• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.699-710
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• 2007

The study purposes to explore the effects of individual characteristics and home environments of children on their bilingual language aquisition, that is, to examine whether their English language competency is different from their Korean language competency depending on those variables. Thus English or Korean language competency of children who had had early exposure in English learning were studied in terms of child's individual characteristics such as age, gender, exposure period to English, intelligence, and experiences of visiting English-speaking countries, and home environments such as parental age, educational level, income level, their perceived English competency, their perceived significance of English and Korean language, and the frequency of using English at home. 72 children who went to English kindergarten were tested with Peabody Pictures Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R) in Korean version and in English version respectively. The results show that child's intelligence and experiences of visiting English-speaking countries influence their Korean language competency. Also child's age, exposure period to English and experiences of visiting English-speaking countries influence their English language competency. Moreover their mother's educational background, father's English fluency, mothers' English fluency, and the frequency of using English at home influence child's English language competency, whereas any variables did not influence child's Korean language competency. Accordingly, child's English and Korean language competencies are related to each other.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.51-66
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• 2022

This study aims to help Korean English learners to learn English pronunciation by revealing which suprasegmentals affect the implementation of English sentences closer to native English speakers when they read English sentences. To this end, Korean middle school English learners were selected as subjects and research data were gathered through sentence types (declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamative), as well as syllables. Speech rate, pause frequency, pause duration, F0 range, and rhythm among suprasegmentals were used for analysis of these English sentence utterances. Mean analysis, correlation analysis, and regression analysis were performed. The results showed that speech rate, pause frequency, pause duration, and F0 range affected the evaluation of fluency levels. In the regression analysis between all suprasegmentals and fluency levels, the suprasegmentals that most affected fluency levels were speech rate and F0 range. Rhythm had no meaningful relation with fluency levels. Therefore, when teaching English pronunciation, it is necessary to teach students to increase their speech rate and F0 range. In addition, students should be trained to reduce both the number and the duration of pauses during utterance to improve their fluency. It is noteworthy that of the four sentence types, exclamative sentences were produced with faster speech rate, fewer pauses, shorter pause duration, and higher rhythm values.

• Journal of Korean language education
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.201-223
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• 2018

The purpose of this study is to observe the effects of text modification by comparing differences in Korean reading comprehension levels that arise from differences in vocabulary levels in texts. This study intends to use simplified texts with the vocabulary difficulty adjusted differently from the original text to measure reading comprehension levels of Korean learners and analyze the result. To measure reading comprehension, the researcher divided 55 Korean learners of intermediate to advanced level of fluency into two groups; the control group read the original text and the treatment group read a simplified text in which complex vocabulary were substituted with easier words of medium difficulty. Then the two groups were tested with the same questionnaire to measure comprehension levels of each group. The result showed that the groups that read simplified texts scored higher than the control group; this suggests that the reading comprehension level was increased in the treatment group. The experiment confirmed that unknown vocabulary density has direct impact on Korean reading comprehension. The result shows that the proportion of unknown vocabulary should be reduced for meaning-focused reading. It also demonstrates that comprehension of the learner was enhanced with lexical simplification rather than structural simplification i.e. simplification of grammar or sentences. Thus, diverse reading materials adjusted to the learners' level of fluency should be developed to enable reading for learning Korean. By reducing the burden of understanding the meaning of each vocabulary, learners will be able to achieve the initial goal of reading.

• Korean Journal of Culture and Social Issue
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.649-669
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• 2015

Korea has entered a multicultural society. As the number of multicultural family grows, identifying factors that facilitate family adjustment seems important. The relationship between parent and children can be a crucial predictor in family adjustment. Thus this study examined how the concordance/discordance in language fluency affects youth's satisfaction towards their parents. This research employed the 2012 National Survey of Multicultural Families (NSMF) using 9 to 24 year-old multicultural youth'(N=4314) data and that of their parents. Since some youth were from the same family, we used Multilevel Models to take into account youth-level data (level-1) and family-level data (level-2). The major findings are as follows: First, concordance/discordance in both national and ethnic language fluency is associated with the quality of relationship between parents and youth. Second, youth's satisfaction toward parents is highest when foreign parent and youth are fluent in Korean, as well as, when Korean parent and youth are fluent in ethnic languages. These findings can suggest directions for Korean multicultural policy to encourage fluency in both Korean and ethnic languages in multicultural families.

