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Consumer Awareness and Evaluation of Retailers' Social Responsibility: An Exploratory Approach into Ethical Purchase Behavior from a U.S Perspective (소비자인지도화령수상사회책임(消费者认知度和零售商社会责任): 종미국시각출발적도덕구매행위적탐색성연구(从美国视角出发的道德购买行为的探索性研究))

  • Lee, Min-Young;Jackson, Vanessa P.
    • Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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    • v.20 no.1
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    • pp.49-58
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    • 2010
  • Corporate social responsibility has become a very important issue for researchers (Greenfield, 2004; Maignan & Ralston, 2002; McWilliams et al., 2006; Pearce & Doh 2005), and many consider it necessary for businesses to define their role in society and apply social and ethical standards to their businesses (Lichtenstein et al., 2004). As a result, a significant number of retailers have adopted CSR as a strategic tool to promote their businesses. To this end, this study sought to discover U.S. consumers' attitudes and behavior in ethical purchasing and consumption based on their subjective perception and evaluation of a retailer. The objectives of this study include: 1) determine the participants awareness of retailers corporate social responsibility; 2) assess how participants evaluate retailers corporate social responsibility; 3) examine whether participants evaluation process of retailers CSR influence their attitude toward the retailer; and 4) assess if participants attitude toward the retailers CSR influence their purchase behavior. This study does not focus on actual retailers' CSR performance because a consumer's decision making process is based on an individual assessment not an actual fact. This study examines US college students' awareness and evaluations of retailers' corporate social responsibility (CSR). Fifty six college students at a major Southeastern university participated in the study. The age of the participants ranged from 18 to 26 years old. Content analysis was conducted with open coding and focused coding. Over 100 single-spaced pages of written responses were collected and analyzed. Two steps of coding (i.e., open coding and focused coding) were conducted (Esterberg, 2002). Coding results and analytic memos were used to understand participants' awareness of CSR and their ethical purchasing behavior supported through the selection and inclusion of direct quotes that were extracted from the written responses. Names used here are pseudonyms to protect confidentiality of participants. Participants were asked to write about retailers, their aware-ness of CSR issues, and to evaluate a retailer's CSR performance. A majority (n = 28) of respondents indicated their awareness of CSR but have not felt the need to act on this issue. Few (n=8) indicated that they are aware of this issue but not greatly concerned. Findings suggest that when college students evaluate retailers' CSR performance, they use three dimensions of CSR: employee support, community support, and environmental support. Employee treatment and support were found as an important criterion in evaluation of retailers' CSR. Respondents indicated that their good experience with a retailer as an employee made them have a positive perception and attitude toward the retailer. Regarding employee support four themes emerged: employee rewards and incentives based on performance, working environment, employee education and training program, and employee and family discounts. Well organized rewards and incentives were mentioned as an important attribute. The factors related to the working environment included: how well retailers follow the rules related to working hours, lunch time and breaks was also one of the most mentioned attributes. Regarding community support, three themes emerged: contributing a percentage of sales to the local community, financial contribution to charity organizations, and events for community support. Regarding environments, two themes emerged: recycling and selling organic or green products. It was mentioned in the responses that retailers are trying to do what they can to be environmentally friendly. One respondent mentioned that the company is creating stores that have an environmentally friendly design. Information about what the company does to help the environment can easily be found on the company’s website as well. Respondents have also noticed that the stores are starting to offer products that are organic and environmentally friendly. A retailer was also mentioned by a respondent in this category in reference to how the company uses eco-friendly cups and how they are helping to rebuild homes in New Orleans. The respondents noticed that a retailer offers reusable bags for their consumers to purchase. One respondent stated that a retailer uses its products to help the environment, through offering organic cotton. After thorough analysis of responses, we found that a participant's evaluation of a retailers' CSR influenced their attitudes towards retailers. However, there was a significant gap between attitudes and purchasing behavior. Although the participants had positive attitudes toward retailers CSR, the lack of funds and time influenced their purchase behavior. Overall, half (n=28) of the respondents mentioned that CSR performance affects their purchasing decisions making when shopping. Findings from this study provide support for retailers to consider their corporate social responsibility when developing their image with the consumer. This study implied that consumers evaluate retailers based on employee, community and environmental support. The evaluation, attitude and purchase behavior of consumers seem to be intertwined. That is, evaluation is based on the knowledge the consumer has of the retailers CSR. That knowledge may influence their attitude toward the retailer and thus influence their purchase behavior. Participants also indicated that having CSR makes them think highly of the retailer, but it does not influence their purchase behavior. Price and convenience seem to surpass the importance of CSR among the participants. Implications, recommendations for future research, and limitations of the study are also discussed.

