A Study on the Development of Environment Color Checklists for Senior Center Based on Characteristics of the elders (재가노인의 특성을 고려한 경로당 환경색채 체크리스트 개발)
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- Korea Science and Art Forum
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- v.34
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- pp.327-337
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- 2018
Korea is rapidly becoming an aging society as much as it takes the first place among OECD countries, and as the life expectancy of Korea gradually increases, the proportion of the elders in society increases. Accordingly, the happiness of the elders is contributed to the overall social atmosphere and happiness, however, the lower quality of life of the elders due to physical, psychological and social changes can be developed into social problems such as depression and rising suicide rate. As a result, there is a social interest in improving the quality of life and satisfaction of the elders, and the senior citizen center is receiving renewed attention as a form of welfare facility that can play a pivotal role in the social activities of the elders. In recent years, efforts to improve the environment of the senior citizen center have been made due to the growing role of it, however, there is a controversy over whether the quality of the indoor environment is user-friendly or not due to the limitations of material resources and human resources. It is considered that the quality of the color environment should be improved in the senior citizen center in the way that the color environment is not only an indoor environmental factor which gives high psychological and mental effects to users but also a way to improve the environmental satisfaction at the lowest cost. Previous studies on the facilities related to the elders have been actively carried out, but they were very sporadic and there was very little information about the color environment in the related laws or in the guideline presented by cities. It is necessary to integrate guidelines that are scattered within a comprehensive range without any specific target in order to grasp the current status of the color environment and to properly evaluate it. In addition, considering that the senior citizen center is an important leisure facility for the elders that functions in a residential area with a nationwide network, the results of this study are expected to contribute to the environmental improvement of existing senior citizen center which will be activated in the future by enabling the improvement of psychological satisfaction of the elders.
International circulation of cultural assets involves numerous countries thereby making an approach based on international law essential to resolving this problem. Since the end of the
This study was conducted to prevent oral disease of primary school, middle school, and high school students, providing basic data for the development of oral health education programs. Data were collected from 898 primary school, middle school, and high school students from March 2, 1999 to May 31, 1999. The results of this study are summarized as follows; 1) The subjects of this study were primary school students(32.6%), middle school students(33.0%), and high school students(34.4%). Boy students were slightly more prevalent than girl students. That is, primary school boys were 56.3%, middle school boys were 53.2%, and high school boys were 52.6%. 2) According to the self-judgement of oral health, primary school students were better than middle/high school students and boy students were better than girl students, 63.5% of primary school students and 57.8% of middle/high school students brushed their teeth once or twice a day. 3) 76.3% of middle/high school students and 63.5% of primary school students experienced dental caries. Girl students were higher than boy students in experiencing dental caries, 35.9% of primary school students and 27.6% of middle/high school students experienced periodontal disease. 4) 22.9% of primary school students and 7.9% of middle/high school students received oral examinations periodically. Girl students showed a higher rate than boy students in primary school, while boy students showed a higher rate than girl students in middle/high school. 5) Explaining to the reasons for reluctant visits to dental hospitals and clinics, 'no time to go' was highest(22.9% of primary school students; 27.4% of middle/high school students) and the rate of 'feeling scared' was second highest. Middle/high school students were more reluctant to visit dental hospitals and clinics than primary school students. In case of problematic symptoms in the mouth, the rate of 'feeling painful or cold in teeth when eating cold or hot foods' was highest, 71.3% of primary school students was concerned about oral health, while 68.6% of middle/high school students was concerned about it. 6) In gathering to the sources of information on oral health, the rate of medical institutions was highest(30.0%) in primary school students, while the rate of family members or persons around them was highest in middle/high school students. 7) 54.9% of primary school students received oral health education, while 13.1% of middle/high school students received it. Only 4.7% of middle school and high school girls received it. In relation to dental health education, the rate of 'possibility of prevention of oral caries or disease of the gum' was highest. 79.5% of primary school students and 80.3% of middle school students answered that they would attend oral health education. 