• Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.85-112
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• 2013

This study aims to understand the developmental trajectories of life satisfaction among retirees and to examine what factors differentiate different trajectory classes. This study used three waves of longitudinal data from Korean Retirement and Income Study and data collected every two years(2005, 2007, and 2009). Subjects were respondents aged 50-69 who identified to be retired between wave 1 and wave 2. Finally, this study used 243 respondents for final data analysis. Life satisfaction was measured by seven items. The latent class growth model and multiple logistic regression model were used for data analysis. This study identified three distinct trajectory classes: high stable class(47.7%), high at the early stage but decreased class(42.8%), and low at the early stage and then decreased class(9.5%). This study founded that approximately 50% of the retirees experienced the decline of life satisfaction after retirement and about 10% of the sample was the most vulnerable group. This study analyzed what factors make different among the distinct trajectory groups. As a results, retirees who experienced the improvement in health change were more likely to be in 'high stable class' compared to 'hight at the early stage but decreased class'. In addition, retirees who were less educated, maintained the same health status rather than the improvement, worked as a temporary or a day laborer, and had less household income were more likely to belong to 'low at the early stage and then decreased class' relative to 'high stable class'. This study suggests that there are distinct three trajectories on life satisfaction among the retirees and finds out factors differentiating between trajectory groups. Based on these findings, the study discusses the implications for social work practice and further study.

• Korea Science and Art Forum
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• v.34
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• pp.327-337
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• 2018

Korea is rapidly becoming an aging society as much as it takes the first place among OECD countries, and as the life expectancy of Korea gradually increases, the proportion of the elders in society increases. Accordingly, the happiness of the elders is contributed to the overall social atmosphere and happiness, however, the lower quality of life of the elders due to physical, psychological and social changes can be developed into social problems such as depression and rising suicide rate. As a result, there is a social interest in improving the quality of life and satisfaction of the elders, and the senior citizen center is receiving renewed attention as a form of welfare facility that can play a pivotal role in the social activities of the elders. In recent years, efforts to improve the environment of the senior citizen center have been made due to the growing role of it, however, there is a controversy over whether the quality of the indoor environment is user-friendly or not due to the limitations of material resources and human resources. It is considered that the quality of the color environment should be improved in the senior citizen center in the way that the color environment is not only an indoor environmental factor which gives high psychological and mental effects to users but also a way to improve the environmental satisfaction at the lowest cost. Previous studies on the facilities related to the elders have been actively carried out, but they were very sporadic and there was very little information about the color environment in the related laws or in the guideline presented by cities. It is necessary to integrate guidelines that are scattered within a comprehensive range without any specific target in order to grasp the current status of the color environment and to properly evaluate it. In addition, considering that the senior citizen center is an important leisure facility for the elders that functions in a residential area with a nationwide network, the results of this study are expected to contribute to the environmental improvement of existing senior citizen center which will be activated in the future by enabling the improvement of psychological satisfaction of the elders.