• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.16 no.6
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• pp.971-978
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• 2014

This study investigates the developmental conditions of functional clothes for the elderly. First, preceding studies and relevant web sites were analyzed along with a survey of commercial functional elderly clothes in Korea. A KIPRIS patent information database was used to study registered and disclosed patents and utility models in order to analyze patent application trends in relevant fields. Patents were searched by year of application from 1990 to 2013. Keywords used for searching included 'senior, aged, and elderly'. Among collected data, overlapping and irrelevant data were excluded to select 162 cases for analysis. Details of analysis are annual patent application trends of functional elderly clothes, topic analysis, shape and characteristics. An examination of commercially available functional clothing products for the elderly indicated that most of products were developed in the form of inner wear or protective clothing for seniors who have bodily discomfort. An annual patent application of functional elderly clothes showed slight fluctuations; however, there was an overall increase. For patent topics, technologies related to secretion and excretion were the most at 47 cases total (29%), followed by 23 cases (14%) on biometric information technology. However, the development of relevant technologies seems necessary in the future as therapeutic function and fiber technologies gradually stagnate.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.44 no.4
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• pp.764-775
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• 2020

Lifespans are increasing and many consumers are interested in health issues in these busy modern days, developing functional clothing that can be worn everyday is one of the competitive solutions in the oversaturated clothing market. When developing a new item with a fresh idea, it is important to look into prior art beforehand to avoid unnecessary intellectual property right-related disputes. This study investigates Korean domestic patents and utility models about functional clothing in terms of human body performance and health promotion in order to suggest essential data to relevant developers. We selected 324 patents and utility models and made an analysis according to the year, functions, applied technologies, frequency of claims, target wearers and item types. We found problems in current functional clothing patent application trends and suggested new aspects when developing innovative functional clothing items. Data was limited to Korean domestic patents; however, this study is still meaningful giving references to technology roadmaps and encouraging new intellectual property development.

• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.1063-1075
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• 2010

Studying awareness, importance, satisfaction, and wearing behavior of functional textiles for active silver generation related with gender and age is expected to contribute to clothing products development to improve and maintain their health and marketing strategy fit for user characteristics. For empirical research, a survey was developed and the aged 50 and above were 332 respondents. The results of the study are as follows. First, silver generation considered all the clothing comfort sensations important when wearing clothes, such as tactile sensation, clothing pressure sensation, thermal/wet sensation, and motion sensation in human physiological aspect. Also, stretchy fabrics were ranked first in awareness, the number of wearing times, and satisfaction of comfort functional fabrics. More than 30% of silver generation have fifteen items out of 36 functional clothes. Second, in analysis of awareness by gender on functional clothing products, women were more aware of health/safety-oriented fabrics than men were. Otherwise, men had more knowledge about the water-related properties of functional fabrics than women have, such as water/moisture absorptive and water-repellent/vapor permeable fabrics. While women have more indoor casual wear, men had more active sportswear. Also, women expressed a strong preference to the stretchy function of fabrics.

• The International Journal of Costume Culture
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.146-158
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• 2001

The purpose of this study was to present basic materials that can be utilized for better understanding of consumers behavior and the formation of marketing strategies through development of scales on the basis of recognition of the type clothing consumption value. The subjects selected for the final analysis were 654 females and 618 males. Re data were collected using a questionnaire after a focus group interview, and analyzed through factor analysis. The result of this study were as follows; 1. A total of 63 questions were selected for males and 68 questions for females and Cornbach's α was 0.97 for both males and females. 2. Males clothing consumption values were comprised of outward attractiveness, situational-social, psychological, functional, epistemic, and fashion values, while females were comprised fashion, psychological, outward attractiveness, functional, situational, personality expression, and social values, which showed clothing consumption values differ between males and females. 3. Re clothing consumption value regarded as the most important by undergraduates was that associated with outward attractiveness, such as expression of an attractive and ideal image, suitability for ones outward appearance, and outward appearance to members of the other sex.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.1-13
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• 2007

Ergonomic methods have been effectively applied to design and evaluation of functional clothing. The goals of the present study are to: (1) develop an ergonomic evaluation system for the systematic analysis of functional clothing and (2) examine the usefulness of the proposed evaluation system by applying to flame-proof clothing. Based on the survey of literature and the brainstorming of experts in clothing design and ergonomics, factors considered for clothing evaluation were selected, classified, and complemented, resulting in an ergonomic clothing evaluation system consisting of four factor categories (clothing construction, user, work and environment, and user response). Using the proposed system, a field survey and a laboratory experiment were conducted for flame-proof clothing to identify its design problems. The field survey to workers found a comprehensive set of problems on the flame-proof clothing design in terms of pattern, textile, and color. The laboratory experiment identified additional design problems using a questionnaire that was developed based on an analysis on the relationship between clothing design components and ergonomic evaluation measures. The present study showed the ergonomic evaluation system and the relationship analysis of clothing design components and ergonomic evaluation measures are of use to identify design problems of functional clothing in a comprehensive and analytic manner.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.1-6
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• 2011

Design patent is a type of industrial design right that is granted on the ornamental design of a functional item. We analyzed domestic design patents that were applied from 1965 until 2008, to the field of functional clothing. Since the year 2000 the number of design patents of functional clothing progressively increased. Design patents applied to the functional clothing field includes sport wear (47%), working clothes (34%), and leisure wear (19%). Design development of the sports wear from the latter half of 1990's has shown a continuously increasing tendency. The most patent applications belonged to the companies(51.4%), followed by individual applicants (46.6%), and the universities or laboratories had the least number of applications (2.0%). In case of working clothes or the leisure wear, the number of design applications focusing on the functional characteristic is higher than that of aesthetic characteristic, however, the number of design applications focusing on the aesthetic characteristic is higher in sportswear.

