• Title/Summary/Keyword: Social Inclusion

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Effects of dietary L-glutamine and glutamic acid combination, and whey powder on the performance and nutrient digestion in weaned piglets fed grain-based diets

  • Almeida, Jonathan Madson dos Santos;Pascoal, Leonardo Augusto Fonseca;de Almeida, Jorge Luiz Santos;Guerra, Ricardo Romao;da Silva, Jose Humberto Vilar;da Silva, David Rwbystanne Pereira;Neto, Manoel Rosa Silva;Martins, Terezinha Domiciano Dantas
    • Animal Bioscience
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    • v.34 no.12
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    • pp.1963-1973
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    • 2021
  • Objective: The present study aimed to evaluate the influence of including L-glutamine along with glutamic acid as a supplement in weaned piglets' diets with and without whey powder. Methods: Two assays were carried out. A total of 40 piglets ([Landrace×Large White]×Pietrain) weaned at 24 days of age with an initial body weight of 6.6±0.6 kg were used in the first assay, and the following parameters were evaluated: growth performance, the incidence of diarrhea, morphometry, intestinal integrity, and hepatic glycogen index. The animals were then blocked into four groups according to different diets: diet all-grain feeding (G); diet all-grain feeding with whey powder (GW); and with vs without 1% supplementation of the commercial product containing L-glutamine and glutamic acid (A or NA). Whey powder was added according to the stage of life, corresponding to 17%, 10%, and 5%, respectively, in order to meet the need for lactose. The animals were evaluated at 24 to 42 days and at 24 to 55 days of age. The nutrient digestibility for the second assay was carried out by using 24 animals with an average weight of 11.49±1.6 kg, and the same diets were tested. Results: The supplementation of L-glutamine + glutamic acid or the addition of whey powder in diets for weaned piglets provided (p<0.05) greater feed intake, greater weight gain and improved feed conversion in the initial period (24 to 42 days age). However, in the whole period (24 to 55 days age) only amino acid supplementation affected (p<0.05) growth performance. There was a positive interaction (p<0.05) between the type of diet and L-glutamine + glutamic acid supplementation on villus height, crypt depth and the villus:crypt ratio in the duodenum. In addition, L-glutamine + glutamic acid supplementation reduced (p<0.05) the crypt depth and improved the villus:crypt ratio in the jejunum. The inclusion of whey powder affected (p<0.05) positively the digestibility coefficients analyzed except mineral matter digestibility coeficients. The supplementation of 1% the commercial product composed of L-glutamine and glutamic acid improved (p<0.05) only the digestibility coefficient of crude protein. Conclusion: These results indicate that supplementation of 1% commercial product containing L-glutamine + glutamic acid in diets for piglets from 24 to 55 days of age, dispenses with the use of whey powder when evaluating growth performance. Amino acid supplementation alone or associated with whey powder affects (p<0.05) positively the indicators of the intestinal integrity.

Estimating the Accuracy of Polygraph Test (폴리그라프 검사의 정확도 추정)

  • Jin-Sup Eom ;Hyung-Ki Ji ;Kwangbai Park
    • Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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    • v.14 no.4
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    • pp.1-18
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    • 2008
  • The present study examined the accuracy of polygraph tests through two types of statistical methods with unknown ground truth. One method evaluated the accuracy based on the rates of agreements between polygraph test results of crime suspects and prosecutors' indictment decisions for them. Those crime suspects were tested with polygraph by the Prosecutors' Office of the Republic of Korea between 2000 and 2004. The other method estimated the accuracy by using the latent class analysis based on the frequency distributions of the polygraph results and indictments during 2006. Excluding cases that were 'inconclusive' on the polygraph test, the study showed that the accuracy of the polygraph tests is .914 (SE=.004) for the 2000-2004 data, and .885 (SE=.021) for the 2006 data. With the inclusion of 'inconclusive' cases in the 2006 data, the results from the latent class analysis showed the accuracy in the range between .707 and .734 (SE=.027~.031), with false positives between .078 and .087 (SE=.019~.023), and false negatives between .029 and .078 (SE=.010~.023). The probability that the polygraph test correctly classifies subjects appeared to be in the range between .912 and .925 (SE=.013-.016) for those who lie, and in the range between .867 to .955 (SE=.011-.040) for those who tell the truth.

