• The Mathematical Education
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• v.52 no.3
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• pp.303-317
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• 2013

Recently in South Korea, various methods are followed in decreasing educational gap between region and social classes through school education. The National Assessment Educational Achievement(NAEA) intends to strengthen responsibility of school education and manage quality of curriculum. Besides, the NAEA intends to bridge achievement gap which is one of educational gaps by grasping the characteristics of academic ability to guarantee basic academic ability. There is not much research about the educational gap among regional scales. Therefore in this study, to examine the achievement characteristics among regional scales closely, we analyse the 2010, 2011 NAEA results in elementary mathematics subject and explore characteristics of items which have sharp differences between local population sizes. The results of the analysis has been showed that the educational gap between 'big-sized cities' and 'small and midium-sized cities' has been increased, but the overall educational gap among regional scales has been decreased.

• Journal of the Korean Regional Science Association
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.3-23
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• 2017

This study aims to understand how human capital is related to the inter-regional wage gap between the capital region and the non-capital region in Korea. We focus more specifically on whether the inter-regional wage gap is due to high levels of human capital in the capital region or due to high returns to human capital in the capital region. The decomposition method based on the unconditional quantile regression was used to examine how the relationship between human capital and the inter-regional wage gap varies along the wage distribution. When first estimating earnings functions from the two regions to apply this decomposition method, we included not only conventional indicators of human capital, such as education and on-the-job training, but also occupational skills including cognitive-interactive skills, technical skills, and physical skills. As a result, other things being equal, a large part of the inter-regional wage gap was explained by the human capital variables. Although the composition effect of the human capital variables existed in all the wage quantiles, the more important factor was the wage structure effect of the human capital variables. In addition, among the various human capital variables, the wage structure effect of years of education was a key factor in explaining the inter-regional wage gap. This study is meaningful in that it shows that the relationship between human capital and the inter-regional wage gap may vary depending on the wage quantiles.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.537-548
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• 2010

As the rapid development of economy in China, the problem in income gaps become a tough and sensitive social problem. Under this social background, this research try to find the main reasons of the income gap among the East China, West China, and the central China, basing on the analysis of its actuality and forming, and then put forward some solution plans. The research shows that in different development levels of China influencing factor of urban-rural income gap is also different. Take East China for example, the education support plays an important part of narrowing income gap. The influence of education support on urban-rural income gaps more significant than industrialization, what is more, its influence has the more reinforce trend, while in the less developed central and western part in China, what can narrowing income gap significantly is industrialization and the support for agriculture. Therefore, in order to solve the problem of income gap between urban and rural areas in China radically, it is not enough to perform medical insurance reform and social insurance reform in the whole county. Besides this, we should perform other kinds of reformation countermeasures which have their regional characteristics. For example, in eastern, the regional governments should reinforce the education system; in central china, they should focus on developing industry; in western, the regional governments should increase the expense to support the agricultural development, and so on. With these countermeasures, they could not only relieve the gap between urban and rural areas in China, but also ensure to develop economy substantially and stably in the whole country.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.55-92
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• 2010

