• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.516-524
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• 2012

K-pop has gained its popularity all over the world, and its popularity is mostly concentrated in Asian countries. Korean wave which has started from Korean dramas has expanded its horizon to K-pop, which centers around idol singers since 2005. The K-pop's popularity is evident from fans imitating singers' dance moves, makeup, appearance, and even trying to learn Korean. This study tries to explore consuming behaviors of Asian K-pop consumers from China, Japan, Thailand and Vietnam, and the main reasons Asian consumers prefer K-pop over their own countries' pop. The study also analyzes on how K-pop influences K-pop consumers to build positive feeling toward Korea and give them intention to visit Korea. The results showed the differences among K-pop consuming behaviors, relationship among attributes of K-pop, positive feeling toward Korea, and intention to visit Korea among four Asian countries. Findings would be the stepping stone that could support K-pop to expand its market to other foreign countries.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.201-206
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• 2019

The study aims to explore ways to advance into the Indonesian market, focusing on hallyu contents such as Korean dramas, music and movies. To this end, we have empirically explored the reasons why local people in Indonesia like Korean wave contents, its consumption channels, its popularity factors for Korean wave contents and its effectiveness. According to the research, the reasons for the popularity of Korean wave contents were confirmed by the quality of the contents itself and the human appeal of the contents. And the consumption path was mainly through television, and the favorable impression of Korean wave contents was found to have a positive effect on the positive feeling toward Korea and the willingness to visit Korea.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.47-53
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• 2012

Businesses make use of advertising strategy using models to give consumers efficient product information. Modern advertisements often make use of models for greater reminiscence to create messages and remind viewers of the product. The purpose of this study was to examine the characteristics of each type of model. The subjects were 230 college students in their twenties or older, and the material was collected from October 20, 2011 to November 5, 2011 to examine the effects of model characteristics on buying intention as well as attitude toward a brand. A questionnaire survey was used; investigators gave one copy to each interviewee. The study investigated the characteristics of each model using a questionnaire of each 40 copies with five kinds of photographs. The characteristics of models had great influence on buying intention and attitude toward the brand: First, factor 2 (being honest and virtuous and having good credit and a good press assessment) and factor 3 (being interesting and a good communicator and creating good memories) had great influence on buying intention. Factor 2 was explained by reliability, and factor 3 by the efficiency of the model in creating a feeling. Second, factors 1 (being attractive, smart, unique, friendly, loved by others, and popular), 2, and 3 influenced attitude toward brand. Factor 1 encapsulated the outgoing characteristics of a model, factor 2 was based on reliability, and factor 3 was based on the efficiency of the model in creating a feeling. The model's positive effects on buying intention and attitudes toward brand shall be examined. For their positive influence on buying intention, reliability and efficiency shall be given attention. For their positive influence on attitude toward brand, creating a good impression, having outgoing characteristics, being reliable, and efficiency shall be given attention. The findings were as follows: Model characteristics influencing buying intention were similar to those influencing attitude toward brand. The differences were as follows. First, reliability and efficiency influenced buying intention. When customers were asked to consider the influence on buying intention of an advertisement, regardless of the strength of the buying intention, they considered these two characteristics. Customers decided to buy based not only on the credibility of the product as presented in the advertisement but also the transmission of the contents of the advertisement. Second, outgoing characteristics, reliability, and efficiency influenced attitude toward a brand. The attitude toward a brand was said to be the attitude toward the business. The attitude is produced even after buying, so businesses view it as very important. The attitude might vary depending upon the model used rather than the brand. Therefore, a model with outgoing characteristics was thought to be important. Therefore, attitude toward a brand whose model influenced buying intention as well as attitude toward brand had outgoing characteristics. The result is that an image the model was related to attitude toward the brand. As such, customers would buy the goods advertised. However, an outgoing image of a model was also important to create a positive attitude toward a business brand. For instance, talent Park Gyeong-Rim's photo was used to promote cosmetics about 10 years ago. When she worked as a model of cosmetics products, she had to make compensation for losses and damages because she made a mistake on a talk show program. At that time, customers who had bought the cosmetics product asked for refunds of several billion won. As such, models who are said to be the face of the businesses they represent can play an important role. To advertise in the most attractive and effective way, the current image of a model should be investigated by examining current activities and news articles after selecting the model, and the model's efficiency and attitude toward the brand should be examined. Factors that stimulate customers' buying decisions can be used to plan advertisement that have positive influence on a brand. This study had the limitation of investigating mainly college students and there were insufficient copies of the questionnaire. The investigation was not done widely but in detail so that a concrete investigation could not be done. Further studies shall supplement these shortcomings and discuss new directions.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 1981