A Survey on the Oral Health Conditions according to Dental Health Behaviors of Elderly People in Community (일부 지역사회 노인들의 구강보건행동에 따른 구강건강상태)

  • Kang, Hyeong-Ku;Yoon, Hyun-Suk;Cho, Young-Chae
    • Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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    • v.30 no.3
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    • pp.263-277
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    • 2005
  • Objectives: This study aimed to reveal the oral health conditions based on the dental health behaviors of a community-dwelling elderly. Methods: The subjects included 206 rural dwellers(100 men & 106 women) aged over 65 years old, who received dental health check-ups in the local public health center and its branches attached to 6 respective Myons of Chunchongnamdo Province, during the 2-month period from Jan. 1st to Feb. 28th, 2005. They were examined by dentists and given self-administered questionnaires asking about their dental heaith behaviors and subjective symptoms of gingival bleeding. Results: The oral health conditions based on dental health behavior showed that those who have not taken dental health service a year were found to have significantly greater number of missing teeth(p=0.002), DMFT(p=0.002) and CPITN(p=0.018), and those who have not observed intra-oral conditions a week to have significantly less number of filled teeth(p=0.002) and significantly greater number of missing teeth(p=0.000) and CPITN (p=0.000) than their respective counterparts. In terms of brushing, those who brushed their teeth below "3 times/day" were found to have significantly greater number of decayed teeth(p=0.000), missing teeth(p=0.000), DMFT(p=0.000) and CPITN(p=0.000) than their counterparts. In terms of time spent in brushing, those who spends "below 3 minutes" had significantly greater number of missing teeth(p=0.002) and DMFT(p=0.041), and significantly less number of filled teeth(p=0.036). According to the use of aid tools for cleaning teeth, the group who don't use them had significantly greater number of DMFT(p=0.041) and CPITN(p=0.018) than its counterpart. Classified by smoking habits, smoking groups had significantly greater number of decayed teeth(p=0.035) and CPITN(p=0.001) than non-smoking groups. Multiple regression analysis of the study data revealed that the significant factors influencing number of decayed teeth were number of brushing, sex and intra-oral observation (explanatory power of 14.2%). The significant factors for number of filled teeth were sex, intra-oral observation, use of aid tools, frequency of brushing, subjective health conditions and drinking of sweet beverages(explanatory power of 18.2%), those for number of missing teeth, number of brushing and age(explanatory power of 13.9%) those for DMFT, number of brushing, sex, use of dental service, age(explanatory power: 13.5%), and those for CPITN included smoking habits, use of dental service, use of aid tools (explanatory power: 10.8%). Conclusions: The study results revealed that the dental health behavior of the elderly population is in poor conditions and their consequent intra-oral health conditions are not good. To improve their oral conditions, public campaign and education will be needed to modify unhealthy dental health behaviors.

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Utilization Pattern of Complementary Therapy in Hypertension, Diabetes and Chronic Arthritis Patients Visited to Local Health Center (일개 보건소를 방문하는 고혈압, 당뇨 및 관절염환자의 보완요법 이용실태)

