• Human Ecology Research
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• v.54 no.2
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• pp.155-164
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• 2016

This study explored the characteristics, housing deficits and expectations for support programs of low-income renter households in housing poverty in order to provide housing policy development and improvement information. Microdata of the 2014 Korea Housing Survey was utilized as secondary data for this study. A total of 2,508,672 low-income renter households (weighted count) in the bottom 40% income ranks of entire general households living in private rental units were selected as study subjects. The major findings were as follows. (1) One point four percent of the subjects were living in non-house living quarters (e.g., shanties, vinyl greenhouses, container houses, and mud huts), 1.4% were in dosshouses, 9.9% were in basements, semi-basements or rooftop units, and 8.2% were in sub-standard units. (2) Among the households whose housing costs burdens were measurable, 75.7% were found to have housing cost burdens to pay 30% or more of their household income towards housing costs (rental costs and maintenance costs), but only 7.5% of the burdened households received a housing voucher. (3) Eighty-one percent were found to be in a housing poverty status as defined by the researcher; in addition, low-income renter households in housing poverty in Seoul tended to have a greater proportion of households headed by females, the elderly, and be persons with low-education or disabilities. (4) Households in housing poverty showed greater expectations for financial support and/or extended provisions of public rental housing than other low-income renter households.

• Journal of Nutrition and Health
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• v.49 no.5
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• pp.313-322
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• 2016

Purpose: This study was conducted to examine the relationship among cognitive function, nutrition screening initiative (NSI) score, and food intake status. Methods: A total of 409 subjects aged over 60 years were recruited from the Yongin dementia prevention and control center. Mini Mental State Examination Dementia Screening (MMSE-DS) method was used to assess the cognitive function of the subjects. Information on health related behaviors and food intake was collected by face to face interview using a structured questionnaire. The questionnaires included the NSI DETERMINE checklist, food intake sheets by 24 hr recall method and by semi-quantified food frequency questionnaire. Results: Subjects were divided into low cognitive or normal groups according to the MMSE-DS result. The prevalence of low cognitive function in the subjects was 25.7%. The low cognitive group exercised less and had higher nutritional health risk than the normal group. The low cognitive group had lower consumption of polyunsaturated fatty acid and higher tendency of thiamin, riboflavin, and iron deficiency. The low cognitive group had less frequency of eating mackerel, pepper, tangerine, and watermelon and higher frequency of eating white rice and cookies than the normal group. Conclusion: The results of this study imply that the cognitive function of elderly is related to exercise behavior, nutritional health risk, and food and nutrient intake status.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.21 no.10
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• pp.308-316
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• 2020

This study attempted to derive an equation for calculating the damage impact distance using CARIS so that local governments can quickly determine evacuation and notification of residents in the event of an ammonia-release accident. Ammonia is an accident-causing substance and one of 16 substances to prepare for resident evacuation. It is the most frequently occurring chemical with 58 chemical accidents from 2014~2019. The study derives an equation for calculating the damage impact distance according to the exposure time of ammonia based on AEGL, an acute exposure standard applicable to the general population, which is includes vulnerable groups such as infants, children and the elderly and designated by the EPA. The calculation formulas for each concentration and exposure time to classify the hazardous area according to AEGL-3 and the semi-dangerous area according to AEGL-2 were derived. A comparison of the relative standard deviation between the damage impact distance values of CARIS revealed that is was in the range of 0~2%. Local governments should consider the actual accident situation and apply the appropriate damage-affected distance calculation formula derived from the study to evacuate residents near the origin of the accident or use for protective measures such as indoor evacuation notification.

• The Journal of The Korea Institute of Intelligent Transport Systems
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.115-124
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• 2022

Unlike the semi-public system of city buses, Seoul's townbus are operated on a private operating system, which is poor condition to the changes in the environment. Sales decreased due to a decrease in the number of passengers due to COVID-19 and a demand for conversion due to the advent of competitive transportation methods, and the financial support of Seoul Metropolitan Government is continuously increasing. In this study, to analyze the characteristics of townbus operated by a private operating system, the townbus sales and surplus companies were analyzed by what factors were affected. For the analysis data, townbus financial statements of Seoul in 2018 were used, and townbus sales and surplus companies were applied as dependent variables, and townbus operation system, satisfaction survey, humanities and social variables, and subway and public bicycle characteristics were applied as independent variables. As a result of the analysis, the sales is affected by operating hours per vehicle, in-vehicle safety, the number of households, the number of elderly people, and public bicycle variables, and surplus companies are affected by in-vehicle safety, reliability, and public bicycle variables. In particular, public bicycles, a competitive means of transportation, had an impact on industry sales, and the townbus business environment is expected to become more difficult as time goes by. The industry is seeking self-rescue measures, and Seoul is required to strengthen financial support so that townbus can operate stably.

• Korean Journal of Biological Psychiatry
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.187-194
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• 2015

Objectives To examine direct causes of attempted suicides, methods adopted to commit suicide, and psychiatric diagnoses among suicide attempters in South Korea. Methods A total of 1359 suicide attempters who had visited emergency department of 17 medical centers due to suicide attempt from May 2013 to Nov 2013 were interviewed using semi-structured questionnaires. Results Psychiatric symptoms were the most common cause of suicide attempts (62.2%), followed by interpersonal relationships (24.4%). Women attempted suicide more often for interpersonal reasons, whereas men were more likely to do so for financial and job-related reasons. Half of participants (55.8%) attempted suicide by drug intoxication, which was more prevalent among females and those who had previous history of psychiatric disease or previous suicide attempt. Men were more likely to use more lethal methods such as pesticide poisoning and gas inhalation than women. Pesticide poisoning was also prevalent among the elderly group and the rural population. Near ninety-five percent (94.5%) of participants received a psychiatric diagnosis : the most frequent diagnosis was depressive disorder. Conclusions This is the first nationwide study of cases of attempted suicide. When stratified by age groups, gender, urbanicity, living alone or not, presence of physical illness, previous psychiatric history, and previous suicide attempt, there were significant differences with respect to causes, methods of attempted suicides and psychiatric diagnoses of suicide attempters.