The purpose of this study was to investigate the attitudes of handed-me-down clothing in the Che-ju elementary school children. Measures of attitudes toward handed-me-down clothing consisted of: 1) attitudes of receiver's 2) feeling of receive.'s 3) behaviors 4) possession 5) frequency of wearing handed-me-down clothing. Two aspects of clothing behaviors were slightly modified to assess conformity?individuality, satisfaction in clothing. The sample consisted of 565 students in Che-ju elementary school children, Korea. The data, collected by means of a self-administered questionaire, were analysed by Chi-Square ($X^2$) and Correlation(R). The results indicated that: 1. Handed-me-down clothing was not significantly different between elder brothers (sisters) and child. 2. Most of the children wanted to wear comfort, good style, fit and neat in handed-me-down clothing. 3. Most of the children were satisfied with their handed-me-down clothing and tended not to be aware of the source in clothing. 4. Most of the children had higher interest of individuality and satisfaction in clothing behaviors.

• Women's Health Nursing
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.518-535
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• 2001

Nursing practices should be based on the understanding of human beings. In order to understand human beings, it is important to study the lifestyles and thoughts of people in their natural environment. In this sense, the cultural aspects of a society need to be studied for a culture-bound nursing service. Child care, which is an important element of nursing, is also strongly influenced by the culture of a society. Therefore, a cultural study is necessary to understand the child-rearing practices of any society. The major purpose of this dissertation is to provide basic foundations for developing a culture-based theory for nursing intervention through studying traditional cultural elements of child care in Korean society. The study examined child-rearing practices in a small village on Koje Island in the southern part of Korea. It utilized ethnographic methodologies including participatory observations and in-depth interviews. The study participants were 9 Korean mothers living on Koje Island. The average age was 52. The data were collected between July in 1998 and December in 1999. The average number of interviews per person was 7-8, and the duration of each interview was approximately 2 hours. The data were analyzed using the Spradley Analytical Method. The following 9 major child-rearing aspects of mothers on Koje Island were discovered as a result of the study: 1. Firstly, mothers on Koje Island were mostly concerned about the "Old Birth Goddess' Curse", especially during their child's early years. This concern was evidenced by their careful behavior when their child was very young and by their praying to the Old Birth Goddess not to be jealous of their babies. 2. Secondly, they wished their children to live a different and better life than themselves. It was represented by their strong motivation toward their children's education as well as their expectation for their children's success. In traditional Korean culture, Korean people think that the rise and fall of the household depend on their offsprings. Therefore, Korean mothers wish their children attain to a higher level of social status through education. 3. Third, mothers are concerned about their children's righteousness. Mothers on Koje island expect their children to live with discretion, justice, strength, respect, harmony, and to do their best in life. 4. Next was an 'anticipation of their children's happy marriage'. The attributes of this category were an 'anxiety about their children's married life', and 'an expectation of a good spouse for their children'. Because Korean people believe that only a son can continue the bloodline of a family, especially Korean mothers have a great concern of the possibility of their daughters not having a son after marriage. Also they have different expectations toward their daughter-in-laws than son-in-laws. 5. Korean mothers also derived their satisfaction from their son. It was characterized by 'excessive affection toward their son', 'dependency on their son', and 'being afraid of their married daughter having a girl like themselves'. Korean society has been a patriarchy. Therefore, a son is beloved as someone who will take care of his old parents, be in charge of ancestral rites, and provide a daughter-in-law who can conceive a son. 6. The sixth category concerned 'the differences in their expectations for their children'. The attributes in this category were 'different expectations depending on their children's gender', 'different expectations depending on their children's ability', and a 'great sympathy toward children with low abilities'. Korean mothers expect their son to become better than their daughter. 7. The seventh category was related to their 'roles in child-caring practices'. Traditionally a child was raised in an extended family system in Korea So it was not the sole duty of a mother to bring up the child. Korean mothers used to receive much help rasing children from their in-laws, and family members. On the other hand, many children grew up by themselves, because their mothers were very busy taking care of housework. Furthermore, many children also grew up in poverty. 8. Mothers also had issues related to 'conflicts in child rearing'. They were characterized by 'lack of understanding', 'rudeness of children', and 'giving vent to one's anger'. 9. Finally, mothers regretted not doing their best in child-rearing practices. It was characterized by a 'bitter feeling of repentance', 'feeling irritated', and 'feeling of unsatisfaction'.