  • Park, Ae-Ju;Park, Jae-Yong;Han, Chang-Hyun
    • Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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    • v.28 no.2
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    • pp.107-122
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    • 2003
  • Objectives: The objective of this study is to investigate the use rate and some aspect of complementary therapies used by patients with chronic illness(hypertension, diabetic mellitus and chronic arthritis). Methods: 600 patients visiting the health center for one month(Jan. 2001) were interviewed on their complementary therapies used by the subjects for the previous year. Results: About fourteen-eight percent of the respondents used therapies; 35% of patients with hypertension, 44.6% of patients with diabetic mellitus and 62.9% of patients with chronic arthritis, which shows the highest rate among patients with three chronic disease. The use rate of complementary therapies indicates few meaningful differences according to the general characteristics of the interviewees. Hypertension patients used herb medication(31.0%) acupuncture(29.6%) and most of all the other therapies. Diabetic patients used dietary therapy(57.5%) and herb medication(35.1%). Chronic arthritis patients used acupuncture(85%) and herb medication(34.7%). 36.8% of all the patients who used complementary therapies tried more than two therapies. 18.3% of hypertension patients, 24.1% of diabetic patients and 55.9% of chronic arthritis patients used more than two therapies. Acupuncture(47%) was used most frequently, followed by herb medications(26.3%), health assistance utensils(21.8%). oriental therapy(21.8%), physical therapy(9.5%), health assistance food(8.4%), herb(7.7%), Korea hand acupuncture(3.2%), abdomen respiration(1.1%), and pore therapy(0.7%) Oriental clinic was visited most frequently(42.8%), which was used to cure diseases(61.8%), and to relieve symptoms(26.0%). (p<0.001) The cost spent on complementary therapies last year was 90,000 won(40.3%) and there are some cases of more than 500,000 won(31.2%). Most of the patients(56.1%) were satisfied with the complementary therapies, with 6% of them having side effects. 74% of the patients used complementary therapies answered that they would continue them and 56.1% of them also answered that they would continue them and 56.1% of them also answered that they would advise other patients to do them. Advantages(compared with those of orthodox medical treatment) are psychological comfort(28.1%), body protection(26.0%), effectiveness(20.0%). 34% of the patients using complementary therapies wanted to have informational orientation on complementary therapies. These findings reveal that a considerable number of patients with chronic illness(47.5%) tried a variety of complementary therapies. Though 6% of the patients using therapies had side effects, most of the subjects seemed satisfied with them and they are supposed to continue them. Conclusions: In conclusion, health center personnels and medical doctors should pay more attention to the complementary therapies used by patients with chronic illness. They also have to try their best to advise more scientific and informative complementary programs with less side effects and more help to improve their conditions.

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Environmental Characteristics and Catch Fluctuations of Set Net Ground in the Coastal Water of Hanlim in Cheju Island I. Properties of Temperature and Salinity (제주도 한림 연안 정치망어장의 환경특성과 어획량변동에 관한 연구 I. 수온 및 염분특성)

  • KIM Jun-Teck;JEONG Dong-Gun;RHO Hong-Kil
    • Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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    • v.31 no.6
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    • pp.859-868
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    • 1998
  • In order to investigate the relation between the marine environmental characteristics and the change of the catch in set net, the marine environment properties were analyzed by temperature and salinity observed in the western coastal area of Cheju Island from 1995 to 1996 and the results are as follows 1) Main axis of Tsushima Current appeared in the western coastal area of Cheju Island was off 2$\~$3 miles from November to May. Therefore the waters of high temperature over $14^{\circ}C$ and high salinity from $34.40\%_{\circ}$ to $34.60\%_{\circ}$ were distributed homogeneously from surface to bottom in this time. But China Coastal Waters of low salinity appeared in the Cheju Strait from June to October, surface waters became of high temperature and low salinity, and middle and bottom waters became of the temperature from 11 to $14^{\circ}C$ and the salinity over $33.50\%_{\circ}$ and then vertically sharp thermocline and halocline are formed in the western coastal area of Cheju Island. In summer, the water temperature and salinity of the surface waters in wstern coastal area of Cheju Island were lower and higher respectively than that in middle area of the Cheju Strait and the temperature and salinity of the bottom waters in this area were higher and lower, respectively than that in middle area of the Cheju Strait. Such a distribution shows a tidal front in this coastal area. On the whole year, surface temperature and salinity were from 14 to $23^{\circ}C$ and from 30.60 to $34.60\%_{\circ}$, respectively, and annual fluctuation range of temperature and salinity was within $9^{\circ}C$ and $4.00\%_{\circ}$, respectively, Thus, annual fluctuation range in this area is much narrower than that in the Cheju Strait. In bottom water, temperature ranges from 14 to $20^{\circ}C$ through the year. Thus, the fluctuation range of temperature is narrow. The low temperature of from $11^{\circ}C$ to $13^{\circ}C$ appeared in the west enterance of Cheju Strait was not shown in this coastal area. 2) The salinity of bottom water was from $33.60\%_{\circ}$ to $34.40\%_{\circ}$ in 1995, while low salinity wale. below $32.00\%_{\circ}$ appeared all depth from June in 1996. Thus, the variation of hydrographic conditions in this area is narrow in winter, and wide in summer due to the influence of China Coastal Waters. 3) In summer, surface cold water, local eddy and fronts of temperature and salinity were showed within 2 mile from the west coast of the Cheju Island due to vertical mixing by tidal current. Especially, temperature and salinity of bottom water are changed with the change of depth around Biyang-Do. Thus, the front of temperature and salinity appeared clearly between shallow area with the depth of under 10 m and deep area with of the depth of more than 50m. Surface water in outside area where high temperature and low salinity water appear intrudes between Worlreong-Ri and Geumreung-Ri. Thus, the front of temperature and salinity was made along the line that connects from this coast to Biyang-Do, The temperature of the bottom water is $2^{\circ}C$ to $4^{\circ}C$ lower than that of the surface water and its salinity is $0.02\%_{\circ}$ to $0.08\%_{\circ}$ higher than that of the surface water even in shallow area.

