• Title/Summary/Keyword: Social-cultural Factors

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The Determinants of Consumption Characteristics and Patterns of Elderly Households (고령자 가구의 소비특성 및 소비패턴 결정요인)

  • Kim, Jinhun
    • 한국노년학
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    • v.36 no.3
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    • pp.905-926
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    • 2016
  • Although the concept of the elderly varies depending on scholars and laws, as consumption expenditure is deeply associated with income due to the nature of this study, 55 years old was set as the low limit standard for the elderly according to Prohibition of Discrimination on Age in Employment and Employment Promotion for the Aged Act and the elderly households were limited to single-elderly person household and an elderly couple family household for this study. It is considered consumption characteristics as a significant analysis subject in terms of social welfare because it could be understood as an expressed need which was a reflection of desire. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the consumption characteristics of the elderly households by stereotyping the consumption pattern of the elderly households, and find the determining factors for consumption patterns and thus contribute to the establishment of related policies through the expressed needs of the elderly households. K-means of cluster analysis was performed by putting the consumption expenditure of the elderly households to investigate inherent structural type of consumption pattern of the elderly households, which were the investigation subjects. As a result, four groups were stereotyped and named as below: 'health care-centered type', 'saving-centered type', 'livelihood-centered type', and 'food expenses-centered type' Binary Logistic Regression analysis was used to identify the factors that influence the decision of consumption pattern of the elderly households. The result of study showed that the elderly households faced all different needs and problems and thus there is a need for various approach plans to solve this situation. In particular, although the elderly have been viewed as economically poor people so far, the study showed that there were also kind of prepared households through saving. Overall, livelihoodcentered type accounted for the highest portion and, as a factor that influenced this, marital state and household income played an important role. Therefore, it is considered that more active efforts to increase the income of the elderly households are needed. In addition, age, owning of house and subjective health state were found to also have significant influence. Through these results of the study, the elderly's own improvement of awareness on health, presentation of overall standard for health state of the elderly, securement of the elderly's access to cultural life, and financial management coordination for improvement of quality of life, development and dissemination of jobs suitable for the elderly, and dissemination of communal life household, which is a cooperation residential type, were presented as institutional task in the conclusion.

The Factors Affecting Attitudes Toward HSDPA Service and Intention to Use: A Cross-Cultural Comparison between Asia and Europe (대영향(对影响)HSDPA복무적태도화사용의도적인소적연구(服务的态度和使用意图的因素的研究): 재아주화구주지간적(在亚洲和欧洲之间的)-개과문화비교(个跨文化比较))

