• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.24 no.5 s.83
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• pp.53-68
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• 2006

This study examines Korean and American undergraduate students' intimacy toward the grandmother and their attitudes toward the elderly and aging. The study also identifies the variances that influence undergraduate students' attitudes. The subjects were 397 Korean and 364 America undergraduates. Statistical analysis was conducted to examine frequency, percentage, meat standard deviation, Cronbach's ${\alpha}$, t-test, Duncan test, ANOVA, and stepwise multiple regression. The results of this study were as follows; 1) Both Korean and American undergraduates' attitudes were mid-range, but their intimacy level toward their grandmother was high. 2) The Korean undergraduates' intimacy level differed significantly according to sex and religion, and it showed a significant correlation with attitudes toward the elderly and aging traits, when the student had lived with and had frequent contact with the grandmother. The American undergraduates' intimacy level, however, was significantly different according to the presence of the grandmother. There was also had a significant correlation with the undergraduate students' attitudes toward the elderly and aging traits, frequency of contact with the grandmother and year. 3) The variables that affect the Korean undergraduates' intimacy level toward the grandmother were attitude, cohabitation with her, gender, frequency of contact with the grandmother, and religion, which explained about 21% of total variance. Attitudes toward the elderly and aging traits were very important variables for Korean undergraduates' intimacy with their grandmother. The American undergraduates' intimacy was affected by the variables of attitude, frequency of contact with the grandmother, year, and the presence of the grandmother, which explained about 19% of the total variance. Attitude toward the elderly and aging traits were the most important variables for American undergraduates' intimacy with their grandmother.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.97-111
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• 2002

Despite the substantial increase of the elderly population in Korea, welfare policies such as housing programs have not been developed enough to meet the diverse needs of the aging people. Particularly, caring for elderly dementia patients is becoming a serious social problem in Korean society. Families are still primarily responsible for taking care of the elderly dementia patients, and thus are suffering from tremendous caregiving burdens. In many Western countries, group homes, which are small-scale care facilities with home-like atmosphere, have become common housing alternatives for elderly dementia patients. Group homes effectively create a therapeutic environment while helping reduce the elder care burdens for the families. This article proposes to review group homes as a housing option for the elderly with dementia in Korea. The purpose of this article is to make suggestions for housing policies, separately or as a part of more general welfare policies. Based on the questionnaire survey conducted on 912 persons currently residing in Seoul and five different provinces, various possible policies and suggestions to promote establishing group homes and other facilities for elderly dementia patients are discussed in this article.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.117-129
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• 2008

In present study, using 1572 low-income families and 266 Head Start teachers from Family and Child Experiences Survey (FACES) in the U.S., we examined the effects of mothers' reading and the characteristics of interaction between teacher-child interaction on 4-and 5-year-olds' cognitive development represented by their verbal and numerical abilities. Frequencies of mothers' reading at home consistently predicted higher scores of children's Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test and Woodcock Johnson Applied Problems. Teachers' sensitivity and permissiveness in their interactions with children in classroom were positively related to children's verbal abilities and teachers' sensitivity predicted better numerical abilities of children after controlling for mothers' reading and the characteristics of family and teacher. The findings shed light on the contributions of teacher behaviors and familial factors to children's cognitive development calling for attention to the need for parent education on cognitively stimulating family environments and continuing education for early childhood teachers focusing on quality interactions with young children.

• Korean Journal of Child Studies
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.405-416
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• 2009

Almost 18,000 children were protected in 285 residential facilities all over the country in 2008 in Korea. The recent trends of the residential care include downsizing, and emphasizing independent living programs for aging out youths. Since the 1990s when the active research on the children in residential facilities has begun, the study focus has extended to the issues of developmental status and outcomes of the children, and recently, to the independency of the youths discharged from the facilities. The practical and policy issues are development of therapeutic programs for the children in care, increase of counseling staff, extension of programs for restoring children's relationship with their families, and planning of various policies to support the independence of discharged youths.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.79-99
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• 2008

Nowadays, social circumstances have changed rapidly due to the decreasing birthrate and increasing number of senior citizens. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate past research for presenting the direction of future research and for improvement of welfare for the elderly. For this study a total of 231 articles within four kinds of major home economics journals are used. The articles were published from 2000 to 2007. Specific research topics (subjects) are investigated for this study. Results from this study are as follows. Research topics are divided into the following fields: facilities for the elderly, family relationships in later life, quality of life, economical aspects of the elderly, physical and metal health, leisure, awareness and the attitudes about elderly people, clothing, death and welfare services for elders. According to this study, 'facilities for the elderly' and 'relationships in later life' are the most frequent topics of interest. Based on the results of this research and the governmental aging society plan, SEROMAZI PLAN 2010, the directions of future research about senior citizens and later life in our home economics major science field are presented.