8) 60.4% of primary school students and 60.2% of middle/high school students think the purpose of oral health is to prevent dental caries and disease of the gums. In preventing dental caries, 78.8% of primary school students and 71.8% of middle school students thought that periodical oral examination was effective, 88.4% of primary school students and 88.8% of middle/high school thought that brushing one's teeth was effective and 64.1% of primary school students and 50.7% of middle school students thought that the use of toothpaste containing fluoride was effective. In preventing periodontal disease, 91.1% of primary school students and 90.2% of middle/high school students thought that brushing one's teeth was effective, while 72.4% of primary school students and 70.3% of middle/high school students thought that teeth cleaning was effective. 9) 16.0% of middle school students and 12.7% of high school students thought that their oral health condition was healthy. According to individual experiences in dental treatment, the rate of experience of middle school students was higher than that of high school students, 12.7% of middle school students received oral examinations periodically, while only 3.3% of high school students did so. 10) In cases of 'having no problematic symptoms in the mouth' and 'concerns about oral health', the rate of middle school students was higher than that of high school students. In gathering obtaining information on oral health, the rate of obtaining it through broadcast media including TV, Radio, etc. was highest in middle school students, while the rate of obtaining it through family members or persons around them was highest in high school students. 11) 81.7% of middle school students have not received oral health education. In case of girl students, 97.3% have not received it in high school students. 85.6% of middle school students and 151.2% of high school students think that oral health education is necessary. 12) According to the knowledge level of oral health, the point of high school students(
Since North Korea has used terror crime as a means of unification under communism against South Korea, South Korea has been much damaged until now. And the occurrence possibility of terror crime by North Korean authority is now higher than any other time. The North Korean terror crimes of Kim Il Sung era had been committed by the dictator's instruction with the object of securing governing fund. However, looking at the terror crimes committed for decades during Kim Jung Il authority, it is revealed that these terror crimes are expressed as a criminal behavior because of the conflict to accomplish the power and economic advantage non powerful groups target. This study focused on the power conflict in various causes of terror crimes by applying George B. Vold(1958)'s theory which explained power conflict between groups became a factor of crime, and found the aspect by ages of terror crime behavior by North Korean authority and responding plan to future North Korean terror crime. North Korean authority high-ranking officials were the Labor Party focusing on Juche Idea for decades in Kim Il Sung time. Afterwards, high-ranking officials were formed focusing on military authorities following Military First Policy at the beginning of Kim Jung Il authority, rapid power change has been done for recent 10 years. To arrange the aspect by times of terror crime following this power change, alienated party executives following the support of positive military first authority by Kim Jung Il after 1995 could not object to forcible terror crime behavior of military authority, and 1st, 2nd Yeongpyeong maritime war which happened this time was propelled by military first authority to show the power of military authority. After 2006, conservative party union enforced censorship and inspection on the trade business and foreign currency-earning of military authority while executing drastic purge. The shooting on Keumkangsan tourists that happened this time was a forcible terror crime by military authority following the pressure of conservative party. After October, 2008, first military reign union executed the launch of Gwanmyungsung No.2 long-range missile, second nuclear test, Daechung marine war, and Cheonanham attacking terror in order to highlight the importance and role of military authority. After September 2010, new reign union went through severe competition between new military authority and new mainstream and new military authority at this time executed highly professionalized terror crime such as cyber/electronic terror unlike past military authority. After July 2012, ICBM test launch, third nuclear test, cyber terror on Cheongwadae homepage of new mainstream association was the intention of Km Jung Eun to display his ability and check and adjust the power of party/military/cabinet/ public security organ, and he can attempt the unexpected terror crime in the future. North Korean terror crime has continued since 1980s when Kim Jung Il's power succession was carried out, and the power aspect by times has rapidly changed since 1994 when Kim Il Sung died and the terror crime became intense following the power combat between high-ranking officials and power conflict for right robbery. Now South Korea should install the specialized department which synthesizes and analyzes the information on North Korean high-ranking officials and reinforce the comprehensive information-collecting system through the protection and management of North Korean defectors and secret agents in order to determine the cause of North Korean terror crime and respond to it. And South Korea should participate positively in the international collaboration related to North Korean terror and make direct efforts to attract the international agreement to build the international cooperation for the response to North Korean terror crime. Also, we should try more to arrange the realistic countermeasure against North Korean cyber/electronic terror which was more diversified with the expertise terror escaping from existing forcible terror through enactment/revision of law related to cyber terror crime, organizing relevant institute and budget, training professional manpower, and technical development.