  • Jung, Hae-Sung;Shin, Jong-Kuk;Park, Min-Sook;Jung, Hong-Seob;Hooley, Graham;Lee, Nick;Kwak, Hyok-Jin;Kim, Sung-Hyun
    • Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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    • v.19 no.4
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    • pp.11-23
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    • 2009
  • HSDPA (High-Speed Downlink Packet Access) is a 3.5-generation asynchronous mobile communications service based on the third generation of W-CDMA. In Korea, it is mainly provided in through videophone service. Because of the diffusion of more powerful and diversified services, along with steep advances in mobile communications technology, consumers demand a wide range of choices. However, because of the variety of technologies, which tend to overflow the market regardless of consumer preferences, consumers feel increasingly confused. Therefore, we should not adopt strategies that focus only on developing new technology on the assumption that new technologies are next-generation projects. Instead, we should understand the process by which consumers accept new forms of technology and devise schemes to lower market entry barriers through strategies that enable developers to understand and provide what consumers really want. In the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use are suggested as the most important factors affecting the attitudes of people adopting new technologies (Davis, 1989; Taylor and Todd, 1995; Venkatesh, 2000; Lee et al., 2004). Perceived usefulness is the degree to which a person believes that a particular technology will enhance his or her job performance. Perceived ease of use is the degree of subjective belief that using a particular technology will require little physical and mental effort (Davis, 1989; Morris and Dillon, 1997; Venkatesh, 2000). Perceived pleasure and perceived usefulness have been shown to clearly affect attitudes toward accepting technology (Davis et al., 1992). For example, pleasure in online shopping has been shown to positively impact consumers' attitudes toward online sellers (Eighmey and McCord, 1998; Mathwick, 2002; Jarvenpaa and Todd, 1997). The perceived risk of customers is a subjective risk, which is distinguished from an objective probabilistic risk. Perceived risk includes a psychological risk that consumers perceive when they choose brands, stores, and methods of purchase to obtain a particular item. The ability of an enterprise to revolutionize products depends on the effective acquisition of knowledge about new products (Bierly and Chakrabarti, 1996; Rothwell and Dodgson, 1991). Knowledge acquisition is the ability of a company to perceive the value of novelty and technology of the outside (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990), to evaluate the outside technology that has newly appeared (Arora and Gambaradella, 1994), and to predict the future evolution of technology accurately (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990). Consumer innovativeness is the degree to which an individual adopts innovation earlier than others in the social system (Lee, Ahn, and Ha, 2001; Gatignon and Robertson, 1985). That is, it shows how fast and how easily consumers adopt new ideas. Innovativeness is regarded as important because it has a significant effect on whether consumers adopt new products and on how fast they accept new products (Midgley and Dowling, 1978; Foxall, 1988; Hirschman, 1980). We conducted cross-national comparative research using the TAM model, which empirically verified the relationship between the factors that affect attitudes - perceived usefulness, ease of use, perceived pleasure, perceived risk, innovativeness, and perceived level of knowledge management - and attitudes toward HSDPA service. We also verified the relationship between attitudes and usage intention for the purpose of developing more effective methods of management for HSDPA service providers. For this research, 346 questionnaires were distributed among 350 students in the Republic of Korea. Because 26 of the returned questionnaires were inconsistent or had missing data, 320 questionnaires were used in the hypothesis tests. In UK, 192 of the total 200 questionnaires were retrieved, and two incomplete ones were discarded, bringing the total to 190 questionnaires used for statistical analysis. The results of the overall model analysis are as follows: Republic of Korea x2=333.27(p=0.0), NFI=0.88, NNFI=0.88, CFI=0.91, IFI=0.91, RMR=0.054, GFI=0.90, AGFI=0.84, UK x2=176.57(p=0.0), NFI=0.88, NNFI=0.90, CFI=0.93, IFI=0.93, RMR=0.062, GFI=0.90, AGFI=0.84. From the results of the hypothesis tests of Korean consumers about the relationship between factors that affect intention to use HSDPA services and attitudes, we can conclude that perceived usefulness, ease of use, pleasure, a high level of knowledge management, and innovativeness promote positive attitudes toward HSDPA mobile phones. However, ease of use and perceived pleasure did not have a direct effect on intention to use HSDPA service. This may have resulted from the fact that the use of video phones is not necessary for everyday life yet. Moreover, it has been shown that attitudes toward HSDPA video phones are directly correlated with usage intention, which means that perceived usefulness, ease of use, pleasure, a high level of knowledge management, and innovativeness. These relationships form the basis of the intention to buy, contributing to a situation in which consumers decide to choose carefully. A summary of the results of the hypothesis tests of European consumers revealed that perceived usefulness, pleasure, risk, and the level of knowledge management are factors that affect the formation of attitudes, while ease of use and innovativeness do not have an effect on attitudes. In particular, with regard to the effect value, perceived usefulness has the largest effect on attitudes, followed by pleasure and knowledge management. On the contrary, perceived risk has a smaller effect on attitudes. In the Asian model, ease of use and perceived pleasure were found not to have a direct effect on intention to use. However, because attitudes generally affect the intention to use, perceived usefulness, pleasure, risk, and knowledge management may be considered key factors in attitude development from which usage intention arises. In conclusion, perceived usefulness, pleasure, and the level of knowledge management have an effect on attitude formation in both Asian and European consumers, and such attitudes shape these consumers' intention to use. Furthermore, the hypotheses that ease of use and perceived pleasure affect usage intention are rejected. However, ease of use, perceived risk, and innovativeness showed different results. Perceived risk had no effect on attitude formation among Asians, while ease of use and innovativeness had no effect on attitudes among Europeans.

