• Journal of Family Resource Management and Policy Review
• /
• v.27 no.1
• /
• pp.25-39
• /
• 2023

This study aims to analyze the differences in the strength of single-parent families based on family characteristics. Using a sample of 267 female single parents, we explore the factors that impact family strength. We found that several variables impact the strength of families headed by a female single parent: the length of time members had lived together as a single-parent family, co-residents, interactions with ex-spouses, full-time work, and household income. Based on these findings, we suggest that the length of time that single-parent families have lived together is an important criterion for planning and evaluating the family policies and services offered by healthy family support centers. Furthermore, in the context of family resource management, family policies and programs that address time management and family life planning for full-time single parents should be developed and implemented.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
• /
• v.22 no.6
• /
• pp.550-557
• /
• 2021

This study examined the latent groups regarding the changes and difficulties after becoming a single parent and analyzed the differences in the backgrounds and depressive levels according to each group. The data of 2,500 single parents from the 2018 Single Parent Family Survey were analyzed by Latent Profile Analysis (LPA). LPA indicated four-profile groups: 1) parenting stability group, 2) normal group, 3) economic stability group, and 4) potential-risk group. Its determinants included gender and economic status, including government funding type and employment status rather than academic status. Specifically, female single parents with an unemployed or low-income support household were more likely to be linked to the potential-risk group. In addition, the potential-risk group showed a higher depressive level than the parenting stability group, normal group, and economic stability group. The significance of this study is that distinguished intervention based on the characteristics of each group can promote the effectiveness of single-parent family support policy.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
• /
• v.69 no.3
• /
• pp.121-140
• /
• 2017

The purpose of this study was to use the Korea Health Panel to determine how the mother's characteristic and household characteristic variables were associated with dental clinic use of children in childhood and adolescence. The logistic regression analysis found that mother's education level was statistically significantly positively correlated with underage child's dental clinic use and children in single-parent family were less likely to use a dental clinic than those in two-parent family. As for dental clinic use by diseases, the higher level of mother's education, the more likely to use a dental clinic due to dental caries and children in single-parent family were less likely to use a dental clinic due to dental caries than those in two-parent family. No difference in dental clinic use due to tooth extraction was found by any of mother's characteristics or household characteristics, probably because age has an absolute impact during the period between milk teeth and permanent teeth. Lastly, mother's education level and household income were significantly positively correlated with dental clinic use due to orthodontics. On the basis of these results, it is necessary to develop a customized strategy reflecting children's growth stages and household characteristics in making a plan for promoting oral health of children and adolescents.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
• /
• v.56 no.1
• /
• pp.127-153
• /
• 2004

In the absence of a male provider the state must decide how far and under what conditions it will provide for the mother and her children. In the case of lone mothers, there are three main possible sources of income: the labour market, the absent father, and the state. However, the relative proportions of these three sources vary significantly from country to country as well as from individual to individual within the group of lone parents. Until very recently the UK has been alone among countries of the EU in allowing lone parents to draw benefits without making themselves available for work so long as they have dependent children. However, in the 1990s, the UK government introduced major changes to his policies regarding lone parents. The UK government attempted to restrict the role of the state as a source of income for lone parent families. At the beginning of the 1990s, the emphasis in the UK was put on securing more money from 'absent fathers' to maintain. However, the policy was unsuccessful and by the mid-1990s attention to the only other possible source of income for lone parent families, the labour market, was stepped up, notwithstanding the ambivalence of politicians about the desirability of women with young children entering employment. From 1998 the Labour government introduced a series of reforms aimed at reducing both worklessness and poverty by raising welfare payments to families both in and out of work, improving financial incentives to work and introducing a more proactive welfare system. The results presented here suggest that these policies have raised the employment rates of lone parents by around 5 percentage points, or 80,000. These employment gains have come from a welfare reform package that does not require lone parents to search for jobs, or uses time limits in welfare programmes. In addition these gains have been achieved despite generous increases in welfare payments for lone parents who do not work. These earnings gains combined with the more generous welfare are making rapid progress in reducing lone parents' poverty.

• Journal of Family Resource Management and Policy Review
• /
• v.21 no.2
• /
• pp.25-50
• /
• 2017

Recently, concern about family safety is rising again as an important issue with the context of family healthiness and well-being in Korean society despite of the dramatic economic growth. The purpose of this study is to examine the status of family safety of singles and single-parent households and to investigate the effect of social capital on the level of their family safety. Data are from the 10th wave of Korea Welfare Panel Study analysing one-person households(N=2,017) and single-parent households(N=172). One-person households were categorized as three groups by age(the youths/middle-aged/the elderly) and single-parent households were also three by family types(mother-child/fahter-child/grandparent-child). The major results were as follows: First, the mean of family safety index was highest among middle-aged, while single youths had the fewest problems in terms of family safety. Second, social capital was found to vary by family structure. In the one-person households, all the levels of the social capital variables, including trust, bond, acceptance, and participation, differed significantly; only two variables, bond and embracement, differed in the single-parent households. Third, social capital differed between the low-income households and others significantly. Forth, the positive effects of social capital on overcoming family safety problems were investigated. In conclusion, social capital represents an alternative resource for overcoming economic hardship for low-income one-person/single-parent households, especially for middle-aged singles and father-child single-parent households. Based on these empirical results, theoretical implications were discussed with regard to family policy and programs.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
• /
• v.68 no.3
• /
• pp.5-27
• /
• 2016

