• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.79-89
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• 2010

Objectives: This study aims to identify health status and health risks among female marriage immigrants to Korea and to provide a basis for public health strategies to address their health issues. Methods: The participants of the study were 3,069 immigrant wives. The health examination was conducted by the Korea Association of Health Promotion (KAHP) in 2008. The participants also completed self-administered questionnaires on demographic characteristics, health-related behaviors and mental health. Results: Patterns of immigrant women's health problems differed by age and country of origin. Behavior patterns also differed by their heritage, age, and years of residence in Korea. Generally Vietnamese women fell in lower ranges of disease prevalence and health risk factors in the participant group and Japanese women presented most healthy eating habits. Filipina women showed relatively high disease prevalence than any other group. Conclusion: Immigration to Korea by marriage is relatively a new phenomenon, thus continuing surveillance and research are needed to identify health risks, behavior patterns, and their relationships. Interventions and policies for the health of migrant wives, their children and families are required.

• Nutrition Research and Practice
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.260-265
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• 2011

The objectives of this study were to develop a food-frequency questionnaire (FFQ) for Vietnamese female immigrants in Korea and to evaluate the validity of the FFQ. A total of 80 food items were selected in developing the FFQ according to consumption frequency, the contribution of energy and other nutrients, and the cooking methods based on one-day 24 hour recall (24HR) from 918 Vietnamese female immigrants between November 2006 and November 2007. The FFQ was validated by comparison with 24HR of 425 Vietnamese female immigrants between November 2008 and August 2009. The absolute nutrient intake calculated from the FFQ was higher than that estimated by 24HR for most nutrients. The correlation coefficients between 24HR and FFQ ranged from 0.10 (vitamin C) - 0.36 (energy) for crude intake, 0.05 (vitamin E) - 0.32 (calcium) for per 1000 kcal, and 0.08 (zinc) - 0.34 (calcium) for energy-adjusted, respectively. More than 70% of subjects were classified into the same or adjacent agreement groups for nutrients other than fiber, sodium, vitamin A, vitamin C, and vitamin E, while less than 10% of subjects were classified into complete disagreement groups. We conclude that the FFQ appears to be an acceptable tool for estimating nutrient intake and dietary patterns of Vietnamese female immigrants in Korea. Future studies to validate the FFQ using various biomarkers or other dietary assessment methods are needed.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.103-114
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• 2017

Objectives: This study aims to investigate the married female immigrants' experience on Korean dietary life adaptation, especially identifying the symbolic meaning and nature of experiences. Methods: This study was conducted with six married female immigrants through an analysis of the qualitative materials which consisted of in-depth interviews, field notes and materials. Data was analyzed using Giorgi's phenomenological research methods. Results: The results were deduced as 116 significant statements, 17 formulated meanings (sub-theme), and 6 theme clusters. Six theme clusters comprised of lack of preliminary knowledge and information, conflict and support in relationships, Korean food culture which is different from homeland, adaptation attitudes of Korean food culture according to situation, sharing of homeland food culture, and practical difficulty and expectative service. The participants started Korean life in the dark about Korea and Korean food culture, so they were subjected to trial and error. The conflict between Korean mother-in-law and foreign daughter-in-law came from lack of consideration of daughter-in-law's cultural background. Some participants were hurt because of misunderstanding and nitpicking. They were learning about cooking method, ingredient, seasoning, table setting and manner. Some participants integrated Korean food culture and their homeland food culture. Some of them assimilated with Korean food culture. One of them maintained homeland food culture. The participants who adapted Korean food culture well could share homeland food amicably. They sometimes didn't apply the services which were offered by the government, because the services did not fit their needs. Some of them didn't know the usage route of the services or information. They had resistance about home teaching and it showed that outreach service was not always effective. Conclusions: This study suggested that it is necessary to develop a practical support plan which covers married female immigrants' real needs and system improvement measures.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.14 no.8
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• pp.197-206
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• 2014

This research intends to explore services, programs or policies for supporting married immigrant women to qualify themselves for being employed from the professional point of view on the assumption that their desire to get a job is high. To achieve this purpose, a delphi survey was conducted with a panel of 13 experts related to multi cultural family support in three sessions from December 20, 2013 to June 5, 2014. To analyze the collected data, descriptive statistics, including frequency, percentage, the mean, and standard deviation, were implemented, and Kendall's W for the internal reliability test on the survey instrument was carried out for statistical processing. The results are as follows : from the first session, services, programs, and policies in the level of married immigrant women themselves, children, parents in law and/or husband, organizations, and government were suggested. The highest item in average is systematization of levelwise Korean teaching program. The next higher items in average are daycare service during job training, parents in law and/or husband's consideration, parenting support services, program development of the organizations, linkage and integration system among the government ministries. As a result of the Kendall's W performed for the internal reliability test of the Delphi research, it has been concluded that the professionals' view on the supportive measures' important contents was statistically identical. According to the results of the Delphi research, systematization of levelwise Korean teaching program most required for the furtherance of the married immigrant women's entering the workforce, followed by provision of the services to draw family support, a grounding teaching of Korean corporate culture, and reconsideration of the policies.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.413-422
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• 2010