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The Influence on Residents' Recognition and Attitude on Their Farm Village Development in a Comprehensive Rural Village Development Project (지역주민의 농촌마을종합개발사업에 대한 인식이 농촌관광개발 인식과 태도에 미치는 영향)

  • Park, Chang-Kyu;Kim, Hye-Young
    • Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
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    • v.14 no.3
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    • pp.419-436
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    • 2011
  • Korean farm villages are locked in vicious circle, as lots of their problems related to low income and hollow matters are geared and multiply. To get over those problems, various plans to develop Korean farm villages are being pushed ahead. In addition, since the early of 1990s, Korea has been projects to develop settlement zones and culture villages. It has been also preceeding with a comprehensive development project of farm villages and a new vitalizations project, etc. All of these projects aim to reorganize and expand life environments, industrial bases, and convenience and welfare facilities. The existing studies on a comprehensive project to develop farm villages have been focusing on evaluation indexes, problems, investment priorities, etc. But in fact, studies on a comprehensive development project of farm villages are not thoroughgoing enough in aspects of residents' attitude and their recognition on the influence on tourist development. Thus, this study aims to present strategic schemes to allow residents to actively participate in a stage of promoting a comprehensive development project of farm villages, a stage of making the plan, and a stage of the implementation. For this, this study analyzes a comprehensive development project of farm villages and attempts to figure out which influence the tourist development in farm villages has on residents' attitude and recognition resulting from changes in economic, social cultural, and environmental aspects. Especially, this study previously examines what influential factors there exists are and what influences the development of farm villages has on residents. Based on the results from the above analysis, schemes to enable residents to actively a comprehensive development project of farm villages are presented as follows. First, it is necessary to raise our recognition on tourism and tourism development of farm villages. If the main theme of a comprehensive development project of farm villages intends farm village development, it is required to educate residents and let them clearly raise their recognition on tourism, and the effect of the project is guaranteed. Second, it is highly required to make a plan so that we can feel economic effects of revenues through project promotion and positive effects including the expansion of infrastructures and welfare facilities, etc. Third, it is necessary to bring into relief the positive recognition and attitude of a comprehensive development project of farm villages. As for the negative recognition and attitude, it is very important to change negative residents' recognition to the positive direction and to allow them to participate in and to take an interest in the project, so that the project can be effectively promoted.

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Topic Continuity in Korea Narrative (한국 설화문에서의 화제표현의 연속성)

  • Hi-JaChong
    • Korean Journal of Cognitive Science
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    • v.2 no.2
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    • pp.405-428
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    • 1990
  • Language has a social function to communicate information. Linguists have gradually paid their attention to the function of language since the nineteen sixties, especially to the relationship of form, meaning and the function. The relationship could be more clearly grasped through disciyrse-based analysis than through sentence-based analysis. Many researches were centered on the discourse functional notion of topic. In the early 1970's the subject was defined as the grammatiocalized topic the topic as a discrete single constituent of the clause. In the late 1970's several lingusts including Givon suggerted that the topic was not an atomic, disctete entity, and that the clause could have more than one topic. The purpose of the present study is, following Givon, to study grammatical coding devices of topic and to measure the relative topic continuity/discontinuity of participant argu, ents in Korean narratives. By so doing, I would like to shed some light on effective ways of communicating information. The grammatical coding devices analyzed are the following eight structures: zero-anaphora, personal pronous, demonstrative pronouns, names, noun phrases following demonstratives, noun phrases following possessives, definite noun phrases and indefinite referentials. The narrative studied for the count was taken from the KoreanCIA chief's Testiomny:Revolution and Idol by Hyung Wook Kim. It was chosen because it was assumed that Kim's purpose in the novel was to tell a true story, which would not distort the natural use of language for literary effect. The measures taken in the analysis wre those of 'lookback', 'persistence', ambiguity'. The first of these, 'lookback', is a measure of the size of gap between the previous occurrence of a referent and its current occurence in the clause. The meausure of persistence, which is a measure of the speaker's topocal intent, reflects the topic's importance in the discourse. The third measure is a measure of ambiguity. This is necessary for assessing the disruptive effects that other topics within five previous clauses may have on topic identification. The more other topics are present within five previous clauses, the more difficult is the task of correct identification of a topic. The results of the present study show that the humanness of entities is the most powerful factior in topic continutiy in narrative discourse. The semantic roles of human arguments in narrative discourse tend to be agents or experiences. Since agents and experiences have high topicality in discourse, human entities clearly become clausal or discoursal topics. The results also show that the grammatical devices signal varying degrees of topic continuity discontinuity in continuous discourse. The more continuous a topic argument is, the less it is coded. For example, personal pronouns have the most continutiy and indefinite referentials have the least continutiy. The study strongly shows that topic continuity discontinutiy is controlled not only by grammatical devices available in the language but by socio-cultural factors and writer's intentions.