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Induction Chemotherapy and Radiotherapy in Locally Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) (국소 진행된 비소세포성 폐암에서 유도 화학요법 및 방사선치료)

  • Yun, Sang-Mo;Kim, Jae-Cheol;Park, In-Kyu
    • Radiation Oncology Journal
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    • v.17 no.3
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    • pp.195-202
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    • 1999
  • Purpose : We peformed this study to evaluate the prognostic factors and the effect of induction chemotherapy in locally advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Materials and Methods : A retrospective analysis was done for 130 patients with locally advanced NSCLC treated with curative radiotherapy alone or induction chemo-radiotherapy from January 1986 to October 1996. Eighty-five patients were treated with radiotherapy alone, forty-five with induction chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Age, sex, performance status, histopathologic type, and stage were evenly distributed in both groups. The patients were treated with 6 MV or 10 MV X-ray. Conventional fractionation with daily fraction size 1$.8\~2.0$ Gy was done. Of the patients, 129 patients received total dose above 59.6 Gy ($56\~66$ Gy, median 60 Gy). Induction chemotherapy regimen were CAP (Cyclo-phosphamide, Adriamycin, Cisplatin) in 6 patients, MVP (Mitomycin, Vinblastine, Cisplatin) in 9 patients, MIC (Mitomycin, Ifosfamide Cisplatin) in 13 patients, and EP (Etoposide, Cisplatin) in 17 patients. Chemotherapy was done in $2\~5$ cycles (median 2). Results : Overall 1-, 2-, and 3-year survival rate (YSR) for all patients were $41.5\%,{\;}13.7\%,{\;}and{\;}7\%$, respectively (median survival time 11 months). According to treatment modality, median survival time, overall 1-, 2-, and 3-YSR were 9 months, $32.9\%,{\;}10.\5%,{\;}6\%$ for radiotherapy alone group, and 14 months, $57.8\%,{\;}20\%,{\;}7.6\%$ for induction chemotherapy group, respectively (f=0.0005). Complete response (CR) to overall treatments was $25\%$ (21/84) in radiotherapy alone and $40.5\%$ (17/42) in induction chemotherapy group (p=0.09). The Prognostic factors affecting overall survival were hemoglobin level (p=0.04), NSE (neuron-specific enolase) level (p=0.004), and respense to overall treatment(p=0.004). According to treatment modalities, NSE (neuron-specific enolase) (p=0.006) and response to overall treatment (p=0.003) were associated with overall survival in radiotherapy alone group, and response to overall treatment (p=0.007) in induction chemotherapy group. The failure Pattern analysis revealed no significant difference between treatment modalities. But, in patients with CR to overall treatment, distant metastasis were found in 11/19 patients with radiotherapy alone, and 3/13 patients with induction chemotherapy and radiotherapy (p=0.07). Locoregional failure patterns were not different between two groups (10/19 vs 6/13). Conclusion : Induction chemotherapy and radiotherapy achieved increased 2YSR compared to radiotherapy alone, At least in CR patients, there was decreased tendency in distant metastasis with induction chemotherapy. But, locoregional failures and long-term survival were not improved. Thus, there is need of more effort to increasing local control and further decreasing distant metastasis.

