• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.44 no.1
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• pp.86-96
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• 2014

Purpose: This study was conducted to examine and compare satisfaction with Korean health care services for Americans, Chinese and Russians who resided in Korea. Methods: A questionnaire was distributed to 252 participants (81 Americans, 89 Chinese, 82 Russians). Three focus group interviews were subsequently conducted in order to obtain a greater understanding of participants' experience and perspectives. Results: The average satisfaction score was 3.09, with Americans and Russians showing significantly higher scores than Chinese. Overall, participants reported higher satisfaction in 'Facility', 'Quality of care' and 'Nursing services' as opposed to 'Information/education'. 'Care with cultural respect' as well as communication related services. Data from the focus group interviews were categorized into 12 sub-categories, 7 categories and 2 themes. The two themes were common experience and contrasting experience. Common experience included 4 categories, 'Quality of care', 'Hospital facility and health care system', 'Language barrier' and 'Information and education'. Contrasting experience included 3 categories, 'Medical cost', 'Health care personnel' and 'Accessibility'. Conclusion: Results of this study provide basic knowledge on foreign residents' satisfaction and experience with Korean health care services. Further research is needed with foreigners from different cultural backgrounds. Administrative and educational efforts are required to improve communication skills and cultural competency.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.10
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• pp.45-70
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• 2002

The purpose of this study is to obtain more insight into the explanation and prognosis of consumer behavior in real and virtual museums. The analysis focuses on the influence of the museum environment on the museum patrons (rather than on the influence of the art objects). On the basis of the emotional approach to environmental psychology by Mehrabian and Russell (1974), a behavior model has been developed for museums. The model, which is based on the emotional variables pleasure, arousal and dominance (PAD), is also enhanced by cognitive variabies (learning attractiveness, education standard and information demand). The enhancement of the classical model was necessary because cognitive variables play a major role in cultural institutions such as museums: One important objective of museums is the communication of cultural knowledge to visitors. The model is tested empirically using structural equation modeling. 301 visitors were interviewed individually. Two different museum environments were represented using visual stimuli. The theoretical model for museums can be proved empirically. The degree to which the model fits the empirical data was extensively tested. The model showed high compatibility with the data and could be accepted. The study proves that a model can be developed, which explains visitor behavior in museums. The model shows museum designers how museums should be designed to be both emotionally appealing and a learning environment. Based on empirical studies in virtual stores on the Internet, it is discussed whether the research findings in these environments may be applied to virtual museum environments. In order to create an emotionally appealing virtual museum, it is recommended that one uses a 3-dimensional representation to offer various possibilities for interaction and to create a multi-sensual environment that appears highly realistic.

• Archives of design research
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.335-344
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• 2003

Creativity has become a buzzword in the 21s1 century to the extent that it is considered as one of the criteria for a nation's competitiveness. In the cultural industry, one of the industries with the highest growth potential, creativity is the decisive factor Nevertheless, we have to admit that there is a serious lack of this quality in the planning area. Everyone is born with creativity and creative way of looking at things can be developed through training and education. Most of universities now classify digital contents within the realm of design, therefore, emphasizing only the formal or the artistic side of it. However, the study of digital contents requires creative thinking processes that are oriented to problem-solving, for which one needs to put together his/her planning (socio-cultural), expressive (artistic) and technological (scientific) capabilities at the same time. Also, the education of digital contents should be focused not only on acquiring the knowledge and skills, but also on developing individual creativity and learning to increase one's creativity working in a team of an organization. For the environmental aspect, education for creativity should take into account social and cultural specificities of Korea. Therefore, continuous studies must be done to explore more concrete ways of developing creativity on the individual, organizational and environmental levels.

