• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.8
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• pp.75-87
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• 2020

The purpose of this study is to examine teachers' stages of concern and levels of use about SW education based on Concerns-Based Adoption Model and to provide implications for teacher education. For this purpose, 152 survey responses were collected from elementary school teachers in South Korea. The result indicated that elementary school teachers' concerns about SW education showed the nonuser pattern in that teachers score highest in stage 0(awareness) to stage 2(personal) and in stage 6(refocusing). Additionally, teachers who are currently implementing SW education showed a tendency to be in the level of mechanical use or routine, and more than half of the teachers who are not implementing SW education showed no motivation to change current practices. There were statistically significant differences in the stages of concern depending on gender, teaching experience, SW training experience, SW teaching experience, and there were differences in the levels of use depending on the teachers' grade level in charge, SW training experience, and SW teaching experience. Based on the results of the research, various SW related programs as well as successful SW education experience for teachers need to be provided for teacher education in order to promote SW education.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.227-239
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• 2002

The purpose of this study was to improve the practice of performance assessment in elementary science education and to support it according to the levels teachers' concerns. So this study was conducted by applying CBAM which is based on teachers' concern, which was designed for the investigation of the elementary science teachers' concern, their performance level, intellectual understanding, status of performance. and stage oi awareness and the connections between these factors. The study involved 311 elementary school teachers in the city of Seoul. The result of this study was as follows: First, the stage of teachers’ concerns performance assessment in science marked 49.5％, indicating that about half of the teachers was staying on the informative stage which could be generally occurring in the beginning of performance the curriculum innovation. The level of performance marked 33.8%, which was regarded as the stage of elaboration. For the category of intellectual understanding, most of the teachers didn’t fully understood the performance assessment. Regarding the status performance, 90.4％ of the teachers were implementing the assessment at the state of knowing the purpose of it. However. 40.5% of the teachers didn't fully understand the specific characteristics of the assessment. Also, the results of analyzing the teachers’ awareness on science performance assessment indicated that they have slightly positive positions. Secondly, the result of analyzing the stages of concerns for the assessment, based on the elementary school teachers' personal background, levels of implementation, and their intellectual understanding showed that the concerns were significantly different with the categories of their workplaces(p<.05). Finally, the result of analyzing the relationship among the concerns for the science performance assessment, levels of implementation and intellectual understanding indicated that there were significant differences in levels of implementation with the degree of intellectual understanding (p<.001).

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.8-13
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• 2003

Soil, ground water, and sea bed are exposed to a continuous accumulation of polluted materials, causing serious environmental damage. It has been reported that such pollution causes a massive mortality of fish stock in rivers due to the resuspension of toxic chemicals, occurring during strong wind conditions. Therefore, it becomes apparent that there is an immediate demand for the restoration treatment of polluted river bed (or sea bed) sediment layers. Pollution levels of major rivers and ports, such as Paldang, Kyungan rivers, and Masan port, are becoming of great public concern, and are posing a serious environmental threat. In particular, the pollution of the Shi-hwa river has become a nation wide issue for the last few years. In spite of such public concern, the pollution levels of such rivers or ports are worsening everyday. In this study, an environmentally sound engineering package is introduced that helps to restore the polluted river bed or sea bed sediments. This engineering package consists of a suction facility, followed by a series of mechanical, chemical, and biological treatment units. The suction facility is designed to minimize secondary pollution that occurs from the resuspension of toxic materials during suction. The sea bed cleaning engineering package is designed to be installed on the top of a floating barge. Such a combination of environmental plant and shipbuilding technology provides a cost-effective solution, minimizing the transportation between suction and treatment facilities.

