leaders' image based on the concepts of social identity and distance. These concepts come from the two ideas: (1) Individuals create events to confirm the sentiments that they have about themselves and others in the current situation. (2) During this process structured sets of beliefs (social identity) about attributes of various entities are formed. Statistical analysis of the data from college students in Seoul offers three main findings. First, attributes clustered into four major groups-sociability, responsibility, power and activity. Sociability concerns as sense of approval or disapproval that can elaborated into closeness and intimacy. Responsibility relates to the judgement of morality, public obligation, or other standards. Power refers to social power, physical magnitude and so on. Activity indexes an entity's spontaneity, which can be elaborate into judgements of agency, speed and so on, Second, respondents evaluate negatively political leaders at the dimensions of sociability, responsibility, and activity, They are positively evaluated only at the dimension of power. Third, political leaders who are felt to be closer than others seem to have more political support nowadays.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.21-43
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• 2015

The purpose of this study was to examine cultural differences and related difficulties which KoreanChinese women in Korean society experience at work and the different styles of their cultural adaptation. For this, semi-structured interviews consisting of questions related to these issues were conducted on 17 Korean-Chinese women living in the metropolitan area (average age: 34, SD = 9.25, average stay in Korea = 4 years, SD = 2.24). After analysis of qualitative data based on Giorgi's(1985) method of phenomenological analysis, a total of 225 significant statements were found and those were grouped into 23 subcategories, which were then grouped again into 9 categories. Cultural differences and related difficulties appeared in identity, verbal communication, political and economic aspects, and relational and sexual affairs. It was also revealed that Korean-Chinese women adapted in the three ways of Active, Passive, and Avoident. Lastly, various social actions that can aid the adaptation of Korean-Chinese women to Korea based on these results were discussed.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.61-81
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• 2004

The purpose of this study was to investigate effects of North Korea defectors' living experiences in South Korea on their self-perceptions and perceptions of South Korea. For this purpose, a questionnaire was distributed to 66 defectors with no living experiences at all and 99 defectors with living experiences of an average of 2.7 years in South Korea. They were asked to rate their own as well as South Koreans' values, personality, attitudes toward sexual misbehavior, gender stereotypes. Also, they evaluated the society of South Korea and its political control. The results indicated that those defectors with living experiences tended to perceive more negatively their own and South Koreans as well, and yet that they were less negative for sexual misbehavior and weaker for gender stereotypes. Also, results suggested that living experiences led defectors to perceive South Korea in a more negative way. Those findings were discussed in terms of changes in culture.