The organization for managing records and archives did not emerge together with the founding of the Chinese Communist Party. Such management became active with the establishment of the Department of Documents (文書科) and its affiliated offices overseeing reading and safekeeping of official papers, after the formation of the Central Secretariat(中央秘書處) in 1926. Improving the work of the Secretariat's organization became the focus of critical discussions in the early 1930s. The main criticism was that the Secretariat had failed to be cognizant of its political role and degenerated into a mere "functional organization." The solution to this was the "politicization of the Secretariat's work." Moreover, influenced by the "Rectification Movement" in the 1940s, the party emphasized the responsibility of the Resources Department (材料科) that extended beyond managing documents to collecting, organizing and providing various kinds of important information data. In the mean time, maintaining security with regard to composing documents continued to be emphasized through such methods as using different names for figures and organizations or employing special inks for document production. In addition, communications between the central political organs and regional offices were emphasized through regular reports on work activities and situations of the local areas. The General Secretary not only composed the drafts of the major official documents but also handled the reading and examination of all documents, and thus played a central role in record processing. The records, called archives after undergoing document processing, were placed in safekeeping. This function was handled by the "Document Safekeeping Office(文件保管處)" of the Central Secretariat's Department of Documents. Although the Document Safekeeping Office, also called the "Central Repository(中央文庫)", could no longer accept, beginning in the early 1930s, additional archive transfers, the Resources Department continued to strengthen throughout the 1940s its role of safekeeping and providing documents and publication materials. In particular, collections of materials for research and study were carried out, and with the recovery of regions which had been under the Japanese rule, massive amounts of archive and document materials were collected. After being stipulated by rules in 1931, the archive classification and cataloguing methods became actively systematized, especially in the 1940s. Basically, "subject" classification methods and fundamental cataloguing techniques were adopted. The principle of assuming "importance" and "confidentiality" as the criteria of management emerged from a relatively early period, but the concept or process of evaluation that differentiated preservation and discarding of documents was not clear. While implementing a system of secure management and restricted access for confidential information, the critical view on providing use of archive materials was very strong, as can be seen in the slogan, "the unification of preservation and use." Even during the revolutionary movement and wars, the Chinese Communist Party continued their efforts to strengthen management and preservation of records & archives. The results were not always desirable nor were there any reasons for such experiences to lead to stable development. The historical conditions in which the Chinese Communist Party found itself probably made it inevitable. The most pronounced characteristics of this process can be found in the fact that they not only pursued efficiency of records & archives management at the functional level but, while strengthening their self-awareness of the political significance impacting the Chinese Communist Party's revolution movement, they also paid attention to the value possessed by archive materials as actual evidence for revolutionary policy research and as historical evidence of the Chinese Communist Party.
The government recently announced various policies for developing big-data and artificial intelligence fields to provide a great opportunity to the public with respect to disclosure of high-quality data within public institutions. KSURE(Korea Trade Insurance Corporation) is a major public institution for financial policy in Korea, and thus the company is strongly committed to backing export companies with various systems. Nevertheless, there are still fewer cases of realized business model based on big-data analyses. In this situation, this paper aims to develop a new business model which can be applied to an ex-ante prediction for the likelihood of the insurance accident of credit guarantee. We utilize internal data from KSURE which supports export companies in Korea and apply machine learning models. Then, we conduct performance comparison among the predictive models including Logistic Regression, Random Forest, XGBoost, LightGBM, and DNN(Deep Neural Network). For decades, many researchers have tried to find better models which can help to predict bankruptcy since the ex-ante prediction is crucial for corporate managers, investors, creditors, and other stakeholders. The development of the prediction for financial distress or bankruptcy was originated from Smith(1930), Fitzpatrick(1932), or Merwin(1942). One of the most famous models is the Altman's Z-score model(Altman, 1968) which was based on the multiple discriminant analysis. This model is widely used in both research and practice by this time. The author suggests the score model that utilizes five key financial ratios to predict the probability of bankruptcy in the next two years. Ohlson(1980) introduces logit model to complement some limitations of previous models. Furthermore, Elmer and Borowski(1988) develop and examine a rule-based, automated system which conducts the financial analysis of savings and loans. Since the 1980s, researchers in Korea have started to examine analyses on the prediction of financial distress or bankruptcy. Kim(1987) analyzes financial ratios and develops the prediction model. Also, Han et al.