A Study on Requirement and Degree of the Satisfaction about Cosmeceuticals of Women (우리나라 여성들의 기능성화장품에 대한 요구 및 만족도 연구)

  • Kim Kang-Mi;Kim Ju-Duck
    • Journal of the Society of Cosmetic Scientists of Korea
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    • v.30 no.4 s.48
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    • pp.571-582
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    • 2004
  • Recently the well-being, which is regarded as the new cultural code, has brought a new change in the cosmetic industry. The application of the functional products is getting mere and lots of functional cosmetics are now diversifying from the skin-care into the make-up as well as the herbal products. So the future in the market of functional cosmetic products is prospected to be positive. Therefore, cosmetic companies need an approach bases on the concept of the well-being. So to speak, they need to understand the needs of customers accurately from the customers point of view. Also it is a crucial issue that how the unique characteristics of functional cosmetic products as well as the development of products base on the concept of well-being make in balance. In this study, we attempt to inspect the advanced domestic market of the functional products due to the well-being trend and try to propose an option of making an advance it through the customers survey (for example, their need and their satisfaction on the functional products, etc) on the functional cosmetic products. For this purpose, it has been surveyed on adult female customers aged 19 to 60 located in Seoul and Gyeonggi province. 379 questionnaires among 510 were used in the final analysis. Collected data was analyzed using the statistical package for the social science (SPSS) program that can give the information about the general characteristics of the subjects like the frequency and percentage. And we used Cronbach's u reliability test, $x^2\;(chi-square)$ frequency analysis, t-test, and one-wat ANOVA to investigate the customers need, their degree of the satisfaction on the functional products of their own, factors of their perception on the quality on them. We think that the results of our study can act not only as the fundamental data on the customers need, their usage pattern, and their degree of the satisfaction, but also as the important tips of planning the marketing strategies.

Conflicts between the Conservation and Removal of the Modern Historic Landscapes - A Case of the Demolition Controversy of the Japanese General Government Building in Seoul - (근대 역사 경관의 보존과 철거 - 구 조선총독부 철거 논쟁을 사례로 -)

  • Son, Eun-Shin;Pae, Jeong-Hann
    • Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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    • v.46 no.4
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    • pp.21-35
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    • 2018
  • In recent years, there has been a tendency to reuse 'landscapes of memory,' including industrial heritages, modern cultural heritages, and post-industrial parks, as public spaces in many cities. Among the various types of landscapes, 'modern historic landscapes', which were formed in the 19th and 20th centuries, are landscapes where the debate between conservation and removal is most frequent, according to the change of evaluation and recognition of modern history. This study examines conflicts between conservation and removal around modern historic landscapes and explores the value judgment criteria and the process of formation of those landscapes, as highlighted in the case of the demolition controversy of the old Japanese general government building in Seoul, which was dismantled in 1995. First, this study reviews newspaper articles, television news and debate programs from 1980-1999 and some articles related to the controversy of the Japanese general government building. Then it draws the following six factors as the main issues of the demolition controversy of the building: symbolic location, discoveries and responses of new historical facts, reaction and intervention of a related country, financial conditions, function and usage of the landscape, changes of urban, historical and architectural policies. Based on these issues, this study examines the conflicts between symbolic values that play an important role in the formation of modern historic landscapes and determines conservation or removal, and the utility of functional values that solve the problems and respond to criticisms that arise in the process of forming the modern historic landscape. Especially, it is noted that the most important factor that makes the decision is the symbolic values, although the determination of the conservation or removal of modern historic landscapes has changed according to changes in historical perceptions of modern history. Today, the modern historic landscape is an important site for urban design, and still has historical issues to be agreed upon and addressed. Thi study has contemporary significance from the point that it divides the many values of modern historic landscapes into symbolic values and functional values, evaluates these, and reviews the background social context.