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Evaluation of External Quality of Brand Soybeans (콩 시판 브랜드 제품의 외관 품질 평가)

  • Jong, Seung-Keun;Woo, Shun-Hee;Kim, Hong-Sig
    • KOREAN JOURNAL OF CROP SCIENCE
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    • v.52 no.3
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    • pp.239-248
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    • 2007
  • Although high nutritional values and continuous identification of important functional substances of soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merrill.] promote consumption of soybean products worldwide, informations on quality of brand soybean is not enough for consumers. Total of 100 brand soybeans [32 for soypaste and source, 45 black testa (lage), and 17 black testa (small) or medicinal soybean and beansprout soybean] were collected at supermarkets and several external quality factors were analyzed. Brand soybeans were marked with the environmental friendly and intimating words along with soybean (white or yellow), black soybean (black-, frost-, late frost-, green or inner-green-), medicinal soybean and beansprout soybean. Among 100 brand soybeans 30% was 1 kg package and 59% was 500 g package, difference between printed and actual weights of 70% brand soybeans was ${\pm}1%$ and weights of 2/3 of brand soybeans were higher than printed weight. Range of 100 seed weights of soypaste and source, black testa (large) and black testa (small) and beansprout soybeans were $23.7{\sim}47.8g$, $21.9{\sim}44.5g$ and $9.5{\sim}15.0g$, respectively. Although ranges of 100 seed weights of soypaste and source and black testa (large) soybeans were similar, 63% of soypaste and source were less than 29 g, while 78% of black testa (large) soybeans were higher than 30 g. Although average and highest percentages of seeds separated with 6.7 mm sieve were similar with 87.4% and 99.9% for soypaste and source soybean and 86.5% and 99.5% for black testa (large) soybean, respectively, the lowest percentages were 70.7% for soypaste and source soybean and 14.4% for black testa (large) soybean. When 100 seed weight was greater than 35 g, 90% of seeds were remained on 6.7 mm sieve. On the other hand 100 g weight and percentage of seeds remained on 6.7 mm sieve showed significantly positive correlations [r=0.7488** for soypaste and source soybean and r=0.7874** for black testa (large) soybean when 100 seed weight was $20{\sim}30g$. Based on hilum color and/or appearance, 76% of brand soybeans collected (more than 90% in yellow testa soybeans) were found to be mixed more than 10% with other cultivars or landraces. Foreign materials such as sand, piece of clothe, wood piece, dead insects, other soybeans were found in 20% of brand soybeans. Average test weight of brand soybeans was 762g $L^{-1}$ with a range of $645{\sim}820g\;L^{-1}$. Soybeans from local markets were as good as brand soybeans in 100 seed weight, uniformity of seeds, weight of foreign materials and test weight.

Effect of Geijibokryunghwan and each constituent herb on inhibition of platelet aggregation (계지복령환(桂枝茯笭丸) 및 그 구성약물(構成藥物)의 혈소판응집억제(血小板凝集抑制)에 관(關)한 연구(硏究))

