• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.15-26
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• 2010

This study was conducted in order to understand grandmothers' satisfaction of caring for working mothers' children and the influence of related variables with regard to living arrangements. The data were collected from 245 grandmothers who have been caring for their grandchildren for more than 6 months. The data were analyzed by mean, t-test, $x^2$-test, and hierarchical multiple regression. The results were as follows: First, Degree of satisfaction was lower in grandmothers who were living with their children than those who were not. Second, the variables affecting the grandmothers living with their children were economic status, extent of care giving activities, and social support, wherein social support proved to be the most influential. In the case of those not living with their children, the significant variables were motive and social support, motive being more influential. This result indicates that affecting variables differ by the grandmothers' living arrangements, and thus the strategy to enhance their care giving satisfaction should differ as well, based on the findings.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.66 no.1
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• pp.191-219
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• 2014

The major purpose of this study was to explore care giving experiences of mothers, who have their children with borderline intellectual functioning disorder. The core analytical strategy was to find out the essential meaning of caring their children. For this purpose, eight mothers were participated in depth interview, which conducted during October, 2011 through July 2012. The face-to-face interview repeated two or three times based on phenomenological perspective. The interview suggested two major findings: changing mother's view from raising retarded children to caregiving a child with growing-up substantially slow speed; the essence of nurturing experiences for mothers, whose children have borderline intellectual functioning, was to watching with attention rather than advocating ownership. This result can be also found in Barshow's concept of 'watching' rather than 'possession', which is suggested by Tennyson. However, the essential meaning of this concept was associated with 'watching with care', which was originated form Goethe's notion of 'existence'. Mother's of children with borderline intellectual functioning have reached a point of view: when creating a parent-child relationship, it was essential that the child was not 'my child', but was 'a child' per se. This type of parent-child relationship was a result of giving up a desire that the child raised within mother's boundary. It was also a result of psychological warfare and conflict in mother's mind. To internalized this view, it is recommended that the mothers implement the following three perspectives: first, the mothers put down overly-pushed motive toward their children; second, they enhance their level of understanding toward their child; third, it is necessary that the mothers build a new sense of existence through matching their level of concern with their children.