• Journal of Gifted/Talented Education
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.139-156
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• 1995

The purpose of the study is to examine the effects of Gifted Education Isnstitute of Korea (GEIK) programs for gifted children especially in the areas of reasoning skills and creativity, thereby proving the effectiveness of the program. The subjects are 136 (103 boys and 33 girls) fourth, fifth, and sixth grade gifted children, who have participated in GEIK programs for more than six moths. They were stratified by the length of participation in GEIK programs. Ninety four children have participated for more than one year. Forty-two children have participated for less than one year. Both groups are rather homogeneous in IQ scores and school achievement levels at the time of enterance into GEIK programs. Both a Group Assessment of Logical Thinking (GAIT) and a Creativity test were used for the study on reasoning skills and creativity. GALT, developed by V. Roadranka, R. H. Yeany and M. J. Padilla in 1983, consists of 12 questions. It is classified into six subscales: conservation, proportional reasoning, controlling variables, provability reasoning, correlational reasoning, and combinatorial reasoning. The reliability of this test is .85. This test recommends to classify the stages of child development as follows according to the total test score. 0-4 point: Concrete Stage, 5-7 points: Transitional Stage, and 8 and above points: Formal stage. The Creativity Test was developed by Y. Lee and W. Chung (1971). It consists of four components: fluency, flexibility, originality, and openness. Only both fluency and openness were used in this study. In order to analyze data, T-Test, Intercorrelational Analyses, ANOVA, and Nultiple Regression were used. Followings are the results deduced from the above analoyses of the data. First, 43.48% of the subjects were on Concrete Stage, 36.78% were on the Transitional Stage, and 19.86% were on the Formal Stage in the developmental level classified by Piaget. Second, the students who have participated in GEIK programs more than one year acquired significantly higher score in GALT than the students who have participated in GEIK programs less than one year. Third, boys showed higher score in GALT than girls did. Fourth, there were statistically significant intercorrelations between six subscales of GALT. Fifth, the students who have participated in GEIK programs more than one year acquired significantly higher score in openness of creativity test than the students who have participated in GEIK programs less than one year. There were no significant differences in openness of creativity test between boys and girls. Sixth, the students who have participated in GEIK programs more than one year acquired significantly higher score in fluency of creativity test than the students who have participated in GEIK programs less than one year. Girls showed higher score in fluency of creativity test than boys did. Seventh, the students who acquired higher score in GALT showed higher score in both openness and fluency of creativity test. Followings are the conclusions deduced form the above results. First, the developmental level of reasoning skills of the fourth grade students participationg in GEIK programs is the same as that of 7th grade of normal Korean students and the same as those of 10th grade of U.S.A. and Philipoine students. Second, the GEIK programs are effective in improving reasoning skills. Third, the GEIK programs are effective in improving creativity. Fouth, reasoning skills and creativity can be improved by well planned programs. In conclusion, this study suggests that beyond reasoning skills and creativity, other areas such as areas in science skills, mathmatical skills, or verbal skills, etc., should be studied in the future.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.35-48
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• 2005

This study was to examine the relationship between maternal interactive behaviors and stuttering behaviors in preschool children who stutter. Participants were twenty-four children who stutter and their mothers. For the purpose of the current study, 5$\sim$10 minutes of 50 minutes videotaped scenes originally collected to develop fluency assessment instrument were re-videotaped. They included mother-child interactions during playing with toys and reading book situations. Mothers-children interactive behaviors were assessed with Maternal Behavior Rating Sroles(MBRS) and Child Behavior Rating Scales (CBRS). And children's stuttering were assessed with Paradise-Fluency Assessment(P-FA). The results were as follows: 1) the maternal interactive behavior did not significantly differ depending on situations, but scores of maternal responsive factor were higher in the play situation than in the reading situation. 2) Maternal responsiveness might influence on promoting the children's pivotal behavior with children who stutter. And 3) the level of maternal responsiveness was the predictor of children's stuttering behaviors. The therapeutic implication of the results were discussed.