(1995, 1996, 1997, 2003, 2005, 2006) construct the prediction model using various techniques including artificial neural network. Yang(1996) introduces multiple discriminant analysis and logit model. Besides, Kim and Kim(2001) utilize artificial neural network techniques for ex-ante prediction of insolvent enterprises. After that, many scholars have been trying to predict financial distress or bankruptcy more precisely based on diverse models such as Random Forest or SVM. One major distinction of our research from the previous research is that we focus on examining the predicted probability of default for each sample case, not only on investigating the classification accuracy of each model for the entire sample. Most predictive models in this paper show that the level of the accuracy of classification is about 70% based on the entire sample. To be specific, LightGBM model shows the highest accuracy of 71.1% and Logit model indicates the lowest accuracy of 69%. However, we confirm that there are open to multiple interpretations. In the context of the business, we have to put more emphasis on efforts to minimize type 2 error which causes more harmful operating losses for the guaranty company. Thus, we also compare the classification accuracy by splitting predicted probability of the default into ten equal intervals. When we examine the classification accuracy for each interval, Logit model has the highest accuracy of 100% for 0~10% of the predicted probability of the default, however, Logit model has a relatively lower accuracy of 61.5% for 90~100% of the predicted probability of the default. On the other hand, Random Forest, XGBoost, LightGBM, and DNN indicate more desirable results since they indicate a higher level of accuracy for both 0~10% and 90~100% of the predicted probability of the default but have a lower level of accuracy around 50% of the predicted probability of the default. When it comes to the distribution of samples for each predicted probability of the default, both LightGBM and XGBoost models have a relatively large number of samples for both 0~10% and 90~100% of the predicted probability of the default. Although Random Forest model has an advantage with regard to the perspective of classification accuracy with small number of cases, LightGBM or XGBoost could become a more desirable model since they classify large number of cases into the two extreme intervals of the predicted probability of the default, even allowing for their relatively low classification accuracy. Considering the importance of type 2 error and total prediction accuracy, XGBoost and DNN show superior performance. Next, Random Forest and LightGBM show good results, but logistic regression shows the worst performance. However, each predictive model has a comparative advantage in terms of various evaluation standards. For instance, Random Forest model shows almost 100% accuracy for samples which are expected to have a high level of the probability of default. Collectively, we can construct more comprehensive ensemble models which contain multiple classification machine learning models and conduct majority voting for maximizing its overall performance.
Located on the right side of the third floor of the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, the "Art of Central Asia" exhibition boasts the world's finest collection of artworks and artifacts from the Silk Road. Every item in the collection has been classified by region, and many of them were collected in the early twentieth century through archaeological surveys led by Russia's Pyotr Kozlov, Mikhail Berezovsky, and Sergey Oldenburg. Some of these artifacts have been presented around the world through special exhibitions held in Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Korea, Japan, and elsewhere. The fruits of Russia's Silk Road expeditions were also on full display in the 2008 exhibition The Caves of One Thousand Buddhas - Russian Expeditions on the Silk Route on the Occasion of 190 Years of the Asiatic Museum, held at the Hermitage Museum. Published in 2018 by the Shanghai Chinese Classics Publishing House in collaboration with the Hermitage Museum, Kuche Art Relics Collected in Russia introduces the Hermitage's collection of artifacts from the Kuche (or Kucha) region. While the book focuses exclusively on artifacts excavated from the Kuche area, it also includes valuable on-site photos and sketches from the Russian expeditions, thus helping to enhance