• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.22 no.8
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• pp.527-541
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• 2022

The purpose of this study is to explore the economic hardship experiences of low-income single-parent families by COVID-19 to find ways to improve after COVID-19. To this end, 10 single parents with children under the secondary school age were recruited through snowball sampling method and in-depth interviews with economic activities, income, expenditure, and economic life. As a result of the study, participants suffered from unemployment and the disappearance of extra income activities in the early stages of COVID-19, additional expenses incurred by children's food and increased utility bills. In addition, it was recognized that COVID-19 has come to be more difficult and unequal to single-parent families of low-income women. It was found that the temporary living difficulties were resolved with disaster support funds, and it was helpful in the short term by spending according to priorities such as overdue monthly rent, food expenses, children's academy expenses, and purchasing home appliances. However, it was recognized that disaster support funds were inappropriate for customized disaster support and long-term and selective support was necessary. In the conclusion, to improve economic problems after COVID-19, it proposed measures to improve social welfare policies and practices

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.13 no.12
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• pp.966-973
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• 2013

It has been frequently asked the question not only by academicians but also by practitioners whether employment flexibility can be compatible with employment stability. This study tries to find the answer by investigating the German model of employment flexibility practices and job stability policies. The German model of employment flexibility is mainly based on working-time accounts and short-time work programs. It is found that social partnership and government support have played a crucial role to stabilize German labour market. Workers, employers, and government have harmoniously interplayed in order for overcoming the economic hardship. Adapting the German experience of overcoming economic turbulence by introducing employment flexibilization can help Korean firms. However, it is important to recognize that there are some differences in practices of labour relations, cultural and social background while applying the German practices.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.58 no.2
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• pp.197-222
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• 2006

This study distinguishes the aging population as young-old and old-old women. It examines the difference of each variable between young-old and old-old women. Also, it examines the effect of physical, psychological, social, economic and environmental factors on the quality of life for older adults in both groups and compares the effects on the quality of life between both groups. The sample of this study is collected from Daegu and Kyungbuk province and the sample size of this study is 310. As statistical method, t-test, $X^2$ and hierarchical multiple regressions are used. As demographic factors, age, marital status, income and education are controlled. The research results show that marriage, perceived health, self-esteem and social support are important factors of affecting on the quality of life for both groups. However, for young-old group, the perceived economic hardship and the receipt of social welfare affect negatively and social participation affects positively on the quality of life. On the other hand, for old-old group, informative social role affects positively and social participation affects on the quality of life negatively.

• Journal of Family Resource Management and Policy Review
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.25-50
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• 2017

Recently, concern about family safety is rising again as an important issue with the context of family healthiness and well-being in Korean society despite of the dramatic economic growth. The purpose of this study is to examine the status of family safety of singles and single-parent households and to investigate the effect of social capital on the level of their family safety. Data are from the 10th wave of Korea Welfare Panel Study analysing one-person households(N=2,017) and single-parent households(N=172). One-person households were categorized as three groups by age(the youths/middle-aged/the elderly) and single-parent households were also three by family types(mother-child/fahter-child/grandparent-child). The major results were as follows: First, the mean of family safety index was highest among middle-aged, while single youths had the fewest problems in terms of family safety. Second, social capital was found to vary by family structure. In the one-person households, all the levels of the social capital variables, including trust, bond, acceptance, and participation, differed significantly; only two variables, bond and embracement, differed in the single-parent households. Third, social capital differed between the low-income households and others significantly. Forth, the positive effects of social capital on overcoming family safety problems were investigated. In conclusion, social capital represents an alternative resource for overcoming economic hardship for low-income one-person/single-parent households, especially for middle-aged singles and father-child single-parent households. Based on these empirical results, theoretical implications were discussed with regard to family policy and programs.

• Journal of Agricultural Extension & Community Development
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.143-176
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• 2014

In this study, the multicultural families female marriage immigrants experience life in Korea to evaluate the difficulty. To this end, a multi-cultural families living in Gyeonggi Province accomplished female marriage immigrants choose eight people to consensual conduct in-depth interviews with qualitative analysis methods(CQR) were analyzed using. The findings in the three categories and therefore the region of 49 to 12 depending on the frequency analysis. Female marriage immigrants living in Korea psychological and emotional difficulties experienced in the relationship with your spouse, in-laws and relations, communication problems, difficulties in expressing emotional difficulties, respectively. Social and economic difficulties experienced discriminatory gaze, economic hardship, as a multicultural families become psychological atrophy, life, customs, and cultural differences, respectively. The process of coping with these experiences self-help meetings, participate in cultural programs, and community systems were used. By the results of this study multicultural families immigrant women to help overcome difficulties in the practical help and social services to the community through the ongoing support system was required to suggestions.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.41 no.6
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• pp.143-156
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• 2003