• Journal of Oriental Neuropsychiatry
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.27-44
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• 2013

Objectives : This study was designed to investigate the effects of Gastrodia elata Blume on the improvement of memory. Methods : This study was a 12 week, double blind, comparative clinical study. There were eligible who worked with a group of healthy seniors, all 60 years of age or older. 50 subjects were randomized either to Gastrodia elata Blume in powder form and steep in hot water or placebo. We measured the faculty of memory by using K-DRS, MMSE-K, Digit Span, Letter Fluency Test, Word List Memory Test, and the Trail Making Test, and after 12 weeks we measured the faculty of memory again using the same methods. Results : Gastrodia elata Blume steeps in the hot water group significantly increased. Initiation, perseveration level, and Memory level of K-DRS and MMSE-K score. There were no considerable differences between three groups in Digit Span and Trail Making Test score. Gastrodia elata Blume group showed significant advances in Letter Fluency Test and recognition of Word List Memory Test. Conclusions : The results suggest that Gastrodia elata Blume may have positive effects on memory improvement and function of the frontal lobe activation.

• Korean Linguistics
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• v.63
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• pp.103-132
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• 2014

This study compares various speech rates of Korean learners with those of native Korean. Speech data were collected from 34 native Koreans and 33 Korean learners (19 Chinese and 14 Japanese). Each participant recorded a 9 syllabled Korean sentence at three different speech rate types. A total of 603 speech samples were analyzed by speech rate types (normal, slow, and fast), native languages (Korean, Chinese, Japanese), and learners' proficiency levels (beginner, intermediate, and advanced). We found that learners' L1 background plays a role in categorizing different speech rates in the L2 (Korean), and also that the leaners' proficiency correlates with the increase of speaking rate regardless of speech rate categories. More importantly, faster speech rate values found in the advanced level of learners do not necessarily match to the native speakers' speech rate categories. This means that learning speech rate categories can be more complex than we think of proficiency or fluency. That is, speech rate categories may not be acquired automatically during the course of second language learning, and implicit or explicit exposures to various rate types are necessary for second language learners to acquire a high level of communicative skills including speech rate variation. This paper discusses several pedagogical implications in terms of teaching pronunciation to second language learners.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.39-48
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• 2024

Reading fluency refers to the ability to read sentences or paragraphs accurately, quickly, and with appropriate prosodic expression. Most reading fluency assessments exclude expressive ability because it is difficult to objectively measure. Therefore, in this study, we examined all elements of reading fluency by analyzing prosodic characteristics of reading scenario texts to maximize expressive reading. The subjects were 30 male students in the first and second grades of middle school (15 normal and 15 poor readers). To analyze the accuracy aspect, error types at the syllable level were analyzed for each group, and related acoustic variables were measured and examined in terms of prosodic aspects. The reading accuracy analysis showed that the poor reading group had a higher error rate than the normal. In terms of error types, the normal group showed the order of 'substitution>omission>correction>insertion>repetition', whereas the poor reading group was in the order of 'correction>substitution>repetition/insertion>omission'. For the speech tempo, the dyslexic students were slower than the typical students for all sentence types. The prosodic variables also showed a high frequency of accentual phrases (AP) and intonation phrases (IP) in sentences along with a wide intensity range.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing Administration
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.76-86
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• 2012

Purpose: As Korea has been rapidly transformed to be a multicultural society, it becomes essential for nurses to develop cultural competency. The purpose of this descriptive study was to assess the cultural competency level of general hospital nurses and to examine its contributing factors adopting ecological model. Method: A convenience sample of 327 nurses from six general hospitals in Seoul metropolitan area was recruited between November 14 to 28, 2011. Cultural competency was measured using the Korean version of the Caffrey Cultural Competence in Healthcare Scale (CCCHS) and Cultural Competence Assessment(CCA). Hierarchical multiple regression analysis was performed to assess the influence of intrapersonal, cultural-experience, and organizational factors on cultural competency. Results: Mean cultural competency in this study was 2.57(${\pm}0.43$). Cultural competency was associated with job position (p=.044) at the intrapersonal level. At the cultural experience level, foreign language classes experience (p=.005), fluency in a foreign language (p=.000), experience of working with foreign health care professionals (p=.000) were associated cultural competency. At the organizational level, training program (p=.000), job description (p=.002), health education materials (p=.016), insufficient job control (p=.000), and interpersonal conflicts (p=.011) showed significant difference. Foreign language class experience, foreign language fluency, experience of working with foreign health care professionals, and job control were the most consistent predictors of cultural competence and explained 20.4% of the total variance in the proposed ecological model. Conclusions: The findings suggest that to enhance cultural competency in general hospital nurses, cultural experience and organizational factors need to be more fully considered than intrapersonal factors.