readers' overall understanding of the characteristics of Kuche art within the Buddhist art of Central Asia. The book was compiled by Dr. Kira Samosyuk, senior curator of the Oriental Department of the Hermitage Museum, who also wrote the main article and the artifact descriptions. Dr. Samosyuk is an internationally renowned scholar of Central Asian Buddhist art, with a particular expertise in the art of Khara-Khoto and Xi-yu. In her article "The Art of the Kuche Buddhist Temples," Dr. Samosyuk provides an overview of Russia's Silk Road expeditions, before introducing the historical development of Kuche in the Buddhist era and the aspects of Buddhism transmitted to Kuche. She describes the murals and clay sculptures in the Buddhist grottoes, giving important details on their themes and issues with estimating their dates, and also explains how the temples operated as places of worship. In conclusion, Dr. Samosyuk argues that the Kuche region, while continuously engaging with various peoples in China and the nomadic world, developed its own independent Buddhist culture incorporating elements of Gandara, Hellenistic, Persian, and Chinese art and culture. Finally, she states that the culture of the Kuche region had a profound influence not only on the Tarim Basin, but also on the Buddhist grottoes of Dunhuang and the central region of China. A considerable portion of Dr. Samosyuk's article addresses efforts to estimate the date of the grottoes in the Kuche region. After citing various scholars' views on the dates of the murals, she argues that the Kizil grottoes likely began prior to the fifth century, which is at least 100 years earlier than most current estimates. This conclusion is reached by comparing the iconography of the armor depicted in the murals with related materials excavated from the surrounding area (such as items of Sogdian art). However, efforts to date the Buddhist grottoes of Kuche must take many factors into consideration, such as the geological characteristics of the caves, the themes and styles of the Buddhist paintings, the types of pigments used, and the clothing, hairstyles, and ornamentation of the depicted figures. Moreover, such interdisciplinary data must be studied within the context of Kuche's relations with nearby cultures. Scientific methods such as radiocarbon dating could also be applied for supplementary materials. The preface of Kuche Art Relics Collected in Russia reveals that the catalog is the first volume covering the Hermitage Museum's collection of Kuche art, and that the next volume in the series will cover a large collection of mural fragments that were taken from Berlin during World War II. For many years, the whereabouts of these mural fragments were unknown to both the public and academia, but after restoration, the fragments were recently re-introduced to the public as part of the museum's permanent exhibition. We look forward to the next publication that focuses on these mural fragments, and also to future catalogs introducing the artifacts of Turpan and Khotan. Currently, fragments of the murals from the Kuche grottoes are scattered among various countries, including Russia, Germany, and Korea. With the publication of this catalog, it seems like an opportune time to publish a comprehensive catalog on the murals of the Kuche region, which represent a compelling mixture of East-West culture that reflects the overall characteristics of the region. A catalog that includes both the remaining murals of the Kizil grottoes and the fragments from different parts of the world could greatly enhance our understanding of the murals' original state. Such a book would hopefully include a more detailed and interdisciplinary discussion of the artifacts and murals, including scientific analyses of the pigments and other materials from the perspective of conservation science. With the ongoing rapid development in western China, the grotto murals are facing a serious crisis related to climate change and overcrowding in the oasis city of Xinjiang. To overcome this challenge, the cultural communities of China and other countries that possess advanced technology for conservation and restoration must begin working together to protect and restore the murals of the Silk Road grottoes. Moreover, centers for conservation science should be established to foster human resources and collect information. Compiling the data of Russian expeditions related to the grottoes of Kuche (among the results of Western archaeological surveys of the Silk Road in the early twentieth century), Kuche Art Relics Collected in Russia represents an important contribution to research on Kuche's Buddhist art and the Silk Road, which will only be enhanced by a future volume introducing the mural fragments from Germany. As the new authoritative source for academic research on the artworks and artifacts of the Kuche region, the book also lays the groundwork for new directions for future studies on the Silk Road. Finally, the book is also quite significant for employing a new editing system that improves its academic clarity and convenience. In conclusion, Dr. Kira Samosyuk, who planned the publication, deserves tremendous praise for taking the research of Silk Road art to new heights.