In terms of labor market accomplishments, such as income, size of the company, and the matching quality between one's job and college major (specialization), a very large discrepancy is observed between the graduates from colleges located in Seoul and those outside Seoul. But, when the department average score of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) at the time of college entrance is controlled for, the discrepancy is found to be reduced to a considerable degree. In the case of wage gap, at least two third can be explained by the SAT score gap. The remaining wage gap seems to reflect the characteristics of workplace. In other words, graduates with high SAT scores enter colleges located in Seoul and thus tend to find better jobs leading to earning differences. This result that confirms the importance of aptitude test scores suggests that in the labor market, one of the major reasons behind a lower accomplishment of the graduate from local colleges is due to a lower competitiveness of local colleges in attracting the brightest students. But, this should not be viewed as only an internal problem of local colleges. This is because the growth of local economies tends to haul the advancement of local colleges in that area rather than being the other way around. The agglomeration effect in Seoul where headquarters of large corporations and financial institutions gather is the factor that has elevated the status of colleges located in Seoul since this provides highly preferred job choices of graduates. When the competitiveness of college is significantly influenced by exogenous factors, such as the vicinity to Seoul, the effort being made by colleges alone would not be enough to improve the situation. However, the central government, too, is not in the position to carry out countermeasure policies for such problems. The regional development strategy boosted through supportive policies for local colleges, such as financial support, is not based on the persuasive and empirical grounds. It is true that college education is universal and that the government''s intervention in assisting local colleges to secure basic conditions, such as tenure faculty and adequate facilities is necessary. However, the way of intervention should not be a support-only type. In order to improve the efficiency and effect of financial support, restructuring programs, including the merger and integration of insolvent colleges, should be underway prior to providing support. In addition, when the policy is focused on education recipients-local college students, and not on education providers-local colleges, the importance of regional gap in compulsory education (elementary and junior high schools) turns out to be much important as the gap between metropolitan area colleges and local colleges. Considering the educational gap before college entrance shown from the discrepancies of aptitude test scores among different regions, the imbalance between regions in terms of human resources is apparently derived from compulsory education, and not from college education. Therefore, there is a need to double the policy efforts to reduce the educational gap among different regions. In addition, given the current situation where it is difficult to find appropriate ex post facto policy measures to solve the problem of income gap between the graduates from metropolitan colleges and local colleges, it can be said that improving the environment for compulsory education in local areas is a growing necessity for bridging the educational gap among different regions.

• Journal of Digital Contents Society
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.265-276
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to investigate the Korean Local Government's recognition on the educational gap among regions in the filed of adult learning including vocational education and life long-learning. The study also tried to figure out the local government's recognition and infrastructure of e-Learning which is suggested as one of the solutions on the regional gap of educational opportunities and quality. This study took 12 HRD(Human Resources Development) centers funded and operated by the Korean Local Governments except Seoul and Kyong-Gi classified by the metropolitan areas in Korea. As a result, firstly it was found that the local governments had perception on the difference and gap of educational opportunities and quality among regions in the area of adult education. Especially, the perception was relatively more serious on quality than quantity. Secondly, the result showed the large gap among regions on the area of opening educational and training programs, the quality of teachers and tutors, the effectiveness and outcomes of educational programs. Thirdly, they perceived more serious educational gap on face-to-face classes rather than e-Learning in the context of educational methodology. It also revealed that the local governments had relatively better foundations on physical systems than other infrastructures and resources such as human-ware, culture-ware and soft-ware(contents, programs etc.). It was recommended to consider these findings in developing and implementing future educational policies to solve the problem of regional gap on education.

• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.196-213
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• 2019

This paper attempts to analyze the contribution of different socioeconomic factors such as income, age, gender, household composition, education and employment status etc. to the difference between the Capital and Non-Capital Regions in the net wealth inequality of household in Korea. To this end, a two-stage Oaxaca-Blinder type decomposition is employed regarding the regional gap in the inequality of net wealth based upon the Recentered Influence Function of the Gini index for 'the 2018 Household Finance and Living Conditions Survey.' Despite the shortcomings of the survey data on wealth, the findings reveal that regional differences in income, marriage status (divorce), job type (agriculture, forestry and fishery related, and technical and assembly), family type (multi-cultural) variables deepen the regional gap in the net-wealth inequality, but employment status (full-time), job type (administrative and specialized, and service sales), household size variables mitigate the gap, and that regional differences in life cycles play an offsetting role.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.43-54
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• 2009

The purpose of the study was to investigate the status of the nutritional education program on educational perception, facilities, contents and systems, which were focused on the school obesity education in the elementary school. A five point Likert scale was used to evaluate the importance and performance of each item in four sections of the survey and Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA; gap between importance and performance) matrix analysis was applied to determine improvement priority. The findings from IPA matrix analysis are in the following. The items of the sections to be improved intensively are recognition of parents and in-charge teacher, availability of the education place, preparation of consulting room, preparation of various teaching media, interest of an education program, meal adjustment of overweight children, combination with education and exercise, education for psychological factors, development of scientific and systematic education program and reduction of meal service duty for education. Accordingly, the IPA matrix analysis suggested that an intensive improvement area should be excessively concentrated on for better performance. The regional gap between importance and performance showed significant difference for textbook and diet of overweight children in Kyunggi-Do. There were significant differences for the government perception, dietary habits and food-life education, fast-food education, education for breakfast importance, and education of school meal indication system and method to read food nutrition indication in Chollabuk-Do. As for the age gap between importance and performance, the twenties showed significantly bigger gaps in perception of school dietitians and linking between school meals and diet education. Therefore, more proactive efforts for the education for obesity prevention are necessary to prevent childhood obesity in elementary school and to help children to possess better health throughout their entire lives.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
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• v.47 no.1
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• pp.41-50
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• 2024