The present study was initially designed to figure out the general condition of care giving system for the elderly women who need long term care and the level of their depression according to the conditions of care. And This research is intented to present appropriate policy that could help the establishment of supporting system for the fragile elderly women.1 used the data from <2001 National Study on the Needs for the Long-Term Care Elderly> by Korea Health and Population Institute. The results are as follows: First, Two third of all the respondents had serious problems (2-9 activities limits) in Instrumental Daily Living Ability(DAL). Most respondents reported “low” in satisfaction level related to receiving care, meaning the elderly had negative perception for the care from the family. The elderly expected their children to be as the primary care giver and mostly wanted to live with them in the future. Second, The majority of the long term care elderly women haven't used community service facilities very often and said they are not likely going to use the facilities in the future. Third, The respondents reported high in depression level as to lower satisfaction with their children's support, poorer health condition, more reluctant to use service facilities due to the cost, and fewer friends and neighbors resources around them. Therefore I could say that negative factors for the elderly women's psychological health were having unsatisfactory relationship with intimate people, developing physical illness, being in economic difficulties. That is, receiving less help from close family members, shrinking social network, and experiencing economic hardship would have negative effects on elderly women's psychological health. In the basis of these results, I suggest that in the mean time we shouldn't overlook the importance of the private support when we develop the public elderly support system.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.1-30
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• 2003

The recent experience about self-employment shows three main trends: first, its share out of the total workers has steadily increased, recording 37.6% in 2001, implying its prevalence and importance; second, its share out of male workers has caught up female workers', implying its importance to males as well as females; and finally, during the recent Economic Crisis when there was mass layoff and large scale bankruptcy, its share rapidly increased, reflecting its role of a buffer to economic fluctuation. However, there have been few studies on self-employment, mainly focusing on what makes someone choose it as an alternative to being employed. This study analyzes the determinants of the duration to terminate self-employment, by applying the proportional hazard model to the Korea Labor and Income Panel Survey(KLIPS) by the Korea Labor Institute. The KLIPS started the first wave in 1998 with the 5,000 household sample (and about 12,000 individual sample of household members aged 15 and more). In this study, the first four waves are used for analysis. The average duration of 5,357 spells of self-employment is 130 months. It shows slight difference between males(124 months) and females(138 months) while it widely ranges over industries (296 months for agriculture industry while 50 months for restaurant and hotel industry). Estimates of the proportional hazard model of the self-employment duration show that females are more likely to terminate self-employment while it is not statistically significant. The effect of age at starting self-employment on the hazard shows the inverse V-shape, which implies that, until a certain age(47 years), the hazard become higher as aging while, since then, it become lower as aging. The level of education has a positive effect on the hazard, implying that more education is related to the higher probability to be employed. The measures of economic performances, annual sales and earnings, are positively related to continuing self-employment while hardship at the start of self-employment measured by several ways has a negative effect. Training before opening business has a positive effect on keeping on self-employment and its effects are different over its providers, significantly positive for public providers while insignificant for private providers. More and further research on self-employment is urgent in the rapidly ageing society. To help workers to be self-employed, more public assistance is necessary for education, training, financing, marketing, management, and human resource management in order to make the olders consider self-employment as a good alternative rather than an inevitable one.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.19-49
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• 2011

In this study, multilateral conceptualizations of underemployment were measured in terms of wages, social status, skill utilization and permanence of the job, and then the effects of antecedents on underemployment and the effects of underemployment on organizational adaptation were examined. Data obtained by a longitudinally designed survey at intervals of 18 months with the reemployed(N = 153) after job loss were used. The underemployment measures include 1) the ratio of wage change 2) the ratio of status change 3) the ratio of education 4) the occurrence of change from the permanent job to temporary job, 5) overqualification - growth opportunity, 6) overqualification - mismatch. The first four measures are social-economic and objective measures and the last two measures are psychological and self-reported ones. Demographic variables(sex, age, education level, and period of unemployed), circumstantial variables(economic hardship, number of dependents), and psychological variables(job-seeking self-efficacy, depression/anxiety, latent function) are included in antecedents. In the effects of antecedents on underemployment, age increases the level of underemployment in the aspects of wage and job status. Economic hardship increases the possibility of underemployment in the aspects of education and number of dependents increases the possibility of underemployment in the aspects of job status. Job seeking self-efficacy decreases the possibility of underemployment in the overqualification - no growth. Retention of latent function during the period of unemployment lowers the possibility of underemployment in the overqualification - no growth. The level of depression and anxiety during the period of unemployment raises the possibility of underemployment in terms of education and in the overqualification - mismatch. In the effects of underemployment on organizational adaptation, the higher the level of underemployment in the aspect of education is, the lower the level of person-organization fit, emotional commitment, and job satisfaction are. And the transition from permanent job to temporary job makes emotional commitment and job satisfaction lower. No growth and mismatch exerted a significant influence on organizational adaptation generally.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.491-505
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• 1992