  • Kim, Jong-Goo;Park, Sun-Dong;Park, Won-Hwan
    • The Journal of Dong Guk Oriental Medicine
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    • v.8 no.2
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    • pp.115-129
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    • 2000
  • The cause that the increase of animality fat intakes, under exercise, fatness, adding the stress, advanced age etc., the occurrence rate of the circulation system disease has been increased. And the thrombosis importantly came to the front as the risk factor of these circulation system's disease. Nowadays, the ischemic disease has especially discussed, for example the angina or myocardial infarction, originated in thrombosis that came from the platelet aggregation. In the western medicine, as the cure and prevention, using the aspirin or ticlopidine for platelet aggregation suppressant. But in the , the curing method must be used properly according to the pectoralgia or heartache's kind, state, grade. The platelet do not attache to the normal hemangioendothelial cell. But when it stimulated by endothelium peronia and so on, it attache to the injury endothelium or rise aggregation between the platelet. On this time, it secrete the platelet aggregation inducer as like ADP, thromboxane A2 from the inside of platelet. So it has first defensive function through the aggregation augment that prevent the celerity consumption of blood. But the activation of abnormal platelet occur the platelet grume and thrombogenesis. So it bring up the occlusive angiosis, so to speak, cardiovascular disease, cerebrovascular disease, arterial sclerosis. In oriental medicine, the thrombosis in the category of blood stasis and this blood stasis present the generalise or local blood circulation disturbance that generated by all kinds of pathological fact or blood stream retention accompanying with a series of syndrome. As the syndrome, stabbing pain fixed at certain region, squamous and dry skin, fullness and pain of the chest and hypochondrium, firmness and fullness of the lower abdomen, black stool, dark purple tongue or with ecchymoses and petechiae etc.. has been created. And it becomes the pathopoiesis cause that the convulsion and palpitation, severe palpitatiion, tympanites, the symtom complex with a mass or swelling in the abdomen, insanity, stricken by wind etc.. Moreover, it used the drugs for invigorating blood circulation and eliminating blood stasis or drugs for removing blood stasis for all kinds of syndrome through the blood stasis. And the drugs for activating the blood circulation, such as Salviae Radix, Angelicae Sinensis Radix, Persicae Semen, Achyranthis Radix, Cnidii Rhizoma, Carthami Flos are used for that. And it is used to the herbs of insects that has strong effect about the disintergrating blood stasis such as Hirudo, Scolopendrae Corpus, Buthus, Lumbricus etc.. On this study, It used Geijibokryunghwan(GBH) and the consisting herbs to investigate the influence of platelet aggregation about drugs that used to improvement various symptoms created by the thrombosis in oriental medicine. GBH formula has as formula recorded in the , action of 'eleminating the evil and not impairment of healthy energy' and 'promoting the flow of QI and cold and heat, so used for the expel blood stasis herbs from the ancient. Therefore we investigated the restraint effect of GBH and the consisting herbs about the platelet agregation induced to the ADP, AA or collagen. The conclusion is following. 1. When it added the aggregation inducer after that it added GBH and individual consisting herbs in the PRP, GBH showed the (+) inhibition effect on the platelet aggregation and it showed the (+) inhibition effect in the individual consisting herbs as like Paeoniae Radix and Moutan Cortex Radicis. 2. It showed the (+), (+,++) inhibition effect on the platelet aggregation in Paeoniae Radix Hoelen, Paeoniae Radix Moutan Cortex Radicis, Hoelen Moutan Cortex Radicis etc. 3. In the aggregation inhibition activating on the difference of density, GBH showed strong inhibition effect to the aggregation state induced to collagen, and it showed the inhibition effect in the individual consisting herbs as like Paeoniae Radix and Moutan Cortex Radicis about the aggregation induced by the collagen. 4. It showed the strong inhibition effect about the aggregation induced by the collagen in Paeoniae Radix Hoelen, Paeoniae Radix Moutan Cortex Radicis, Hoelen Moutan Cortex Radicis etc Like this, as confirm GBH and the individual consisting herb's inhibition effect of platelet aggregation, We considerated that GBH and the individual consisting herbs have practical applicational value of clinical trial in the thrombosis caused by platelet aggregation.

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Prevalence of Enteyobius vermiculuris infection and preventive effects of masts treatment among children in rural and urban areas, and children in orphanages (농촌, 도시 및 집단생활 아동의 요충 감염과 집단 구충에 의한 예방 효과)