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Consumer Awareness and Evaluation of Retailers' Social Responsibility: An Exploratory Approach into Ethical Purchase Behavior from a U.S Perspective (소비자인지도화령수상사회책임(消费者认知度和零售商社会责任): 종미국시각출발적도덕구매행위적탐색성연구(从美国视角出发的道德购买行为的探索性研究))

  • Lee, Min-Young;Jackson, Vanessa P.
    • Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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    • v.20 no.1
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    • pp.49-58
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    • 2010
  • Corporate social responsibility has become a very important issue for researchers (Greenfield, 2004; Maignan & Ralston, 2002; McWilliams et al., 2006; Pearce & Doh 2005), and many consider it necessary for businesses to define their role in society and apply social and ethical standards to their businesses (Lichtenstein et al., 2004). As a result, a significant number of retailers have adopted CSR as a strategic tool to promote their businesses. To this end, this study sought to discover U.S. consumers' attitudes and behavior in ethical purchasing and consumption based on their subjective perception and evaluation of a retailer. The objectives of this study include: 1) determine the participants awareness of retailers corporate social responsibility; 2) assess how participants evaluate retailers corporate social responsibility; 3) examine whether participants evaluation process of retailers CSR influence their attitude toward the retailer; and 4) assess if participants attitude toward the retailers CSR influence their purchase behavior. This study does not focus on actual retailers' CSR performance because a consumer's decision making process is based on an individual assessment not an actual fact. This study examines US college students' awareness and evaluations of retailers' corporate social responsibility (CSR). Fifty six college students at a major Southeastern university participated in the study. The age of the participants ranged from 18 to 26 years old. Content analysis was conducted with open coding and focused coding. Over 100 single-spaced pages of written responses were collected and analyzed. Two steps of coding (i.e., open coding and focused coding) were conducted (Esterberg, 2002). Coding results and analytic memos were used to understand participants' awareness of CSR and their ethical purchasing behavior supported through the selection and inclusion of direct quotes that were extracted from the written responses. Names used here are pseudonyms to protect confidentiality of participants. Participants were asked to write about retailers, their aware-ness of CSR issues, and to evaluate a retailer's CSR performance. A majority (n = 28) of respondents indicated their awareness of CSR but have not felt the need to act on this issue. Few (n=8) indicated that they are aware of this issue but not greatly concerned. Findings suggest that when college students evaluate retailers' CSR performance, they use three dimensions of CSR: employee support, community support, and environmental support. Employee treatment and support were found as an important criterion in evaluation of retailers' CSR. Respondents indicated that their good experience with a retailer as an employee made them have a positive perception and attitude toward the retailer. Regarding employee support four themes emerged: employee rewards and incentives based on performance, working environment, employee education and training program, and employee and family discounts. Well organized rewards and incentives were mentioned as an important attribute. The factors related to the working environment included: how well retailers follow the rules related to working hours, lunch time and breaks was also one of the most mentioned attributes. Regarding community support, three themes emerged: contributing a percentage of sales to the local community, financial contribution to charity organizations, and events for community support. Regarding environments, two themes emerged: recycling and selling organic or green products. It was mentioned in the responses that retailers are trying to do what they can to be environmentally friendly. One respondent mentioned that the company is creating stores that have an environmentally friendly design. Information about what the company does to help the environment can easily be found on the company’s website as well. Respondents have also noticed that the stores are starting to offer products that are organic and environmentally friendly. A retailer was also mentioned by a respondent in this category in reference to how the company uses eco-friendly cups and how they are helping to rebuild homes in New Orleans. The respondents noticed that a retailer offers reusable bags for their consumers to purchase. One respondent stated that a retailer uses its products to help the environment, through offering organic cotton. After thorough analysis of responses, we found that a participant's evaluation of a retailers' CSR influenced their attitudes towards retailers. However, there was a significant gap between attitudes and purchasing behavior. Although the participants had positive attitudes toward retailers CSR, the lack of funds and time influenced their purchase behavior. Overall, half (n=28) of the respondents mentioned that CSR performance affects their purchasing decisions making when shopping. Findings from this study provide support for retailers to consider their corporate social responsibility when developing their image with the consumer. This study implied that consumers evaluate retailers based on employee, community and environmental support. The evaluation, attitude and purchase behavior of consumers seem to be intertwined. That is, evaluation is based on the knowledge the consumer has of the retailers CSR. That knowledge may influence their attitude toward the retailer and thus influence their purchase behavior. Participants also indicated that having CSR makes them think highly of the retailer, but it does not influence their purchase behavior. Price and convenience seem to surpass the importance of CSR among the participants. Implications, recommendations for future research, and limitations of the study are also discussed.