The Applicable Laws to International Intellectual Property License Contracts under the Rome I Regulation (국제 지식재산권 라이센스 계약 분쟁의 준거법 결정 원칙으로서 로마I 규정의 적용에 관한 연구)

  • Moon, Hwa-Kyung
    • Journal of Legislation Research
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    • no.44
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    • pp.487-538
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    • 2013
  • It is the most critical issue in recent international intellectual property licence disputes to decide the applicable laws to the license contracts. As Korea and the European Union(EU) reached free trade agreement(FTA), and the EU-Korea FTA entered into force on July 1, 2011, the FTA has boosted social, economic, cultural exchanges between the two. As a result of the increased transactions in those sectors, legal disputes are also expected to grow. This situation calls for extensive research and understanding of the choice of law principles applicable to international intellectual property license contracts in the EU. To decide the laws applicable to issues arising from international intellectual property license contracts disputes, the characterization of those issues is necessary for the purpose of applying private international law principles to them. In terms of characterization, intellectual property license contracts fall within contractual matters. In the EU, the primary rule of choice of law principles in contractual obligations is the Rome I Regulation. Because the choice of law rules, such as private international law principles, the Rome Convention(1980), and the Rome I Regulation, differ in the time of application, it is essential to clarify the time factor of related contracts. For example, the Rome I Regulation applies to contracts which were concluded as from December 17, 2009. Although party autonomy in international contracts disputes is generally allowed, if there is no choice of law agreement between the parties to the contracts, the objective test rule of private international law doctrine could be the best option. Following this doctrine, the Rome I Regulation Article 4, Paragraph 1 provides the governing law rules based on the types of contracts, but there is no room for intellectual property license contracts. After all, as the rule for governing law of those contracts, the Rome I Regulation Article 4, Paragraph 2 should be applied and if there are countries which are more closely connected to the contracts under the Rome I Regulation Article 4, Paragraph 3, the laws of those countries become the governing laws of the contracts. Nevertheless, if it is not possible to decide the applicable laws to the license contracts, the Rome I Regulation Article 4, Paragraph 4 should be applied in the last resort and the laws of the countries which are the most closely connected to the contracts govern the license contracts. Therefore, this research on the laws applicable to intellectual property license contracts under the Rome I Regulation suggests more systematic and effective solutions for future disputes in which Korea and the EU countries play the significant role as the connecting factors in the conflict of laws rules. Moreover, it helps to establish comprehensive and theoretical understanding of applying the Korean Private International Law to multifarious choice-of-law cases.

Study on Tragic Characteristic in Lope's Drama La estrella de Sevilla (로뻬의 연극 『세비야의 별』에 나타난 비극성 연구)

  • YOON, Yong-wook
    • Cross-Cultural Studies
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    • v.50
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    • pp.371-394
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    • 2018
  • La estrella de Sevilla, is a representative masterpiece of the Golden Age of Spain, and is a tragic work of Lope de Vega, who was a representative drama writer living in the 17th century. However, regardless of its great literary value, there are insufficient researches on this drama even in Spain, due to several controversies surrounding the truth about Lope's creation. Here, this research concretely investigated the tragic characteristic of this drama, by largely dividing it into the viewpoint of Aristotle and Shakespeare. Thanks to the noble social status of the characters and proper dialogue of the hero Sancho Ortiz in trouble, there seems to be no problem in performing the cathartic function that Aristotle mentioned regarding the work in his review. However, there are a few problems in the aspect of the 'hero's free will to resist the absolute fate,' which is fundamentally the essence of the associated Aristotelian tragedy. Because, there's no Hamartia in this drama, the core mechanism that forms the absolute fate, makes the statement that accordingly, no absolute fate or irresistible force of destiny is established. Rather, the tragic characteristic of this drama can be more properly investigated from the viewpoint of Shakespeare. As noted differently from Aristotle, Shakespeare considered that the tragic characteristic came from the hero's characteristic. According to him, tragedy starts from the hero's value view and personality, instead of the external factors such as an absolute fate. Actually, Busto's death and separation between Sancho Ortiz and Estrella, two tragic affairs of La estrella de Sevilla, were caused by the crooked selfishness of King Sancho IV, who abused his authority, and Sancho Ortiz' excessively blind loyalty to the King, rather than the irresistible event. In conclusion, in light of a lethargic and hopeless situation, with no eventual choice of options before the injustice of absolute power, is must have been a significant tragedy for the audience, witnessing the play's tragic ending.