• Architectural research
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.127-137
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• 2015

A typology study is a comparative study of the physical characteristics of the built environment divided into distinct types such as architecture, culture, and environment. Lao vernacular dwellings were initially created based on the Lao people's behavior in terms of beliefs, traditional culture, lifestyle, and local wisdom with regard to the environment, climate, geography, and materials. The main research method used in this study is a comparative case study of three ethnic dwellings. The multiple data collection tools employed included second source data and primary data to analyze the findings of the unique characteristic typology of Lao vernacular dwellings. The objective of this paper is to compare the cultural and physical contexts, the patterns and origins of settlement, the architecture, the cultures, and the local indigenous knowledge related to the dwellings and settlement of the three main ethnic groups. These three groups are rich in tradition and their documentation is therefore essential for the intellectual history of the society of Lao; this research could therefore aid in enhancing our understanding of the three typologies of Lao vernacular architecture and settlement within the historical and sociocultural contexts of each ethnicity to convey an understanding of Lao vernacular dwellings by analyzing their different types to help identify the differences and similarities among architectural artifacts by recognizing the invisible connections between them, whereby the figurative ornamentation is based on the relationship between man and nature. This study also provides a glimpse of the living culture and characteristic features of Lao vernacular architecture.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.16 no.9
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• pp.667-678
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• 2016

National preference enables a nation to achieve more advantageous position regarding international relations. Considering this benefit, the purpose of this study is to explore determinants of national preference between Korean and Japanese college students. To pursue this aim, two versions (translated to Korean and Japanese) of survey were conducted in Korea and Japan in 2015. A total of 370 (206 of Koreans and 164 of Japanese) college students were participated in the survey. Specifically, participants were asked to respond perceptions toward multiculturalism, international experiences, and consumption of media contents. Further, participants were asked to describe their knowledge and perception toward cultural contents of partnered country via open-ended questions. The results implies that Japanese music and books are significant determinants among Korean students in developing national preference toward Japan whereas Koran drama is more an effective factor among Japanese students to build national preference toward Korea. Based on the result, theoretical and practical implications were discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Library and Information Science
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• v.54 no.2
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• pp.105-125
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• 2020

This study attempts to identify the influence factors on the numbers of visitors and reference room users of public libraries through log-log multiple regression models, using the Korean National Libraries Statistical Data 2018. The fact found is summarized as follows; Even though books collection and seating capacities might be the most important factors in attraction of visitors and reference room users to public libraries in the past when the storage and propagation of knowledge and information was the top function of public libraries, very various and compound factors such as cultural or lifetime education programs, library operation, and user activities have an effect on inducing people to visit and use public libraries at present. This means that these days, public libraries are being transformed into some kinds of comprehensive cultural center where software elements such as cultural programs, user education, events, budget, membership, opening days, building style and age, and group activities rather than hardware elements such as books, literature material, and facilities constitute their essential parts in connection with visitor and user induction.

• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.993-1008
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• 2011

Traditional culture could be a wonderful source of inspiration for creative design. Tteoksal, the stamps used for making decorative patterns on traditional rice-cakes, have been used and passed on to generations to show the emotions of our ancestors. Numerous traditional patterns found in Tteoksal can be used to better understand and transmit tradition in modern ways. The purpose of this study was to develop fashion cultural products with a modern sensibility by understanding the origin, types and characteristics of Tteoksal and its patterns. The method of this study was through considering the proceeding studies and the references published by a specialist and museums having some information about further knowledge on Tteoksal. In line with the aforementioned study, neckties, eco-friendly bags and pouches were developed as fashion goods. Among the Tteoksal's patterns selected were lotus, bats, 樂 letters and complex patterns. Using a computer graphic software program such as Adobe Illustrator CS5, archetypes of patterns were traced as vector graphics, and two design motives were developed in every pattern. The patterns were developed into two types: one was a basic pattern faithful to a basic motive pattern, and the other was a varied type that was changed and applied. The fashion products were developed as two styles for basic and varied patterns for neckties, eco-friendly bags and pouch items. Twelve products were made for each pattern, which totals 48 unique products. In conclusion, the study could be a critical step to better understand the traditional culture and its influence to the patterns applied to modern fashion design.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.22
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• pp.73-98
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• 2011