Today's consumers perceive consumption as a representation of themselves. It is not simply an act that fulfills a consumer's physical and practical needs. Even in terms of life quality, consumers increasingly want to achieve an emotional and sensible experience through consumption. Consumers now make decisions based on their need to express their position in relation to other people, pursue emotional satisfaction, and try to improve the quality of life. Culture-art products that meet such internal and external demands of consumers have made significant improvements in both quantity and quality, because of the social interest and policy support. The recognition of personal and social values of culture and arts has brought about interest in and need for culture-art products. Businesses have agilely embraced such change and actively implemented various marketing strategies utilizing culture and arts. For example, businesses began to sponsor artists who produce culture-art products while building facilities for cultural and art performances or exhibitions. Businesses have also provided performances and exhibitions free-of-charge or at affordable prices. As a result, the supply in the market has started to exceed its demand as is often the case in many of other markets. However, such imbalance has occurred not because of over-supply but because of a lack of demand. Given these circumstances, the government and culture and art related organizations, which had mainly concentrated on the supply side, started to recognize the importance of creating personal and social values in culture and arts. As a result, the government and various organizations are now creating various strategies that include policy measures to achieve their new found goal. Unfortunately however, such efforts are not meeting the expectations. Focusing on above-mentioned circumstances and problems, this study aims to find measures to create demand for culture-art products in the internal conditions of those who consume culture-art products. In other words, given that the demand for culture-art products has not increased despite all external conditions to encourage consumption, this study aims to find the reasons in consumers' value judgment on culture-art products. Though there were recent studies on culture-art products that applied consumer behavior on marketing theories, most of them focused on peripheral aspects such as people's motivation for or satisfaction from watching culture-art events. Hence, there is a need to understand what kind of value consumers perceive from culture-art products and how such value cognition leads to consumption in a comprehensive manner. This study acts as follow-up to a separate study entitled "Qualitative Study about Value Cognition and Benefits of Consumer on Culture-Art Products". The current study aims to extend practical implications that enhance the effectiveness of marketing strategies among the producing and policy agencies in the industry. The purpose of this study is to investigate dimensions of value cognition, benefits and attributes of culture-art products, and identify the effects of consumer value cognition on benefits and attributes. The questionnaire was developed based on the conceptual structure of qualitative research and previous researches. It was composed of value cognition, benefits, attributes of culture-art products and demographic variables. This survey was conducted on-line and off-line among a total of 662 persons ranging from their teens to their 50's who were living in Seoul, Gyeonggi-do, various metropolitan cities, and small and medium-sized cities. The data collected was analyzed by factor analysis and path analysis using SPSS WIN 18.0 and AMOS 16.0. This empirical study found that the dimensions of value cognition of culture-art products were categorized into personal goods, aesthetic goods and public property. This shows that the consumers perceive culture-art products as products that are worthy enough to pay the costs not just for personal benefits but also for their social values. Also the formation of value cognition for culture-art products requires special conditions unlike that for physical consumer goods and services, which simply require marketing stimuli. The dimensions of benefits pursued by consuming culture-art products were found to be composed of four types - pursuit of aesthetic benefits, pursuit of actual benefits, pursuit of emotional benefits, and pursuit of conspicuous character. This result implies that people consume culture-art products not just to pursue pleasure from emotional and intelligent satisfaction as well as social relations, but also to seek the needs and benefits embodied at a social level. The dimensions of attributes of culture-art products had seven different factors, - environmental, price, evaluation, people, artwork, composition, and personal relations - which is plentiful. This is because the attributes of culture-art products are very complicated compared to other consumer goods or services. Since culture-art products include not just cultural or artistic works but also all physical, human, environmental, and systemic elements of the products in a comprehensive manner, consumers perceive everything they experience in the process of consuming culture-art products as part of the products. The dimensions of value cognition was found to affect attributes of the products, mostly using pursued benefits as a mediating factors. This result is consistent with the result of qualitative research, and proves that applying the means-end chain theory in the reverse direction is reasonable. The result can be interpreted that consumers' value cognitions for culture-art products turns into actual benefits leading to consumers' decisions. Furthermore, this result reveals that when consumers choose culture-art products, they take into account the attributes of culture-art products depending on the benefits they pursue. These results confirm that despite their conceptual and abstract attributes, culture-art products have values that contribute to actual benefits for individual consumers and society. Hence, value cognition generates benefits to be pursued and this in turn affects the consumers' choices of attributes on products. Based on the conceptual structure of consumers' value cognitions on culture-art products and its dimensions, it is possible to find detailed methods to provide opportunities for education and training to form and reinforce positive value cognition on culture-art products. And through those methods, it will be possible to develop attributes of culture-art products according to the dimensions of pursued benefits, and allow conceptual products become the subject to valuable consumption in real life. These results provide theoretical understanding of consumer behavior in culture marketing and useful information to culture-art producers, companies that use culture and art, and government agencies that use culture-art as a mean to improve the public perception of quality of life. As a follow up on this study, there should be experimental studies that can develop criteria visualizing the demands of consumers who purchase culture-art products and identify their detailed attributes. Studies that compare characteristics of different areas within the culture-art product category and in-depth studies on a specific area or genre will also be needed. In order to develop marketing strategies for culture-art products, studies on the formation and reinforcement of positive value cognition on culture-art products and education for the development of consumer demand as well as on the development and differentiation of attributes of culture-art products depending on types of consumer groups should also follow.