• Journal of Yeungnam Medical Science
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.105-115
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• 2011

Mercury is a toxic, persistent pollutant that bioaccumulates and biomagnifies through food webs. People are exposed to methyhnercruy mainly through their diet, especially through the consumption of freshwater and marine fish and of other animals that consume fish (e.g., marine mammals). All humans are exposed to low levels of mercury. Dietary patterns can increase exposure to a fish-eating population where the fish and seafood are contaminated with mercury. The primary toxicity targets of mercury and mercury compounds are the nervous system, kidneys, and cardiovascular system. It is generally accepted that developing organ systems are most sensitive to the toxic effects of mercury. The fetal-brain mercury levels appear to be significantly higher than the maternal-blood mercury levels, and the developing central nervous system of the fetus is currently regarded as the main system of concern as it demonstrates the greatest sensitivity. The subpopulation that may be at greater risk for mercury toxicity are those exposed to higher levels of methylmercury due to carnivorous fish, including sharks.

• Journal of the East Asian Society of Dietary Life
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.451-462
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to examine the level of concern and the level of knowledge of endocrine disruptors, and the level of dietary behaviors to decrease exposure to endocrine disruptors, to determine the factors affecting the level of knowledge and behaviors, and to assess the causal relationship between them. The data were collected from 579 adults in Seoul, Incheon, Daejeon, Daegu, Busan and Gwangju provinces. Frequencies, t tests, analysis of variance, Cronbach's alpha, Pearson's correlation coefficient analysis, multiple regression analyses, and path analysis were carried out by SPSS for Win V.18.0. The results of this study were as follows: The level of concern about endocrine disruptors was higher than the medium level. The respondents were most concerned about a container of cup ramen among products related to foods. The levels of both knowledge and behaviors in order to decrease exposure to endocrine disruptors in dietary life were not high. The factors affecting the level of knowledge of endocrine disruptors were educational level, attendance in education for endocrine disruptors, and concern about endocrine disruptors. On the other hand, sex, age, concern about endocrine disruptors, and the level of knowledge of endocrine disruptors affected the level of behaviors to decrease exposure toward endocrine disruptors. The results of the path analysis showed that educational level and education of endocrine disruptors had an indirect influence on the level of behaviors in order to decrease exposure to endocrine disruptors in dietary life. The concern about endocrine disruptors had both a direct and an indirect effect on the level of behaviors to decrease exposure to endocrine disruptors in dietary life. In addition, sex, age and the level of knowledge of endocrine disruptors directly affected the level of behaviors to decrease exposure to endocrine disruptors in dietary life.

• Environmental Mutagens and Carcinogens
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.51-55
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• 2003

Benzo(a)pyrene and bisphenol A have been classified as endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs), which have been of concern in toxicology and environmental sciences. Benzo(a)pyrene and bisphenol A were monitored by HPLC or GC-MS in Baekwoon and Ilwirl lakes of Kyonggi-Do province to investigate contamination levels of EDCs. During the period between June, 2000 and August, 2000, water samples were collected from four different sites of each lake once per month. Contamination levels of benzo(a)pyrene were 3.27~4.25 ppb in Ilwirl lake and 2.00~2.33 ppb in Baekwoon lake, respectively. Bisphenol A levels were detected with the range of 0.33~7.94 and 0.43~4.71 for Baekwoon lake and Ilwirl lake, respectively. pH levels were higher in Ilwirl lake than in Baekwoon lake, where the contamination was relatively lower. These data suggest that lakes in Kyonggi-Do province could be contaminated with EDCs and be subjected to the routine monitoring and water quality control.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.60 no.5
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• pp.353-361
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• 2016