  • Kim, Jong-Su;Lee, Hae-Yong;An, Yeong-Gyeom
    • Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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    • v.29 no.3
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    • pp.235-244
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    • 1991
  • An epidemiological study and mass treatments of Enterobius vermicularis infection among children near Wonju area of Kangwon province were carried out. The children were divided into 4 groups according to their residing localities; children in the mountainous area, rural area, urban area and in orphanage. They were examined by adhesive cellotape anal swab technique, and egg positive rates were obtained. The rates of egg reduction and re-infection rates after repeated mass treatments were also observed. The results obtained were as follows: 1. The overall egg Positive rate of E. vermicularis in the first screening was 19.9% (251 out of 1, 262 examinees; 19.7% in males and 20.1% in females). The positive rates were 13.0% in the mountainous area, 11 9% in the rural area, 15.1% in the urban (medium-sized) area and 61.9% in orphanages. 2. The highest positive rates were observed in the kindergarten children, and 1st and 2nd grade children of primary schools (26.2~32.2%), and the lowest rate (13.6%) in 6-year grade children of primary schools. 3. Cumulative detection rates from 3 repeated anal swabs at 4~5 days interval were higher (70.8%) than those from single anal swabs (50.0~59.2%). 4. Out of the examinees who showed the highest cumulative positive rate (70.8%), about 39.2% were consecutively positive in 3 anal swabs. Among different groups of children, the higher the total egg detection rates (87.5%), the higher the consecutive positive rates (71.9%) . 5. A total of 2, 609 (male : female=1 : 12.4) worms were collected from 17 egg-positive cases treated with anthelinintics. The mean number of worms per child was 153 (range: 4-824) . 6. The egg-positive cases in several studied groups (180 children) were treated with anthelmintics 6 times at 3-week intervals. In this case, the overall positive rate was decreased from 54.8% to 2.2% at 15 weeks after the treatments, but no complete negative conversion was experienced. However, in a group of children (154 children) including egg Positive and negative cases who were both treated with anthelmintics at 3-week interval, a complete egg-negative conversion was observed in the 9th week after treatments. 7. The egg-detection rate in the brothers or sisters of egg Positive children was 70.0% (28 out of 40 examined), and the egg-positive rate according to the family unit was 69.7%. In summarizing the above results, it is concluded that Enterobius vermicularis infection is still highly prevalent among children in Korea, and that repeated mass treatments of more than 3 times will be effective for control of this infection.

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Characteristics That Affect Japanese Consumer Preferences for Chrysanthemum (국화 수출 확대를 위한 일본 소비자의 상품 선호도 분석)

  • Lim, Jin Hee;Seo, Ji Yeon;Shim, Myung Syun
    • Horticultural Science & Technology
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    • v.31 no.5
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    • pp.640-647
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    • 2013
  • This study was conducted to provide exportation strategy by surveying on preference of Japanese consumers on cut chrysanthemum exported. The survey was conducted two times by a local survey company in Japan, and the surveys were conducted largely on chrysanthemums for casual flowers and the altar. After departmentalizing Japanese consumers per groups the result were analyzed through conjoint and cluster methods, flower colors and shape were used relatively higher rate for selection criteria of flowers in every group in the case of casual flowers. Group 1 comprised of 60 year-old housewives who reside in a small city with high school diploma and annual income less than 300 million yen, and group 2 of 40 year-old housewives who are small city residents with high school diplomas and annual income of 300 million yen show higher rate of use in flower shape than colors. Another group 3 whose members are 50 year-old housewives, small city residents with high school diplomas and annual income of 600 million yen showed higher rate of use colors than the shape for selection criteria of flowers. The consumption characteristics according to the ages of the consumers showed a pronounced tendency. The 40-50 year-old housewives preferred single flowers packed with other flowers, and the 60 year-old housewives double flowers packed with only chrysanthemums. In flower color, the 50-60 year-old housewives preferred white and yellow flowers, and the 40 year-old housewives pink and yellow flowers. Therefore, there are needs for development strategy of new products considering the consumption characteristics of flower shape and color according to the ages of consumer. After analyzing the chrysanthemums for altar by departmentalization of Japanese consumers, every group showed relative higher rate of use for flower shape for selection criteria of flowers. According to the analysis on the consumption characteristics, group 1 which is comprised of 30-40 year-old housewives who reside in small city with high school diplomas and income less than 300 million yen, and the group 2 of 20 year-old housewives who reside in small city with college diplomas and annual income less than 300 million yen. They are very sensitive to the price of the products while the group 3 of 50 year-old housewives who reside in small city with high school diplomas and annual income less than 300 million yen are insensitive to the price. The 30-50 year-old housewives preferred white and pink flowers, and the 20 year-old housewives yellow and pink flowers. In flower shape, the 50 year-old housewives preferred anemone shape, the 30-40 year-old housewives double shape, and the 20 year-old housewives pompon shapes. Therefore, the white, double flowers for the 30-40 year-old housewives and the yellow, pompon flowers for the 20 year-old housewives are needed to be created at the lowest cost, while the white, anemone flowers are needed to created at higher cost with high quality. In light of these results, it is considered that we should understand the types of purchasing products through consumption characteristics of Japanese consumers. Also we should plan, create market-oriented and consumer-oriented products, and should export them in order to expand more exportation.