• Journal of Korea Entertainment Industry Association
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• v.14 no.8
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• pp.131-140
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• 2020

This article attempted to apply the methodology of film acting as a performance oriented towards socio-cultural meaning to Min-sik Choi's acting. Specifically, the relationship between the body, the face, the audio, the direction and the attitude toward film technology mentioned in the interview dictation of actor Choi Min-sik was analyzed. In conclusion, Min-sik Choi's acting cannot be defined only by method acting, but implies or integrates the typical or avant-garde acting theories such as Stanislavsky, Strasberg, Mayerhold, Brecht and Grotovski. Above all, it is the presentation that expresses the flow of life through movement suggested by S. Kracauer. The feeling of compassion that Choi Min-sik himself emphasizes is in contact with the essence of the film that reproduces the flow of life, and it expands to an intended screen performance with a certain purpose. The screen performance that can be compressed with compassion and the flow of life is expressed by Min-sik Choi's various personas. His persona, transcending good and evil, reflects the present of Korean society.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.55-78
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• 2021

Tosolve complex and diverse social problems and ensure the quality of life of individuals, social robots that can interact with humans are attracting attention. In the past, robots were recognized as beings that provide labor force as they put into industrial sites on behalf of humans. However, the concept of today's robot has been extended to social robots that coexist with humans and enable social interaction with the advent of Smart technology, which is considered an important driver in most industries. Specifically, there are service robots that respond to customers, the robots that have the purpose of edutainment, and the emotionalrobots that can interact with humans intimately. However, popularization of robots is not felt despite the current information environment in the modern ICT service environment and the 4th industrial revolution. Considering social interaction with users which is an important function of social robots, not only the technology of the robots but also other factors should be considered. The design elements of the robot are more important than other factors tomake consumers purchase essentially a social robot. In fact, existing studies on social robots are at the level of proposing "robot development methodology" or testing the effects provided by social robots to users in pieces. On the other hand, consumer emotions felt from the robot's appearance has an important influence in the process of forming user's perception, reasoning, evaluation and expectation. Furthermore, it can affect attitude toward robots and good feeling and performance reasoning, etc. Therefore, this study aims to verify the effect of appearance of social robot and consumer emotions on consumer's attitude toward social robot. At this time, a social robot design evaluation model is constructed by combining heterogeneous data from different sources. Specifically, the three quantitative indicator data for the appearance of social robots from the ABOT Database is included in the model. The consumer emotions of social robot design has been collected through (1) the existing design evaluation literature and (2) online buzzsuch as product reviews and blogs, (3) qualitative interviews for social robot design. Later, we collected the score of consumer emotions and attitudes toward various social robots through a large-scale consumer survey. First, we have derived the six major dimensions of consumer emotions for 23 pieces of detailed emotions through dimension reduction methodology. Then, statistical analysis was performed to verify the effect of derived consumer emotionson attitude toward social robots. Finally, the moderated regression analysis was performed to verify the effect of quantitatively collected indicators of social robot appearance on the relationship between consumer emotions and attitudes toward social robots. Interestingly, several significant moderation effects were identified, these effects are visualized with two-way interaction effect to interpret them from multidisciplinary perspectives. This study has theoretical contributions from the perspective of empirically verifying all stages from technical properties to consumer's emotion and attitudes toward social robots by linking the data from heterogeneous sources. It has practical significance that the result helps to develop the design guidelines based on consumer emotions in the design stage of social robot development.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.53-62
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• 2012