Roles of Perceived Use Control consisting of Perceived Ease of Use and Perceived Controllability in IT acceptance (정보기술 수용에서 사용용이성과 통제가능성을 하위 차원으로 하는 지각된 사용통제의 역할)

  • Lee, Woong-Kyu
    • Asia pacific journal of information systems
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    • v.18 no.2
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    • pp.1-14
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    • 2008
  • According to technology acceptance model(TAN) which is one of the most important research models for explaining IT users' behavior, on intention of using IT is determined by usefulness and ease of use of it. However, TAM wouldn't explain the performance of using IT while it has been considered as a very good model for prediction of the intention. Many people would not be confirmed in the performance of using IT until they can control it at their will, although they think it useful and easy to use. In other words, in addition to usefulness and ease of use as in TAM, controllability is also should be a factor to determine acceptance of IT. Especially, there is a very close relationship between controllability and ease of use, both of which explain the other sides of control over the performance of using IT, so called perceived behavioral control(PBC) in social psychology. The objective of this study is to identify the relationship between ease of use and controllability, and analyse the effects of both two beliefs over performance and intention in using IT. For this purpose, we review the issues related with PBC in information systems studies as well as social psychology, Based on a review of PBC, we suggest a research model which includes the relationship between control and performance in using IT, and prove its validity empirically. Since it was introduced as qa variable for explaining volitional control for actions in theory of planned behavior(TPB), there have been confusion about concept of PBC in spite of its important role in predicting so many kinds of actions. Some studies define PBC as self-efficacy that means actor's perception of difficulty or ease of actions, while others as controllability. However, this confusion dose not imply conceptual contradiction but a double-faced feature of PBC since the performance of actions is related with both self-efficacy and controllability. In other words, these two concepts are discriminated and correlated with each other. Therefore, PBC should be considered as a composite concept consisting of self-efficacy and controllability, Use of IT has been also one of important areas for predictions by PBC. Most of them have been studied by analysis of comparison in prediction power between TAM and TPB or modification of TAM by inclusion of PBC as another belief as like usefulness and ease of use. Interestingly, unlike the other applications in social psychology, it is hard to find such confusion in the concept of PBC in the studies for use of IT. In most of studies, controllability is adapted as PBC since the concept of self-efficacy is included in ease of use explicitly. Based on these discussions, we can suggest perceived use control(PUC) which is defined as perception of control over the performance of using IT and composed of controllability and ease of use as sub-concepts. We suggest a research model explaining acceptance of IT which includes the relationships of PUC with attitude and performance of using IT. For empirical test of our research model, two user groups are selected for surveying questionnaires. In the first group, there are freshmen who take a basic course for Microsoft Excel, and the second group consists of senior students who take a course for analysis of management information by Excel. Most of measurements are adapted ones that have been validated in the other studies, while performance is real score of mid-term in each class. In result, four hypotheses related with PUC are supported statistically with very low significance level. Main contribution of this study is suggestion of PUC through theoretical review of PBC. Specifically, a hierarchical model of PUC are derived from very rigorous studies in the relationship between self-efficacy and controllability with a view of PBC in social psychology. The relationship between PUC and performance is another main contribution.