Research on the Circumstance for Agricultural Investment of Cambodia (캄보디아 농업투자 환경에 관한 연구)

  • Lee, Kyu-Seong;Bae, Dong-Jin;Kim, Seong-Nam;Kang, Young-Shin
    • Journal of the Korean Society of International Agriculture
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    • v.23 no.5
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    • pp.475-484
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    • 2011
  • International price of cereal has been dramatically increasing for the past few years. This price hike amplified the importance of food self-sufficiency in numerous countries due to the fact that food security is directly proportional to food self-sufficiency. In this study, we conducted a survey to provide useful information of Cambodia's agricultural environment to possible Korean agricultural investors and as to highlight Cambodia as a strong candidate for the establishment of Korea's foreign base for cereal production. The survey conducted includes information regarding Cambodia's agricultural environment and investment circumstances including the political, economical and other contributing factors affecting agricultural investment in Cambodia. Seventy percent of the Cambodia's total population engage in agriculture and this comprises about 30% of the country's GDP. This statistics reflects the possibility of Cambodia's poverty alleviation which proves that agriculture in Cambodia is the driving force for the improvement of the country's economy. In addition, low labor cost, fertile land, abundant water resources, like the Tonle sap lake and the Mekong river, and unreclaimed lands are the strong points that could attract agricultural investors to Cambodia. Poor infrastructure, irrigation systems, law reforms, including social and cultural differences may be the biggest setbacks for the acceleration of Cambodia's agriculture development. However, the Cambodian government is open and willing to make adjustments for Cambodia to be both foreign and domestic agricultural investor-friendly, expecting that it will boost its country's agricultural development. Making the best out of this opportunity, the coordination of KOICA with Korean agricultural investors in building infrastructures and with the help of the KOPIA program for the transfer of agricultural technology will benefit both countries and will play an important role in Cambodia's agriculture.

Brand Equity and Purchase Intention in Fashion Products: A Cross-Cultural Study in Asia and Europe (상표자산과 구매의도와의 관계에 관한 국제비교연구 - 아시아와 유럽의 의류시장을 중심으로 -)