Well-being is a reflection of current sociocultural trends that focus on the quality of life based on economic growth. Furthermore, organic food is believed to help people maintain good health and therefore leads to increased consumption of organic foods. Therefore, consumer interest in organic food is increasing, causing its market to grow, and this trend will be maintained in the future. The abuse of agricultural pesticides, gene manipulation, and bovine spongiform encephalopathy has caused consumers to worry about food safety. The well-being trend has also contributed to consumers' growing interest inorganic food and organic agricultural products. A consumer's choice offood is a complex processes affected by various factors. In particular, organic food is considered an individualistic merit good, considering the consumers' preferences related to certification policies. Therefore, various factors such as personal characteristics and sense of value could affect consumers' decisions. This research focused on an analysis of the factors influencing consumers' purchasing intention for organic food on the basis of an increase in organic food consumption. The research method was based on the theory of planned behavior (TPB). Factors such as consumer characteristics regarding food consumption, purchasing frequency, and other factors affecting purchasing intention were presented. The hypothesis was set using advanced research and stated that it is easier to forecast purchasing intentions by combining the theory of planned behavior and personal characteristics of consumer. The results show that two dimensions, attitude and perceived behavioral control, have statistically significant influence on the purchasing intention. It can be said that a positive attitude toward organic foods in particular increases the possibility of purchasing intention. In addition, consumers who consume more organic food products are more likely to have positive attitudes, and, in the past, purchasing frequency has positively influenced purchasing intention of organic foods. Consumers' negative feelings about the non-purchase of organic foods also showed a negative influence on purchasing intentions. In other words, even though consumers feel uncomfortable when not consuming organic food products, they do not try to purchase such products because of this feeling of discomfort. Furthermore, the subjective norm and the behavioral control of food-related involvement do not have a statistically significant influence on the purchasing intention or attitudes. This research verified the influence of factors related to purchasing intention. This study has several limitations: (1) even though consumers' responses can change based on the type of food, the types of food were not classified in this study; (2) future studies are necessary to analyze the attitudes of consumers on the basis of their purchasing experiences with organic foods.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.69-98
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• 2009