Gender Roles, Accessibility, and Gendered Spatiality (성역할, 접근성, 그리고 젠더화된 공간성)

  • Kim, Hyun-Mi
    • Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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    • v.42 no.5
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    • pp.808-834
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    • 2007
  • This study attempts to elucidate manifold dimensions of gendered accessibility experiences. How gender roles(household responsibilities) differentiate accessibility experiences between women and men is explored through the comparison of married dual-earner couples' parental status, using the US Portland activity-travel diary dataset with GIS-based geocomputation results of(time-geography based) space-time accessibility. First, this study shows how gender division of labor within the household still permeates current society, despite the widespread belief of the social change toward a gender-egalitarian society. Then, the study pays special attention to the way gender roles structure individual accessibility experiences of women and men differently, and, in turn, the way such accessibility experiences take a form of gendered spatiality. Gendered spatiality is examined through the analysis of accessibility space as well as activity space in order to ascertain women's home-attached and spatially entrapped characteristics. More household responsibilities throughout a day and, even more, the time constraint of picking up children at the daycare centers after work lead women's possible activity space to be more home-centered. The analysis of the spatio-temporal context of accessibility space makes gendered spatiality visible. However, the findings suggest that behavioral outcomes should be understood with an explicit awareness of constraints individuals face. It is because the revealed activity spaces can be not only an outcome of constraint but also an outcome of choice. Behavioral outcomes should not be treated as a straightforward expression of the level of constraints. It is problematic to expect that behavioral outcomes directly mirror the level of constraints. It is also problematic to suppose that the level of constraints can be straightforwardly elicited from revealed behavioral outcomes.

Is Fertility Rate Proportional to the Quality of Life? An Exploratory Analysis of the Relationship between Better Life Index (BLI) and Fertility Rate in OECD Countries (출산율은 삶의 질과 비례하는가? OECD 국가의 삶의 질 요인과 출산율의 관계에 관한 추이분석)

  • Kim, KyungHee;Ryu, SeoungHo;Chung, HeeTae;Gim, HyeYeong;Park, HeongJoon
    • International Area Studies Review
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    • v.22 no.1
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    • pp.215-235
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    • 2018
  • Policy concerns related to raising fertility rates are not only common interests among the OECD countries, but they are also issues of great concern to South Korea whose fertility rate is the lowest in the world. The fertility rate in South Korea continues to decline, even though most of the national budget has been spent on measures to address this and many studies have been conducted on the increase in the fertility rates. In this regard, this study aims to verify the effectiveness of the detailed factors affecting the fertility rate that have been discussed in the previous studies on fertility rates, and to investigate the overall trend toward enhancing the quality of life and increasing the fertility rate through macroscopic and structural studies under the recognition of problems related to the policy approaches through the case studies of the European countries. Toward this end, this study investigated if a high quality of life in advanced countries contributes to the increase in the fertility rate, which country serves as a state model that has a high quality of life and a high fertility rate, and what kind of social and policy environment does the country have with regard to childbirth. The analysis of the OECD Better Life Index (BLI) and CIA fertility rate data showed that the countries whose people enjoy a high quality of life do not necessarily have high fertility rates. In addition, under the recognition that a country with a high quality of life and a high birth rate serves as a state model that South Korea should aim for, the social characteristics of Iceland, Ireland, and New Zealand, which turned out to have both a high quality of life and a high fertility rate, were compared with those of Germany, which showed a high quality of life but a low fertility rate. According to the comparison results, the three countries that were mentioned showed higher awareness of gender equality; therefore, the gender wage gap was small. It was also confirmed that the governments of these countries support various policies that promote both parents sharing the care of their children. In Germany, on the other hand, the gender wage gap was large and the fertility rate was low. In a related move, however, the German government has made active efforts to a paradigm shift toward gender equality. The fertility rate increases when the synergy lies in the relationship between parents and children; therefore, awareness about gender equality should be firmly established both at home and in the labor market. For this reason, the government is required to provide support for the childbirth and rearing environment through appropriate family policies, and exert greater efforts to enhance the effectiveness of the relevant systems rather than simply promoting a system construction. Furthermore, it is necessary to help people in making their own childbearing decisions during the process of creating a better society by changing the national goal from 'raising the fertility rate' to 'creating a healthy society made of happy families'