With the beginning of foreign workers' immigration since 1990, Korea has faced multi-cultural society. At the same time, the number of female marriage immigrants have constantly increased. But the social services for immigrants are not yet prepared. According to the research on the actual condition of immigrants' culture enjoyment, which was done by Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Korea, the most preferable leisure activity of immigrants is 'sightseeing'. So this study focused on improvement of web contents of tourism information to satisfy the information needs of immigrants. Concretely, this study analysed the present condition of the existing tourism web contents, and analysed deeply the web site 'Tourism Busan' for special reference. Especially this study tried to analyse VOD images among web contents of 'Tourism Busan', and provided concrete improvement plan for that. And also this study processed interview with marriage immigrants to provide web site evaluation at the level of immigrants' eyes. As a result of evaluation, immigrants was the most dissatisfied with 'contents quality', and showed lower dissatisfaction at 'service quality', 'interface quality' factors.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.49 no.1
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• pp.61-68
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• 2016

Objectives: In South Korea (hereafter Korea), the number of adolescent offspring of immigrants has rapidly increased since the early 1990s, mainly due to international marriage. This research sought to examine the association between the experience of school violence and mental health outcomes, and the role of help-seeking behaviors in the association, among biethnic adolescents in Korea. Methods: We analyzed cross-sectional data of 3627 biethnic adolescents in Korea from the 2012 National Survey of Multicultural Families. Based on the victim's help-seeking behavior, adolescents who experienced school violence were classified into three groups: 'seeking help' group; 'feeling nothing' group; 'not seeking help' group. Multivariate logistic regression was applied to examine the associations between the experience of school violence and depressive symptoms for males and females separately. Results: In the gender-stratified analysis, school violence was associated with depressive symptoms in the 'not seeking help' (odds ratio [OR], 7.05; 95% confidence interval [CI], 3.76 to 13.23) and the 'seeking help' group (OR, 2.77; 95% CI, 1.73 to 4.44) among male adolescents after adjusting for potential confounders, including the nationality of the immigrant parent and Korean language fluency. Similar associations were observed in the female groups. However, in the 'feeling nothing' group, the association was only significant for males (OR, 8.34; 95% CI, 2.82 to 24.69), but not females (OR, 0.77; 95% CI, 0.18 to 3.28). Conclusions: This study suggests that experience of school violence is associated with depressive symptoms and that the role of victims' help-seeking behaviors in the association may differ by gender among biethnic adolescents in Korea.

• Human Ecology Research
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• v.54 no.1
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• pp.1-11
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• 2016

This study developed and evaluated a Seoul National University literacy program for multicultural family children (SNU-LPMFC). The program was developed to enhance Korean language ability for children from multicultural backgrounds. The characteristics of this program were education using fairy tales and nursery rhymes, individual education from home visiting teacher, and parent participation education for effective children's learning support. The effectiveness of this program was examined based on 54 young children and their mothers (34 in the experimental group and 20 in the control group). To examine the effect of SNU-LPMFC, we assessed children's literacy ability as pre-tests and post-tests as well as interviewed the home visiting teachers. After 8 weeks' field application, the experimental group exhibited higher scores than the control group in total language ability and phonology. Home visiting teachers highly praised the effectiveness of the program as the children showed a higher level of interest and attention. SNU-LPMFC was shown to be an effective program to improve multicultural family children's literacy. Implications for research and practice were discussed along with the main results of this study. This study extends the limitations of existing language education programs with uniform teaching methods, configured a customized education approach for children from multicultural families and helps develop concrete teaching material that validated its effectiveness.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.275-294
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• 2010

In recent years, international migration of professional workers is significantly increasing as globalization has been deepened more and more. South Korea is not an exception for this case. Immigration of professional workers have steadily increased since 2000 in Korea, and the number reached approximately to 50,000 in 2009. In addition, it is a major trend that immigrants of short-sojourn are decreasing and ones of long-sojourn increasing. Our research shows that foreign language instructor has the greatest number of foreign professional immigrants. The next is professional immigrants related to business-activities. There are considerably entertainers, but they have greatly decreased since 2003. Majority of foreign professional immigrants settle down in a few metropolises. Especially, they reside in Seoul Metropolitan Area and Southeast coastal region. Professional immigrants trend to do with Korean on the base of their offices rather than residental communities in terms of adaptation, and they do not have strong will to reside permanently in Korea. Moreover, they are located at a blind spot of Korean government's foreign immigrant policy, comparing to foreign workers and female marriage immigrants.