A Deep Learning Based Approach to Recognizing Accompanying Status of Smartphone Users Using Multimodal Data (스마트폰 다종 데이터를 활용한 딥러닝 기반의 사용자 동행 상태 인식)

  • Kim, Kilho;Choi, Sangwoo;Chae, Moon-jung;Park, Heewoong;Lee, Jaehong;Park, Jonghun
    • Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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    • v.25 no.1
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    • pp.163-177
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    • 2019
  • As smartphones are getting widely used, human activity recognition (HAR) tasks for recognizing personal activities of smartphone users with multimodal data have been actively studied recently. The research area is expanding from the recognition of the simple body movement of an individual user to the recognition of low-level behavior and high-level behavior. However, HAR tasks for recognizing interaction behavior with other people, such as whether the user is accompanying or communicating with someone else, have gotten less attention so far. And previous research for recognizing interaction behavior has usually depended on audio, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi sensors, which are vulnerable to privacy issues and require much time to collect enough data. Whereas physical sensors including accelerometer, magnetic field and gyroscope sensors are less vulnerable to privacy issues and can collect a large amount of data within a short time. In this paper, a method for detecting accompanying status based on deep learning model by only using multimodal physical sensor data, such as an accelerometer, magnetic field and gyroscope, was proposed. The accompanying status was defined as a redefinition of a part of the user interaction behavior, including whether the user is accompanying with an acquaintance at a close distance and the user is actively communicating with the acquaintance. A framework based on convolutional neural networks (CNN) and long short-term memory (LSTM) recurrent networks for classifying accompanying and conversation was proposed. First, a data preprocessing method which consists of time synchronization of multimodal data from different physical sensors, data normalization and sequence data generation was introduced. We applied the nearest interpolation to synchronize the time of collected data from different sensors. Normalization was performed for each x, y, z axis value of the sensor data, and the sequence data was generated according to the sliding window method. Then, the sequence data became the input for CNN, where feature maps representing local dependencies of the original sequence are extracted. The CNN consisted of 3 convolutional layers and did not have a pooling layer to maintain the temporal information of the sequence data. Next, LSTM recurrent networks received the feature maps, learned long-term dependencies from them and extracted features. The LSTM recurrent networks consisted of two layers, each with 128 cells. Finally, the extracted features were used for classification by softmax classifier. The loss function of the model was cross entropy function and the weights of the model were randomly initialized on a normal distribution with an average of 0 and a standard deviation of 0.1. The model was trained using adaptive moment estimation (ADAM) optimization algorithm and the mini batch size was set to 128. We applied dropout to input values of the LSTM recurrent networks to prevent overfitting. The initial learning rate was set to 0.001, and it decreased exponentially by 0.99 at the end of each epoch training. An Android smartphone application was developed and released to collect data. We collected smartphone data for a total of 18 subjects. Using the data, the model classified accompanying and conversation by 98.74% and 98.83% accuracy each. Both the F1 score and accuracy of the model were higher than the F1 score and accuracy of the majority vote classifier, support vector machine, and deep recurrent neural network. In the future research, we will focus on more rigorous multimodal sensor data synchronization methods that minimize the time stamp differences. In addition, we will further study transfer learning method that enables transfer of trained models tailored to the training data to the evaluation data that follows a different distribution. It is expected that a model capable of exhibiting robust recognition performance against changes in data that is not considered in the model learning stage will be obtained.