Human Papillomavirus (HPV) Type Distribution in Korean Women: a Meta-Analysis

  • Bae, Jeong-Hoon;Lee, Sung-Jong;Kim, Chan-Joo;Hur, Soo-Young;Park, Yong-Gyu;Lee, Won-Chul;Kim, Young-Tak;Ng, Timothy L.;Bock, Hans L.;Park, Jong-Sup
    • Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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    • v.18 no.4
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    • pp.788-794
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    • 2008
  • The aim of the present study is to estimate the overall prevalence and type distribution of human papillomavirus (HPV) in Korean women, through literature review and meta-analysis. We searched published data for the period between 1995 and 2007 using the following inclusion criteria; (1) studies using type-specific HPV tests, (2) data from Korean female, (3) with cytologic or pathologic results, (4) having more than 20 cases for each subgroup classified by cytologic results, and (5) HPV detection including types 16, 18, and at least one other type. In total, 18 studies (13,842 cases) published up to April 2007 were identified and selected. Adjusted overall HPV prevalence was 23.9% (95% CI: 23.8-24.1%) in women with normal cytology and 95.8% (95% CI: 95.4-96.2%) in women with cervical cancer. Type 16 was predominant regardless of cervical disease status, and type 58 occupied a significantly larger proportion in high-grade cervical intraepitheliallesions and cervical cancer in Korean women. HPV types 58, 33, and 52 together accounted for about 20% of infections in cervical cancer and high-grade intraepitheliallesions. After introduction of HPV prophylactic vaccines, extended protection, especially against types 58, 33, and 52, will be an important issue for cervical cancer prevention in Korea. The future dominant genotypes will require follow-up epidemiological studies with a large-scale, multicentered, and prospective design.

Comparison of Trajectory of Quality of Life in Patients with High Risk Breast Cancer Undergoing Adjuvant Chemotherapy and Autogenous Bone Marrow Transplantation (보조적 표준 항암 화학요법에 비한 자가조혈모세포 이식 유방암 환자 삶의 질 내용 비교)

  • Lee, Eun-Ok
    • Asian Oncology Nursing
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    • v.1 no.1
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    • pp.5-17
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    • 2001
  • It is known that aggressive treatment of chemotherapy, radiation and autogenous stem cell transplantation is effective for prevention of recurrence in the high-risk breast cancer patients. It was assumed that this procedure takes a longer time and decreases the quality of life more than the standard adjuvant chemotherapy. However, there are few studies comparing the quality of life of patients having bone marrow transplantation and adjuvant chemotherapy. Most of the studies were focused on the quality of life in one point of time, such as only during the early treatment stage, only overall quality of life rather than specific dimensions of the quality of life. The purposes of this study are 1) to identify the difference of the quality of life between two different treatment patterns, adjuvant chemotherapy and autogenous stem cell transplantation: 2) to identify the mostly affected dimension and the periods of time affected by the treatment patterns; and 3) to identify the trajectories of quality of life in each treatment pattern. This is a time series design that measures 4 different points of times. At the beginning of the study, 19 patients were placed in the chemotherapy group and 12 in the group of auto-peripheral blood stem cell transplantation. The inclusion criterion was the advanced disease stage of 3 or over with metastasis of more than 5 lymph nodes. The exclusion criteria were 1) anyone who has metastasis to other organ; 2) anyone who had psychological problems. Ferrell's Quality of Life Scale for Cancer Survivors 41 items on a 10 point scale was used. The QOL-CS includes 4 dimensions, which were labeled physical, psychological, social, and spiritual. The Cronbach‘s alpha of this scale was 0.89. Mann-Whitney U test and Friedman test were used to test each hypothesis. In comparison of the two groups, the quality of life of the bone marrow transplantation group dramatically increased at the 3rd and 6th month after transplantation, while the chemotherapy groups results stayed lower. The most affected dimension of the quality of life at the end of the treatment was the physical dimension. However, it and increased along with time, while the psychological dimension values remained low over the long-term period. Intensive nursing care is needed during the entire period of chemotherapy in all patients having chemotherapy, and is also required for right after cases of bone marrow transplantation.