This study has as a object to investigate some various meanings of the discourses of postdevelopment of Arturo Escobar with the respect of the social movements of the indigenous and the afro-colombians in the area of the Pacific Coast of Colombia. The ideological lines of Escobar go around the group of critical discourse Modernity/(De)coloniality whose thesis lies on revealing the coloniality as principal elements of the modernity from the XVI century until now culminating in the neoliberal globalization. In another words, they try to seek for the alternative globalization based on the autonomy of the people who has been alienated for long time as 'others' by the eurocentrism of the power and the knowledge and on the equality of the cultural differences o the cosmovisions in Latin America. Escobar concentrates on the fact that the neoliberal regime would turn the nature into the environment considered as the resources for example the traditional knowledges of biodiversity of the indigenous as the capital of the pharmaceutical companies through the patents. However, the indigenous and the afro-colombians have fought fiercely to have them be maintained as a colective right of the possession not only to guard the economic interests but also their proper cultural traditions and the way of life based on the social solidarity of reciprocal care instead of the occidental individualism. This corresponds not only to the social relations but between the nature and the human society. And so, Arturo Escobar interprets these movements not only to defend the places but to express the cosmovisions of Postdevelopment further more the modern paradigm of nation-state.

• English & American cultural studies
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.1-29
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• 2018

Nadine Gordimer's The Pickup, published in 2001, well shows how the social issues have been changed in a way to reflect the South African society which is more complicated in the post-apartheid era. Examining the two different geographical territories between Johannesburg, South Africa and an unnamed nation in Middle East, putting aside the domestic racism between white and black, she extends her issue of racial other to global one with new rising issue of immigration in South African society. It seems that Gordimer's such issue is well represented by two main characters: Julie Summers who comes from a wealthy family and falls in love with Abdu, an illegal immigrant who was born from a poor country in Middle East and is now working at a garage in a downtown of Johannesburg with hiding his real name Ibrahim ibn Musa. Having an official relationship with Ibrahim and joining the regular meeting at the El-Ay (L.A.) Cafe where all participants can enjoy the freedom of expression/speech except for Abdu, she begins to have interest in his silence and his presence, orientalized as the Arab Prince for her imagination. Arriving at Abdu 's nation later, she also keeps projecting the 'less civilized' images to his nation where there are only desert, uneducated people, and dirty houses and streets. In doing so, Gordimer leads reader to a never-ending issue of Orientalism in the Western literature. Moreover, the writer attempts to create a female-centered community at the male-centered Islam community by marginalizing the presence of Abdu who finally leaves to America alone. As Julie is successfully acculturated to the unknown Abdu's community, she begins to place herself at the center of the community and plays a role as a mediator/communicator who can change/civilize it with her western knowledge of language and culture. By replacing the male-centered with the female-centered through Julie, Gordimer seems to be creating an idealized community with the notion of matriarchy. However, Gordimer places Abdu as an unstable subject who has to endlessly move back and forth for his undetermined national and cultural identity while Julie achieves the determined identity in both nations.

• SUVANNABHUMI
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.63-91
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• 2018

One of the goals of this article is to continue the momentum begun by emerging scholarship on theory and practice of writing about visual culture of and in Southeast Asia. I hope to offer culturally sensitive and embodied ways of looking at images and objects as sites/sights of cultural knowledge as further theoretical intervention. The argument put forward in my essay is three-fold: first, I critique the prevailing logocentric approach in the field of Southeast Asian Studies and I argue that in a postcolonial, global, and transnational period, it is important to be inclusive of other objects as sites/sights of social, political and cultural analysis beyond written and oral texts. Second, I argue that although it has its own political and theoretical problems, the evolving field of Visual Studies as it is practiced in the United States is one of many ways to decolonize the prevailing logocentric approach to Southeast Asian Studies. Third, I argue that if one reads these Euro-American derived theories of vision and visuality through the lens of what Walter Mignolo calls "colonial difference(s)," then Visual Studies as an evolving field has the potential to offer more nuanced local ways of looking at and understanding objects, vision, and visuality. Last, I point out that unlike in the West where there is an understanding of pure, objective and empirical vision, local Southeast Asian perspectives on objects and visions are more embodied and multi-sensorial. I argue that if one is ethically mindful of the local cultural ways of seeing and knowing objects, then the evolving field of Visual Studies offers a much-needed intervention to the privileged, lingering logocentric approach to Southeast Asian Studies. Moreover, these alternative methods might help to decolonize method and theory in academic disciplines that were invented during the colonial period.