• Archives of Pharmacal Research
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.165-171
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• 2006

Osteoarthritis is thought to be induced by the ageing-related loss of homeostatic balance between degeneration and repair mechanism around cartilage tissue in which inflammatory mediators such as reactive oxygen species, cytokines and prostaglandins are prone to overproduction under undesirable physiological conditions. Phlorotannins are unique polyphenolic compounds bearing dibenzo-1,4-dioxin skeleton which are not found in terrestrial plants but found only in some brown algal species such as Ecklonia and Eisenia families. Phlorotanninrich extracts of Ecklonia cava including LAD103 showed significant antioxidant activities such as DPPH radical scavenging, ferric ion reduction, peroxynitrite scavenging, and inhibition of LDL oxidation, indicating their possible antioxidative interference both in onset and downstream consequences of osteoarthritis. LAD103 also showed significant down regulation of $PGE_2$ generation in LPS-treated RAW 246.7 cells, and significant inhibition of human recombinant interleukin-$1{\alpha}$-induced proteoglycan degradation, indicating its beneficial involvement in pathophysiological consequences of osteoarthritis, the mechanism of which needs further investigation. Since LAD103 showed strong therapeutic potentials in arthritic treatment through several in vitro experiments, it is highly encouraged to perform further mechanistic and efficacy studies.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.24 no.6 s.84
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• pp.79-93
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• 2006

Aging in place strategies such as residential remodeling have potential to enable older persons to remain in their own homes satisfactorily in terms of quality of life. The purpose of this study is to investigate the types of residential remodeling, needs, and opinions of elderly households living in Seoul and to suggest the housing policy and system for improving independent living of elderly households. Using face to face interview with structured questionnaire, 115 elderly households were interviewed during April $25{\sim}June$ 25, 2005. Most of respondents wanted to stay in their own homes as long as they can and some of them remodeled their houses to adapt their physical and financial conditions and housing needs. Various factors such as financial problem and lack of knowledge about remodeling process, however, restricted their actions to realize their needs. Based on the results, some suggestions to activate 'aging in place' were proposed as future guidelines of housing policy related to residential remodeling for housing welfare of the elderly.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.131-144
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• 2003

Selective Optimization with Compensation (SOC), a concept defined by Baltes and Baltes, is known to predict successful aging. This study was conducted to find out which factors affect Korean elderly people SOC The data for this study were obtained from a survey conducted between March and May 2001, on a sample of middle-class male and female participants over 60 years old. Two hundred and fifty four completed questionnaires were used for final analyses. Descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, Duncan test, Pearson correlations, multiple regressions, multiple response frequencies and sequential threshold methods were used to analyze the data. In order to measure successful aging, the Selective Optimization with Compensation Scale developed by Baltes, Baltes, Freud, and Lang (1996) was used. The SOC scale consists of four subscales, Elective Selection, Loss-based Selection, Optimization, and Compensation. The major findings are summarized in the following. First, the level of SOC by various socio-demographic variables was examined. It tuned out that health status is the most important variable in predicting SOC. Also important was satisfaction with family life. Second, significant correlations were found between SOC and duration of the marriage (negative), practicing a religion, health, and economic stability (all positive). Third, religion and health status affected SOC, but health was a stronger predictor Those who practiced a religion and were healthy had a higher score in SOC as a whole. Fourth, the participants were divided into three groups by their SOC score, and their idea.; of successful aging were compared. The top- and middle-score groups considered satisfaction with family life to be more important, whereas the bottom-score group regarded the social status as more important.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.34 no.5
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• pp.293-306
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• 1996

An educational program for parent caregiving families has been developed with a view to help mitigate burdens of those who provide caring services for their aged parents and to meet the needs of both the caregiving middle-aged daughter-in-law and the parent. The program has been applied to a small group of people who at least one living aged parent. The effectiveness of the program has been evaluated by taking pre- and posttests. The result of the tests strongly suggest that the program has been effective in improving participatns' knowledge on aging process, confict solving and relationship with parent.

• 한국노년학
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.1409-1427
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to understand volunteer work experiences of senior citizen volunteers serving in the welfare center in K district in the aspect of an insider and to apprehend the meaning. The objects of this study are fifteen senior citizen volunteers and two social workers who do volunteer works in the welfare center, and this study utilized the qualitative study method through observations and in-depth interviews from 2009.09.02 to 2009.10.21. The data analysis is processed by the qualitative analysis program, Nvivo 2.0, and the processed data are analyzed in accordance with the grounded theories of Strauss and Corbin. As a result of reviewing data, the meanings about volunteer work experiences of senior citizens are induced as eight factors; senior citizens' identity in an old aging society, desire fulfillment through volunteer works by senior citizens, various leisure activities to help their health in mind and body, acceptance attitude about aging, mental supports from their families, finding activities suitable for each person's personality and capability, changes of perception about the handicapped, and endeavors to spend meaningful old age. Through results and discussion obtained by this study, the conclusion is as below: First, participation induction factors are identities of elderly people in aging society, acceptance attitudes toward aging and emotional support from families in the matter of senior citizens' volunteer work. Second, programs suitable for individual aptitude and capability should be implemented for activating senior citizens' volunteer work. Third, participation in senior citizens' volunteer work indicates desire satisfaction through senior citizens' volunteer work, leisure activities helping health for body and mind, and life changes such as changes of perception about handicapped people etc.