The purpose of this research was to understand the structure of the lived experience of parents of a child terminally ill with cancer The research question was “What is the structure of the experience of parents of a child terminally ill with cancer\ulcorner” The sample consisted of 17 parents of children admitted to the cancer units of two university hospitals in Seoul. The unstructured interviews were carried out from October 10, 1991 through January 10, 1992. They were audio-recorded and analysed using Van Kaam's method. Parents ascribed the cause of the cancer to the mother's emotional imbalance during pregnancy, the mother's stress, failure to observe religious rites, food, the parent's sin, misfortune and pollution. The theme clusters were tension, fear and depression experienced during pregnancy, stress that children suffer from abusive parents, failure to observe religious activites, bad luck, and sins committed during a previous life. When the child suffered a recurrence of cancer, the parents experienced negative emotions, nervousness, sorrow. depression and death. The theme clusters were feelings of despair, helplessness, regret, guilt, insecurity, emptyness and apathy. The long struggle with cancer resulted in the loss of economic security, loss of psychological and physical well being, and social withdrawal. The theme clusters were the economic burden of medical cost, giving up treatment, debt, limited medical insurance coverage and blood transfusion. The loss of psychological well being included stress, lack of support systems, inability to carry out responsibilities, lack of trust of the medical ten family breakdown, inappropriate expression of emotion and not disclosing the diagnosis to the child. Physically the parents suffered fatigue, insomnia, loss of appetite, loss of weight, dizzness, headache, psychosomatic symptoms, and increased consumption of liquor and cigarettes. Social withdrawal was manifested by taking time off from work to look after the child, decrease of outside social activities and feelings of isolation. Influences on family life were spousal conflicts, negative response of siblings, separation of the family members and economic hardship. The theme clusters were blaming a spouse for the cause of the illness and disagreements, maladjustment, lonliness, hostility and depression of siblings. The high price of medical care over the long period was a major factor influencing the life of the family. Positive experiences during the child's long illness were the strengthening of support systems and religious beliefs and financial help from social organizations. The support of one's spouse primarily helped to overcome the stress of the long illness. In addition, support was received from parents of other children with cancer and from nurses and religious leaders. The nurse, by providing empathetic support, should be a person with whom parents can express their feelings and share their experiences.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.391-400
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• 2005

Objective : This study examined the socioeconomic differentials for the health and health related behaviors among South Korean middle school students. Methods : A nationwide cross-sectional interview survey of 3,449 middle school second-grade students and their parents was conducted using a stratified multi-stage cluster sampling method. The response rate was 93.3%. The socioeconomic position indicators were based on self-reported information from the students and their parents: parental education, father's occupational class, monthly family income, out-of-pocket expenditure for education, housing ownership, educational expectations, educational performance and the perceived economic hardships. The outcome variables that were measured were also based on the self-reported information from the students. The health measures included self-rated health conditions, psychological or mental problems, the feelings of loneliness at school, the overall satisfaction of life and the perceived level of stress. The health related behaviors included were smoking, alcohol drinking, sexual intercourse, violence, bullying and verbal and physical abuse by parents. Results : Socioeconomic differences for the health and health related behaviors were found among the eighth grade boys and girls of South Korea. However, the pattern varied with gender, the socioeconomic position indicators and the outcome measures. The prevalence rates of the overall dissatisfaction with life for both genders differed according to most of the eight socioeconomic position indicators. All the health measures were significantly different according to the perceived economic hardship. However, the socioeconomic differences in the self-rated health conditions and the psychosocial or mental problems were not clear. The students having higher socioeconomic position tended to be a perpetrator of bullying while those students with lower socioeconomic position were more likely to be a victim. Conclusions : The perceived economic hardships predicted the health status among the eighth graders of South Korea. The overall satisfaction of life was associated with the socioeconomic position indicators. Further research efforts are needed to explore the mechanisms on how and why the socioeconomic position affects the health and health related behaviors in this age group.