In this study, we examine differences in the children's medical utilization by family structure with a focus on single-mother and single-father families using data from the Korean Health Panel Survey, years 2008~2012. We also investigate whether the cause of transition into a single-parent household, whether coresidence with children's grandparents, and number of siblings are associated with children's use of ambulatory visits. The main findings of this study are as follows. First, children who grew up in single-father households had fewer ambulatory visits compared to those living with both parents after controlling for children's demographic characteristics and family backgrounds. Second, coresidence with grandparents was not associated with children's medical utilization. However, number of siblings was significantly and negatively correlated with the use of ambulatory visits. Third, children living with a divorced father had fewer medical utilization compared to those living with a widowed father, and coresidence with grandparents was positively associated with children's use of ambulatory visits. Our findings suggest that tailored policy supports would be more fruitful based on characteristics of single-parent households such as gender of parents, and the supports should also pay more attention to health care needs and medical utilization of children.

• Journal of Korean Public Health Nursing
• /
• v.23 no.2
• /
• pp.162-173
• /
• 2009

Purpose: This study investigated the health and socioeconomic status of single-parent and partnered families, and examined the intersection between sex and single-parent status focusing on inequalities of health and socioeconomic status. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study using the data from the nationally representative 2005 Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. A total of 14,827 respondents had custody of their own children and other family members (13,943 were coupled families and 891 were single-parent). Results: Our result indicate that single-parent had poorer health status and were more likely to have lower educational attainment, lower household income, no home ownership and be unemployed. However, the association between single-parent status and socioeconomic and health inequality were in divergent ways according to sex. The most socioeconomically disadvantaged were single-parent women. Inequalities in health differ markedly by sex but vary little according to single-parent status. Conclusions: An uneven distribution of socioeconomic resources might help us to understand why single-parent, both women and men, have worse health than parents who live together. Previously recognized sex gap with regard to health status also might help us to understand the difference in health between single-parent men and single-parent women found here.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
• /
• v.13 no.9
• /
• pp.387-395
• /
• 2015

The aim of this study was to investigate effects of socio-demographic, household, social support, health-related factors on adolescent internet use time. Multiple regression analysis was conducted to examine factors affecting adolescent internet using time, and this study used the 2014 10th Korean Youth Health Risk Behavior On-line Survey data by Centers for Disease and Prevention. Results show that as for socio-demographic factors, being male, lower economic status, being middle school student, and having poor academic grade were; as for household factors, youth-led, one-parent, grandparent(s), multicultural, and North Korean defectors family were; as for social support factors, the absence of family support, the absence of friend support and the absence teacher support were; and as for health-related factors, less exercise, higher level of stress, and lower level of subjective happiness were associated with increased internet using time. Based on these results, convergent implications about effective intervention strategies that adolescents can use internet appropriately were discussed in the section of conclusion.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Child Welfare
• /
• no.59
• /
• pp.1-23
• /
• 2017

Using a subsample of 3,409 unmarried smothers and their children from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study, the present study examined the cross-lagged effects of unmarried fathers' involvement on their children's behavior problems. Father involvement was used as a latent variable to measure the frequency of fathers' visits to the child, fathers' instrumental support, and their supportive parenting. Both variables of father involvement and child behavior problems were repeatedly measured at child ages 3, 5, and 9 to estimate their trends over time. The results indicated that fathers' more active engagement in parenting at child ages 3 to 5 reduced behavior problems in children at ages 5 to 9. Further discussions include programs and services to support unmarried fathers through education and training opportunities for effective parenting, relationship skills, and conflict resolutions as well as policy strategies to encourage their continuous involvement in the lives of their children.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.14 no.10
• /
• pp.551-561
• /
• 2014

This study analyzes the surveys of local residents on their family-related needs and finds the differences of specific target attributes in order to establish family support projects that can meet the specific demands. The results are as follows. First, the domestic concerns of local residents were more related to 'difficulties in their children's education and care' compared to 'family relationship problems'. Second, although there is high awareness of family support centers, the overall utilization is very low, and utilization is high amongst families with special needs such as single-parent families, multi-cultural families, and kinship families. However, utilization was low amongst families without special needs. Third, the desired services varied by gender, age, education level, family structure, occupation, and income level. Therefore, there is a need for tailored service programs and promotion of Multicultural Family Support Center that reflects the needs of the diverse needs of local families.