Trust has been studied extensively in psychology, economics, and sociology, and its importance has been emphasized not only in marketing, but also in business disciplines in general. Unlike past relationships between suppliers and buyers, which take considerable advantage of private networks and may involve unethical business practices, partnerships between suppliers and buyers are at the core of success for industrial marketing amid intense global competition in the 21st century. A high level of mutual cooperation occurs through an exchange relationship based on trust, which brings long-term benefits, competitive enhancements, and transaction cost reductions, among other benefits, for both buyers and suppliers. In spite of the important role of trust, existing studies in buy-supply situations overlook the role of trust and do not systematically analyze the effect of trust on relational performance. Consequently, an in-depth study that determines the relation of trust to the relational performance between buyers and suppliers of business services is absolutely needed. Business services in this study, which include those supporting the manufacturing industry, are drawing attention as the economic growth engine for the next generation. The Korean government has selected business services as a strategic area for the development of manufacturing sectors. Since the demands for opening business services markets are becoming fiercer, the competitiveness of the business service industry must be promoted now more than ever. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of the mutual trust between buyers and suppliers on relational performance. Specifically, this study proposed a theoretical model of trust-relational performance in the transactions of business services and empirically tested the hypotheses delineated from the framework. The study suggests strategic implications based on research findings. Empirical data were collected via multiple methods, including via telephone, mail, and in-person interviews. Sample companies were knowledge-based companies supplying and purchasing business services in Korea. The present study collected data on a dyadic basis. Each pair of sample companies includes a buying company and its corresponding supplying company. Mutual trust was traced for each pair of companies. This study proposes a model of trust-relational performance of buying-supplying for business services. The model consists of trust and its antecedents and consequences. The trust of buyers is classified into trust toward the supplying company and trust toward salespersons. Viewing trust both at the individual level and the organizational level is based on the research of Doney and Cannon (1997). Normally, buyers are the subject of trust, but this study supposes that suppliers are the subjects. Hence, it uniquely focused on the bilateral perspective of perceived risk. In other words, suppliers, like buyers, are the subject of trust since transactions are normally bilateral. From this point of view, suppliers' trust in buyers is as important as buyers' trust in suppliers. The suppliers' trust is influenced by the extent to which it trusts the buying companies and the buyers. This classification of trust using an individual level and an organization level is based on the suggestion of Doney and Cannon (1997). Trust affects the process of supplier selection, which works in a bilateral manner. Suppliers are actively involved in the supplier selection process, working very closely with buyers. In addition, the process is affected by the extent to which each party trusts its partners. The selection process consists of certain steps: recognition, information search, supplier selection, and performance evaluation. As a result of the process, both buyers and suppliers evaluate the performance and take corrective actions on the basis of such outcomes as tangible, intangible, and/or side effects. The measurement of trust used for the present study was developed on the basis of the studies of Mayer, Davis and Schoorman (1995) and Mayer and Davis (1999). Based on their recommendations, the three dimensions of trust used for the study include ability, benevolence, and integrity. The original questions were adjusted to the context of the transactions of business services. For example, a question such as "He/she has professional capabilities" has been changed to "The salesperson showed professional capabilities while we talked about our products." The measurement used for this study differs from those used in previous studies (Rotter 1967; Sullivan and Peterson 1982; Dwyer and Oh 1987). The measurements of the antecedents and consequences of trust used for this study were developed on the basis of Doney and Cannon (1997). The original questions were adjusted to the context of transactions in business services. In particular, questions were developed for both buyers and suppliers to address the following factors: reputation (integrity, customer care, good-will), market standing (company size, market share, positioning in the industry), willingness to customize (product, process, delivery), information sharing (proprietary information, private information), willingness to maintain relationships, perceived professionalism, authority empowerment, buyer-seller similarity, and contact frequency. As a consequential variable of trust, relational performance was measured. Relational performance is classified into tangible effects, intangible effects, and side effects. Tangible effects include financial performance; intangible effects include improvements in relations, network developing, and internal employee satisfaction; side