  • Kim, Kyung-Hoon;Ko, Eun-Ju;Graham, Hooley;Lee, Nick;Lee, Dong-Hae;Jung, Hong-Seob;Jeon, Byung-Joo;Moon, Hak-Il
    • Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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    • v.18 no.4
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    • pp.245-276
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    • 2008
  • Brand equity is one of the most important concepts in business practice as well as in academic research. Successful brands can allow marketers to gain competitive advantage (Lassar et al.,1995), including the opportunity for successful extensions, resilience against competitors' promotional pressures, and the ability to create barriers to competitive entry (Farquhar, 1989). Branding plays a special role in service firms because strong brands increase trust in intangible products (Berry, 2000), enabling customers to better visualize and understand them. They reduce customers' perceived monetary, social, and safety risks in buying services, which are obstacles to evaluating a service correctly before purchase. Also, a high level of brand equity increases consumer satisfaction, repurchasing intent, and degree of loyalty. Brand equity can be considered as a mixture that includes both financial assets and relationships. Actually, brand equity can be viewed as the value added to the product (Keller, 1993), or the perceived value of the product in consumers' minds. Mahajan et al. (1990) claim that customer-based brand equity can be measured by the level of consumers' perceptions. Several researchers discuss brand equity based on two dimensions: consumer perception and consumer behavior. Aaker (1991) suggests measuring brand equity through price premium, loyalty, perceived quality, and brand associations. Viewing brand equity as the consumer's behavior toward a brand, Keller (1993) proposes similar dimensions: brand awareness and brand knowledge. Thus, past studies tend to identify brand equity as a multidimensional construct consisted of brand loyalty, brand awareness, brand knowledge, customer satisfaction, perceived equity, brand associations, and other proprietary assets (Aaker, 1991, 1996; Blackston, 1995; Cobb-Walgren et al., 1995; Na, 1995). Other studies tend to regard brand equity and other brand assets, such as brand knowledge, brand awareness, brand image, brand loyalty, perceived quality, and so on, as independent but related constructs (Keller, 1993; Kirmani and Zeithaml, 1993). Walters(1978) defined information search as, "A psychological or physical action a consumer takes in order to acquire information about a product or store." But, each consumer has different methods for informationsearch. There are two methods of information search, internal and external search. Internal search is, "Search of information already saved in the memory of the individual consumer"(Engel, Blackwell, 1982) which is, "memory of a previous purchase experience or information from a previous search."(Beales, Mazis, Salop, and Staelin, 1981). External search is "A completely voluntary decision made in order to obtain new information"(Engel & Blackwell, 1982) which is, "Actions of a consumer to acquire necessary information by such methods as intentionally exposing oneself to advertisements, taking to friends or family or visiting a store."(Beales, Mazis, Salop, and Staelin, 1981). There are many sources for consumers' information search including advertisement sources such as the internet, radio, television, newspapers and magazines, information supplied by businesses such as sales people, packaging and in-store information, consumer sources such as family, friends and colleagues, and mass media sources such as consumer protection agencies, government agencies and mass media sources. Understanding consumers' purchasing behavior is a key factor of a firm to attract and retain customers and improving the firm's prospects for survival and growth, and enhancing shareholder's value. Therefore, marketers should understand consumer as individual and market segment. One theory of consumer behavior supports the belief that individuals are rational. Individuals think and move through stages when making a purchase decision. This means that rational thinkers have led to the identification of a consumer buying decision process. This decision process with its different levels of involvement and influencing factors has been widely accepted and is fundamental to the understanding purchase intention represent to what consumers think they will buy. Brand equity is not only companies but also very important asset more than product itself. This paper studies brand equity model and influencing factors including information process such as information searching and information resources in the fashion market in Asia and Europe. Information searching and information resources are influencing brand knowledge that influences consumers purchase decision. Nine research hypotheses are drawn to test the relationships among antecedents of brand equity and purchase intention and relationships among brand knowledge, brand value, brand attitude, and brand loyalty. H1. Information searching influences brand knowledge positively. H2. Information sources influence brand knowledge positively. H3. Brand knowledge influences brand attitude. H4. Brand knowledge influences brand value. H5. Brand attitude influences brand loyalty. H6. Brand attitude influences brand value. H7. Brand loyalty influences purchase intention. H8. Brand value influence purchase intention. H9. There will be the same research model in Asia and Europe. We performed structural equation model analysis in order to test hypotheses suggested in this study. The model fitting index of the research model in Asia was $X^2$=195.19(p=0.0), NFI=0.90, NNFI=0.87, CFI=0.90, GFI=0.90, RMR=0.083, AGFI=0.85, which means the model fitting of the model is good enough. In Europe, it was $X^2$=133.25(p=0.0), NFI=0.81, NNFI=0.85, CFI=0.89, GFI=0.90, RMR=0.073, AGFI=0.85, which means the model fitting of the model is good enough. From the test results, hypotheses were accepted. All of these hypotheses except one are supported. In Europe, information search is not an antecedent of brand knowledge. This means that sales of global fashion brands like jeans in Europe are not expanding as rapidly as in Asian markets such as China, Japan, and South Korea. Young consumers in European countries are not more brand and fashion conscious than their counter partners in Asia. The results have theoretical, practical meaning and contributions. In the fashion jeans industry, relatively few studies examining the viability of cross-national brand equity has been studied. This study provides insight on building global brand equity and suggests information process elements like information search and information resources are working differently in Asia and Europe for fashion jean market.

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