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A Review Study on Adjustment of College Freshmen for Suggesting Adaptation Program (적응프로그램 제언을 위한 대학신입생 학교적응 관련 문헌분석)

  • Yoo, Kyung Hee;Kim, Jong Kyung
    • The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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    • v.16 no.8
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    • pp.580-591
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    • 2016
  • The purpose of this study was to review articles and theses on adjustment of college freshmen from domestic researches conducted during the past 11 years, to identify overall research trends, and to suggest direction and strategies for college freshman's adjustment. The final 24 articles were selected from three databases, RISS, KISS, and NAL (National assembly library) using specific inclusion criteria. Twenty were correlation studies and four were experimental studies. In 2009, the first study on adjustment of college freshmen was published. Since then several more studies have been conducted to date. This means that people have recognized the importance of adjustment of college freshmen. Twenty three studies that are reviewed used Baker and Siryk's college adjustment tool. From reviewed correlation studies, mean score of college students' adjustment was 3.25. The related variables with adjustment of college freshmen revealed 20 items, especially self-esteem, self-efficacy, and stress showed important related concepts. The general characteristics related to adjustment of freshmen were outgoing character, living with family, aged students, satisfied with the area of study, and satisfied with school life. The findings of this study indicated that colleges when planning for the freshmen orientation program should focus on improving self-efficacy of students, stress management, mentor program, and freshmen adjustment program for each department of the school and college.

Exploratory Study of Dimensions of Health-related Quality of Life in the General Population of South Korea

  • Kim, Seon-Ha;Jo, Min-Woo;Ock, Minsu;Lee, Sang-il
    • Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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    • v.50 no.6
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    • pp.361-368
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    • 2017
  • Objectives: This study aimed to explore dimensions in addition to the 5 dimensions of the 5-level EQ-5D version (EQ-5D-5L) that could satisfactorily explain variation in health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in the general population of South Korea. Methods: Domains related to HRQoL were searched through a review of existing HRQoL instruments. Among the 28 potential dimensions, the 5 dimensions of the EQ-5D-5L and 7 additional dimensions (vision, hearing, communication, cognitive function, social relationships, vitality, and sleep) were included. A representative sample of 600 subjects was selected for the survey, which was administered through face-to-face interviews. Subjects were asked to report problems in 12 health dimensions at 5 levels, as well as their self-rated health status using the EuroQol visual analogue scale (EQ-VAS) and a 5-point Likert scale. Among subjects who reported no problems for any of the parameters in the EQ-5D-5L, we analyzed the frequencies of problems in the additional dimensions. A linear regression model with the EQ-VAS as the dependent variable was performed to identify additional significant dimensions. Results: Among respondents who reported full health on the EQ-5D-5L (n=365), 32% reported a problem for at least 1 additional dimension, and 14% reported worse than moderate self-rated health. Regression analysis revealed a $R^2$ of 0.228 for the original EQ-5D-5L dimensions, 0.200 for the new dimensions, and 0.263 for the 12 dimensions together. Among the added dimensions, vitality and sleep were significantly associated with EQ-VAS scores. Conclusions: This study identified significant dimensions for assessing self-rated health among members of the general public, in addition to the 5 dimensions of the EQ-5D-5L. These dimensions could be considered for inclusion in a new preference-based instrument or for developing a country-specific HRQoL instrument.