effects include those not included either in the tangible or intangible effects. Three hundred fifty pairs of companies were contacted, and one hundred five pairs of companies responded. After deleting five company pairs because of incomplete responses, one hundred five pairs of companies were used for data analysis. The response ratio of the companies used for data analysis is 30% (105/350), which is above the average response ratio in industrial marketing research. As for the characteristics of the respondent companies, the majority of the companies operate service businesses for both buyers (85.4%) and suppliers (81.8%). The majority of buyers (76%) deal with consumer goods, while the majority of suppliers (70%) deal with industrial goods. This may imply that buyers process the incoming material, parts, and components to produce the finished consumer goods. As indicated by their report of the length of acquaintance with their partners, suppliers appear to have longer business relationships than do buyers. Hypothesis 1 tested the effects of buyer-supplier characteristics on trust. The salesperson's professionalism (t=2.070, p<0.05) and authority empowerment (t=2.328, p<0.05) positively affected buyers' trust toward suppliers. On the other hand, authority empowerment (t=2.192, p<0.05) positively affected supplier trust toward buyers. For both buyers and suppliers, the degree of authority empowerment plays a crucial role in the maintenance of their trust in each other. Hypothesis 2 tested the effects of buyerseller relational characteristics on trust. Buyers tend to trust suppliers, as suppliers make every effort to contact buyers (t=2.212, p<0.05). This tendency has also been shown to be much stronger for suppliers (t=2.591, p<0.01). On the other hand suppliers trust buyers because suppliers perceive buyers as being similar to themselves (t=2.702, p<0.01). This finding confirmed the results of Crosby, Evans, and Cowles (1990), which reported that suppliers and buyers build relationships through regular meetings, either for business or personal matters. Hypothesis 3 tested the effects of trust on perceived risk. It has been found that for both suppliers and buyers the lower is the trust, the higher is the perceived risk (t=-6.621, p<0.01 for buyers; t=-2.437, p<0.05). Interestingly, this tendency has been shown to be much stronger for buyers than for suppliers. One possible explanation for this higher level of perceived risk is that buyers normally perceive higher risks than do suppliers in transactions involving business services. For this reason, it is necessary for suppliers to implement risk reduction strategies for buyers. Hypothesis 4 tested the effects of trust on information searching. It has been found that for both suppliers and buyers, contrary to expectation, trust depends on their partner's reputation (t=2.929, p<0.01 for buyers; t=2.711, p<0.05 for suppliers). This finding shows that suppliers with good reputations tend to be trusted. Prior experience did not show any significant relationship with trust for either buyers or suppliers. Hypothesis 5 tested the effects of trust on supplier/buyer selection. Unlike buyers, suppliers tend to trust buyers when they think that previous transactions with buyers were important (t=2.913 p<0.01). However, this study did not show any significant relationship between source loyalty and the trust of buyers in suppliers. Hypothesis 6 tested the effects of trust on relational performances. For buyers and suppliers, financial performance reportedly improved when they trusted their partners (t=2.301, p<0.05 for buyers; t=3.692, p<0.01 for suppliers). It is interesting that this tendency was much stronger for suppliers than it was for buyers. Similarly, competitiveness was reported to improve when buyers and suppliers trusted their partners (t=3.563, p<0.01 for buyers; t=3.042, p<0.01 for suppliers). For suppliers, efficiency and productivity were reportedly improved when they trusted buyers (t=2.673, p<0.01). Other performance indices showed insignificant relationships with trust. The findings of this study have some strategic implications. First and most importantly, trust-based transactions are beneficial for both suppliers and buyers. As verified in the study, financial performance can be improved through efforts to build and maintain mutual trust. Similarly, competitiveness can be increased through the same kinds of effort. Second, trust-based transactions can facilitate the reduction of perceived risks inherent in the purchasing situation. This finding has implications for both suppliers and buyers. It is generally believed that buyers perceive higher risks in a highly involved purchasing situation. To reduce risks, previous studies have recommended that suppliers devise risk-reducing tactics. Moving beyond these recommendations, the present study uniquely focused on the bilateral perspective of perceived risk. In other words, suppliers are also susceptible to perceived risks, especially when they supply services that require very technical and sophisticated manipulations and maintenance. Consequently, buyers and suppliers must solve problems together in close collaboration. Hence, mutual trust plays a crucial role in the problem-solving process. Third, as found in this study, the more authority a salesperson has, the more he or she can be trusted. This finding is very important with regard to tactics. Building trust is a long-term assignment; however, when mutual trust has not been developed, suppliers can overcome the problems they encounter by empowering a salesperson with the authority to make certain decisions. This finding applies to suppliers as well.