The goal of this study was to examine the current status of science teachers’ stage of concern (SOC) and level of use (LoU) on descriptive assessment and determine the relationship between SoC and LoU. To achieve this, concerns-based adoption model (CBAM) was used, and a survey was conducted on 138 science teachers. The data from this study were analyzed by frequency analysis, percentile analysis based on CBAM, χ² test, and Spearman correlation analysis. SoC and LoU of the science teachers observed in this study are as follows. First, the science teachers’ overall SoC for the descriptive assessment was low and showed a typical pattern of the initial stage when the program was introduced. Second, LoU analysis on descriptive assessment showed that the “mechanical Use” (N=49, 35.5%) or “routine” (N=48, 34.8%) accounted for the majority. Third, the Spearman correlation between SoC and LoU on descriptive assessment was .299(p<.01). This suggests that teachers’ SoC needs to be increased in order to promote higher LoU on descriptive assessment, which requires new alternative measures.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.363-397
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• 2018

We study the impact of loss-aversion and the threat of critical damages from insufficient pollutant abatement, which we jointly call threshold concerns, on the outcome of international environmental agreements. We aim to understand whether concerns for a critical level of damages induce cooperation among countries faced with the well-known free-riding problem, and yield sufficient emission reductions to avoid exceeding the threshold. Specifically, we focus on loss-averse countries negotiating under the threat of either high or low environmental damages. Under symmetry, when countries display identical degrees of threshold concern, we show that such beliefs have a positive effect on reducing the emission levels of both signatories to the treaty and non-signatories, leading to weakly larger coalitions of signatories than in the absence of reference dependence. We then introduce asymmetry, by allowing countries to differ in the degree of concern about the damages. We show that stable coalitions are mostly formed by the countries with higher threshold concerns. When enough countries exhibit standard preferences, the coalition size may diminish, regardless of the degree of concern by the others.

• Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
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• v.4 no.1_2
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• pp.55-65
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• 1989

Nevertheless the serious environmental pollution in Korea has been discussed in concern with health effect, the significant effect are not determined easily. Toxicological method has been used to establish safe levels of exposure for environmental pollutants to have threshold health effect below which significant effects are unlikely to occur. However the conventional method cannot to establish safe levels of exposure for non-threshold pollutants have been used to express comprehensive pollution degree, not in detailed toxic effects. Acceptable exposure or risk levels are decides by policymakers who consider descriptions and estimates of risks together with social and economic benefits. This paper focuses on the concept development of risk assessment and describes some risks of environmental pollution based on the surveyed date in Korea. The current concepts of risk assessment in policy descisions can be explored and areas for possible improvement, given current scientific knowledge are identified. The experience of foreign countries can provide a realistic basis for evaluating the existing data of environmental pollutants. To improve the environmental quality, risk regulation should be managed as soon as possible in Korea.

• Journal of the East Asian Society of Dietary Life
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.691-702
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• 2015

This study examined the levels of risk perception of food risk elements by adopting a psychometric paradigm and analyzed factors affecting concerns about food risk elements to obtain basic materials for food safety policy. The data were collected from 296 housewives in Daegu, Korea, by a self-administered questionnaire. Frequency distributions, Pearson's correlation coefficient analysis, factor analysis, Cronbach's ${alpha}$, and multiple regression analyses were conducted by SPSS 21.0. The mean level of concern for food safety was 3.75/5.00 points, and the mean percentage of correct answers about heavy metal contamination was highest among food risk elements. The respondents perceived radioactive contaminated foods, GM foods, and endocrine disruptors as a new, delayed, scientifically unknown, involuntary, serious, and uncontrollable risk in risk perception. According to the result of factor analysis for risk perception, two factors such as non-controllability and dread were categorized. In the risk perception map, radioactive contaminated foods and GM foods were considered as an uncontrollable and dreaded risk, heavy metal contamination, endocrine disruptors, and pesticide residues as a controllable and dreaded risk, and foodborne illness and food additives as a controllable and less dreaded risk. On the other hand, the levels of concerns about food risk elements were higher in order of radioactive contaminated foods, GM foods, and endocrine disruptors. The results of multiple regression analysis showed that age, concern for food safety, percentage of correct answers about food risk elements, non-controllability, and dread influenced the concerns about food risk elements. These results imply that food safety policies should consider differences in consumer's risk perception of food risk elements.