• Fibers and Polymers
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.215-221
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• 2003

A vertical skin model with two detachable environmental chambers was developed to simulate a Human-Clothing-Environment system and to evaluate heat and moisture transport properties of textile materials under severe conditions and during transient states. The construction of the system was described and data reproducibility and accuracy of the instrument were verified by using PEG treated nonwovens. Also advantages over a traditional static type experiment were demonstrated based on a series of experiments.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.34 no.8
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• pp.1392-1402
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• 2010

This research studied the development of high functional wear that reflects the various needs of an aged population. A survey of the life style, body functions and body changes, cognition, and preference of high functional wear with a subject group of 342 women aged 50's-60's was conducted. The results show that these women showed a high interest in clothing, challenged to new tasks, and enjoyed social meetings. Women aged 50's and 60's showed a relatively vibrant and active tendency, with no difference between them. They had the most interest in health and diet. The development of various clothing items and designs for women in their fifties and sixties are required because exercise was the most favored leisure activity. Meanwhile, they showed indisposition according to body type changes and the decrease in body functions. There was also some discomfort due to changes in visual power and trouble in controlling the body temperature. Therefore, the need to develop high quality smart wear that can help improve these problems was raised. Women aged 50's to 60's did not fully understand smart clothing; however, they showed some interest in high quality smart wear designed to improve health conditions after they heard detailed explanations about the clothing. They perceived the matter of laundry or managing he clothing more important than the price or rejection to mechanical device in regards to smart wear.

• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.190-204
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• 2010

Understanding awareness and wearing behavior of functional textiles for silver generation is expected to contribute to clothing products development to improve and maintain their health and marketing strategy fit for user characteristics. For empirical research, a survey was developed and the aged 50 and above were 332 respondents. The results of the study are as follows. First, the level of awareness for both comfort-oriented and health/safetyoriented functional fabrics in high health-conscious group was much higher than that in low health-conscious group. In number of wearing times, health body and high-conscious group wear comfort-oriented fabrics more frequently, while weak body group wear health/safety-oriented fabrics more often. The health-consciousness significantly influenced the possession of active sportswear with various functions. Second, the awareness of functional fabrics in exercise activities groups was much higher than that in exercise-conscious groups. High exercise activities group know more about the wet sensation-related fabrics and clothing materials for outdoor activities. Low exercise-conscious group put on health/comfort-oriented fabrics for casuals more frequent than functional fabrics for sportswear. High exercise activities group preferred to wear sportswear suitable for outdoor activities. The aged people have a lot of health/comfort-oriented functional casual wear appropriate for indoor activities regardless of exercise-consciousness. However, the more they enjoy exercise activities the more they are interested in functional sportswear. Even though they were unconcerned with exercise, older people are interested in functional casual clothes. As a conclusion, the high interest in health and exuberant activities in silver generation arose the necessity of new multi-functional clothing products.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Costume
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• v.56 no.6 s.105
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• pp.58-71
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• 2006

This research is aimed to develop the functional clothing designs for disabled women in the manner of investigating design preferences among them by means of questionnaire and interview with 150 disabled women as respondents and interviewees. The findings of this research are summarized as follows: 1. Regarding satisfaction with ready-made clothes, the respondents answered 'very satisfied' (1.6%), 'usually satisfied' (14.1%), 'moderate' (20.3%) and 'unsatisfied' (53.1%), suggesting that they had been generally unsatisfied with ready-made clothes. 2. There were more disabled women preferring to ready-made clothes with one-grade bigger (loose.) size than the actual one (53.1%) instead of completely fitted size (43.8%) when they purchased such clothes. This result indicates that they prefer to ready-made clothes with bigger size than the actual one because most of such clothes are made up of non-elastic materials which may be unfavorable for wearer's activities. 3. It was found that primarily worn upper garment among them was T-shirt (59.4%). The reason may be that T-shirt is favorable for using prosthesis and orthotics such as wheelchair, walking stick and crutches thanks to its remarkably high activity as well as simple to maintain, compared with other kinds of upper garments. 4. Regarding preferences to functional clothing designs, the primarily worn lower garment among them was trousers (85.9%); the reason was easiness to move. The main reasons of avoiding to wear a skirt included 'difficult to move' (40.6%) and 'exposed disabled region' (30.3%). Accordingly, functional clothing for disabled women should be developed in consideration for their individual characteristics of disability associated with the disabled region such as wheelchair user, crutch user or brace user, In addition, the designs should be made so that they are not different from those for non-disabled people.