We investigated what factors motivate gamers to participate in a guild and why they continue to be engaged as members of the guild. We find that, based on the result of focus group interviews with MMORPG gamers, social support and self-esteem factors play important roles. Considering both prior research and the focus group interviews we have conducted, we define social support and character control as independent variables. Character identity, guild identity, and self-esteem are proposed as mediating variables while guild flow and game loyalty as dependent variables. Accordingly, we develop the research model and hypotheses, and verify them empirically. Based on our experiences of playing the WoW game, we proposed a research model and conducted focus-group interviews (FGIs). FGIs involve formulating a hypothesis and then collecting some relevant data. FGIs were conducted face-to-face with students of C University in Korea. We formulated structured interview schedules, and the questions were based on our research variables and personal experiences. The questions for the interviews encompassed the following areas: (a) the demographic characteristics of the focus group; (b) the number of years for which respondents had played online games; (c) the motive for starting a game; (d) the number of game-characters assumed by each gamer; (e) the type of game played; and (f) other issues such as the reasons for involvement in the play, the willingness to reuse the game in case new versions were released, etc. On average, it took two hours to interview each of three groups. A primary set of FGIs was conducted with three groups on the premise that there would be some differences caused by character race (Horde vs. Alliance) or by playable server (Normal vs. Combat). With respect to the manner of playing, we found that guild members shared information, felt a sense of belonging, and played computer games for quite a long time through the guild; however, they did not undergo these experiences when playing alone. Gamers who belonged to a specific guild helped other players without expecting compensation for that, freely shared information about the game, gave away items for free, and more generous with other members who made mistakes. The guild members were aware of the existence other members and experienced a sense of belonging through interactions with, and evaluations from, other players. It was clear that social support was shown within the guild and that it played an important role as a major research variable. Based on the results of the first FGIs, a second set of in-depth FGIs was carried out with a focus on the psychology of the individual within the guild and the social community of the guild. The second set of FGIs also focused on the guild's offline meetings. Gamers, over all, recognize the necessity of joining a community, not only off-line but also online world of the guild. They admit that the guild is important for them to easily and conveniently enjoy playing online computer games. The active behavior and positive attitudes of existing guild members can motivate new members of the guild to adapt themselves to the guild environment. They then adopt the same behaviors and attitudes of established guild members. In this manner, the new members of the guild strengthen the bonds with other gamers while feeling a sense of belonging, and developing social identity, thereby. It was discovered that the interaction among guild members and the social support encouraged new gamers to quickly develop a sense of social identity and increase their self-esteem. The guild seemed to play the role of socializing gamers. Sometimes, even in the real world, the guild members helped one another; therefore, the features of the guild also spilled over to the offline environment. We intend to use self-esteem, which was found through the second set of FGIs, as an important research variable. To collect data, an online survey was designed with a questionnaire to be completed by WoW gamers, who belong to a guild. The survey was registered on the best three domestic game-sites: 'WoW playforum,' 'WoW gamemeca,' and 'Wow invent.' The selected items to be measured in the questionnaire were decided based on prior research and data from FGIs. To verify the content of the questionnaire, we carried out a pilot test with the same participants to point out ambiguous questions as a way to ensure maximum accuracy of the survey result. A total of 244 responses were analyzed from the 250 completed questionnaires. The SEM analysis was used to test goodness-of-fit of the model. As a result, we found important results as follows: First, according to the statistics, social support had statistically significant impacts on character control, character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Second, character control had significant effects on character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Third, character identity shows its clear impact on self-esteem and game loyalty. Fourth, guild identity affected self-esteem, guild flow and game loyalty. Fifth, self-esteem had a positive influence on the guild flow. These days, the number of virtual community is rising along with its significance largely because of the nature of the online games. Accordingly, this study is designed to clarify the psychological relationship between gamers within the guild that has been generally established by gamers to play online games together. This study focuses on the relationships in which social support influences guild flow or game loyalty through character control, character identity, guild identity, and self-esteem, which are present within a guild in the MMORPG game environment. The study results are as follows. First, the effects of social support on character control, character identity, guild identity and self-esteem are proven to be statistically significant. It was found that character control improves character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Among the seven variables, social support, which is derived from FGIs, plays an important role in this study. With the active support of other guild members, gamers can improve their ability to develop good characters and to control them. Second, character identity has a positive effect on self-esteem and game loyalty, while guild identity has a significant effect on self-esteem, guild flow and game loyalty. Self-esteem affects guild flow. It was found that the higher the character and guild identities become, the greater the self-esteem is established. Contrary to the findings of prior research, our study results indicate that the relationship between character identity and guild flow is not significant. Rather, it was found that character identity directly affects game players' loyalty. Even though the character identity had no direct effect on increasing guild flow, it has indirectly affected guild flow through self-esteem. The significant relationship between self-esteem and guild flow indicates that gamers achieve flow, i.e., a feeling of pleasure and excitement through social support. Several important implications of this study should be noted. First, both qualitative and quantitative methods were used to conduct this study. Through FGIs, it was observed that both social support and self-esteem are important variables. Second, because guilds had been rarely studied, this research is expected to play an important role in the online community. Third, according to the result, six hypotheses (H1, H5, H6, H7, H8, and H11) setup based on FGIs, were statistically significant; thus, we can suggest the corresponding relationships among the variables as a guideline for follow-up research. Our research is significant as it has following implications: first, the social support of the guild members is important when establishing character control, character identity, guildidentity and self-esteem. It is also a major variable that affects guild flow and game loyalty. Second, character control when improved by social support shows notable influence on the development of character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Third, character identity and guild identity are major factors to help establish gamers' own self-esteem. Fourth, character identity affects guild flow through self-esteem and game loyalty. The gamers usually express themselves through characters; the higher character identity is, the more loyalty a gamer has. Fifth, guild identity, established within the guild, has clear effects on self-esteem, guild flow and game loyalty. Sixth, qualitative and quantitative methods are employed to conduct this study. Based on the results of focus group interviews and SEM analysis, we find that the social support by guild members and psychological factors are significant in strengthening the flow of guild and loyalty to the game. As such, game developers should provide some extra functions for guild community, through which gamers can play online games in collaboration with one another. Also, we suggest that positive self-esteem which is built up through social support can help gamers achieve higher level of flow and satisfaction, which will consequently contribute to minimizing the possibility for the players to develop negative attitude toward the guild they belong to.