• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.19-37
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• 2008

The youth unemployment issue has not shown any improvement in years. The purpose of this study was to observe how employment issues affecting university students influence their life aims, self-efficacy, view of reality, view of the future, and life satisfaction. 239 students from three universities located in Seoul and Gyeonggi province were assessed through the instrument FLL and questions about employment issues, their life aims, life satisfaction and also their employment perspective. A total of 34 items of the FLL were divided through factor analysis into six higher life aims, self-love, family love and interpersonal aims, personal-financial aims, social-public aims, moral aims and political and ideological aims. Using Cluster analysis, three group profiles were found depending on the employment perspective such as a better view of reality, better self-efficacy, and better life satisfaction. A t-test was conducted in order to compare the two groups classified according to favorable or unfavorable employment perspectives. No significant differences existed between the groups in the perception of youth unemployment or in social-demographic factors, such as gender, age, and academic year. However, in life aims, the unfavorable group showed significantly higher interest in the domains of family love and interpersonal aims, personal -financial aims, and social-public aims than the favorable perspective group. Conversely, this group showed a significantly greater negative view of reality in most life domains, as it evaluated that its aims are more poorly achieved than the comparable group. Also, the unfavorable perspective group showed a lesser degree of self-efficacy in most life domains and the same in the category of life satisfaction, i.e., lesser satisfaction in all life domains except for family love, and moral aims. However, no significant difference existed between the groups in the view of the future. The results were discussed in relation to other social-cognitive factors for life satisfaction found in preceding studies.