Korea is facing a significant problem with historically low fertility rates, which is becoming a major social issue affecting the economy, labor force, and national security. This study analyzes the factors contributing to the regional gap in fertility rates and derives policy implications. The government and local authorities are implementing a range of policies to address the issue of low fertility. To establish an effective strategy, it is essential to identify the primary factors that contribute to regional disparities. This study identifies these factors and explores policy implications through machine learning and explainable artificial intelligence. The study also examines the influence of media and public opinion on childbirth in Korea by incorporating news and online community sentiment, as well as sentiment fear indices, as independent variables. To establish the relationship between regional fertility rates and factors, the study employs four machine learning models: multiple linear regression, XGBoost, Random Forest, and Support Vector Regression. Support Vector Regression, XGBoost, and Random Forest significantly outperform linear regression, highlighting the importance of machine learning models in explaining non-linear relationships with numerous variables. A factor analysis using SHAP is then conducted. The unemployment rate, Regional Gross Domestic Product per Capita, Women's Participation in Economic Activities, Number of Crimes Committed, Average Age of First Marriage, and Private Education Expenses significantly impact regional fertility rates. However, the degree of impact of the factors affecting fertility may vary by region, suggesting the need for policies tailored to the characteristics of each region, not just an overall ranking of factors.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.20 no.11
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• pp.19-31
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• 2022

Purpose: This research aims to analyze the educational potential and students' satisfaction with the quality of education services distribution in Kazakhstani universities. The conceptual review shows that very few studies on regional development have been able to determine the level of satisfaction with the quality of educational services depending on the university's location. Research design, data, and methodology: The research methodology is divided into two approaches descriptive analysis and qualitative data analysis. The current educational situation and the distribution of educational services in the largest Kazakh universities were studied based on the proposed approaches' use. Statistical data are taken for indicators of educational potential for 2010-2020 from the Bureau of National Statistics. The primary data were collected based on a survey for 2021-2022 in five regions of Kazakhstan. Results: The results showed that there is a gender gap between men and women and regional disparities between the regions of Kazakhstan in the coverage of higher education. The results of the sociological survey revealed that the quality of educational services depends on the territorial location of the university. Conclusions: Based on the results of the assessment of educational potential and educational services, policy recommendations and further research in this area were proposed.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.45 no.2
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• pp.90-97
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• 2012

Objectives: While there have been many quantitative studies on the public's attitude towards mental illnesses, it is hard to find quantitative study which focused on the contextual effect on the public's attitude. The purpose of this study was to identify factors that affect the public's beliefs and attitudes including contextual effects. Methods: We analyzed survey on the public's beliefs and attitudes towards mental illness in Korea with multi-level analysis. We analyzed the public's beliefs and attitudes in terms of prejudice as an intermediate outcome and social distance as a final outcome. Then, we focused on the associations of factors, which were individual and regional socioeconomic factors, familiarity, and knowledge based on the comparison of the intermediate and final outcomes. Results: Prejudice was not explained by regional variables but was only correlated with individual factors. Prejudice increased with age and decreased by high education level. However, social distance controlling for prejudice increased in females, in people with a high education level, and in regions with a high education level and a high proportion of the old. Therefore, social distance without controlling for prejudice increased in females, in the elderly, in highly educated people, and in regions with a high education and aged community. Conclusions: The result of the multi-level analysis for the regional variables suggests that social distance for mental illness are not only determined by individual factors but also influenced by the surroundings so that it could be tackled sufficiently with appropriate considering of the relevant regional context with individual characteristics.