Abstract
The purpose of this qualitative case study was to investigate the causes and processes of marital conflicts among intermarried families in Korea. The participants were 19 Korean men and their 19 Filipino spouses, who had experienced domestic violence. Their marital conflicts seemed to result from their lack of information about each other due to the short-term courtship, from the marital inequality based on the wives' lower economic status, and from the mother-in-law's interference in their marital relationships. Korean men showed ambivalent feelings about their wives' adaptation to Korean society. They wanted their wives to team Korean culture but worried that their young and educated wife might leave them, which could be called as "the fairy and woodman syndrome." The exploratory view of the study highlights the important psychosocial and cultural aspects of marital conflicts, and suggests the supporting systems for the intermarried families in Korea.