• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.30 no.3 s.58
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• pp.540-554
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• 1997

The effects of cigarette smoking on the psychosocial distress, the absenteeism, the occupational injuries, and on the prevalence for the accidents were assessed in 795 male workers who had been employed since March 1994. The results show that the prevalence of current smokers were higher in young men, lower educational level, lower income, single men(unmarried or divorced), alcohol drinkers, and blue collar workers. In the bivariate analyses, the workers with the high job demand and low work control were more likely to smoke, although the relationship was not strong. Those who reported lower satisfaction on his job tended to smoke more. Mean scores of psychosocial well-being index(PWI) were higher in current smokers than nonsmokers. For the hierarchical multiple regression analyses, interaction terms between cigarette smoking and job stressors(job demand and work control) were not significant. For smokers, the odds ratios for the occupational injuries, and the accidents were 1.40(95% confidence interval 0.77-2.57) and 1.96 (95% confidence interval 0.75-5.09), respectively. The mean absent day were 4.13 for smokers, 3.65 for nonsmokers, although the differences were not statistically significant. It seems that cigarette smoking had not caused any crucial effects on the psychosocial well-being status and the occupational risks. Some considerations for the further research on the relationship of cigarette smoking on the mental health status and the occupational risks were also discussed.

• Journal of Family Resource Management and Policy Review
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.17-32
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• 2018

The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of family life stress and family values on marital stability among middle-aged couples. The subjects included a total of 302 men and women aged 45-64 who had been married for more than 20 years and were living in Seoul. The collected data were statistically analyzed with the SPSS 21.0 Package. First, Cronbach's alpha was calculated to measure the reliability of the scale that assessed the variables of the research model. Then, mean and standard deviation were calculated to determine the degrees of family life stress, family values, and marital stability among the subjects. Finally, a hierarchical multiple regression analysis was performed to identify factors that affected the subjects' marital stability. The results revealed that the level of family life stress in middle-aged married men and women was slightly higher than the mean value. Of all the sub-scales of family life stress, the subjects were found to experience the most stress from factors related to financial pressure, followed by family relationships, a sense of loss within a family, and work-family compatibility. Therefore, financial problems were one of the critical stressors for middle-aged married couples. Also, for this demographic, the levels of family values and marital stability were higher than the medians. The factors affecting marital stability in middle-aged couples were identified to be family relationship stress, financial stress, subjective economic status, family values, stress related to work-familycompatibility,religion,andage.Thedegreeofmaritalstabilitywashigherinmiddle-agedcouplesa stheirstresslevelsfromfamilyrelationshipsandfinancialproblemswerelower.Moreover,thehigherthes ubjectiveeconomicstatusandthemoretraditionalthefamilyvalues,thehigherthedegreeofmaritalstabili ty.Finally,marriedcoupleswhowerereligioushadalowerlevelofstressfromwork-family compatibility, and the younger the couples, the higher the degree of marital stability.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.122-129
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• 2008

The purpose of this work was to investigate the synergically bactericidal effects and cellular responses of green tea polyphenols (TPPs) and nalidixic acid (NA) on nalidixic acid-resistant (NAR) Salmonella typhimurium. The bactericidal activities of $>3,500{\mu}g/ml$ TPPs and $<256{\mu}g/ml$ NA were investigated for S. typhimurium of which initial cell number was approximately adjusted to 107 cell/ml. Complete elimination of NAS-S. typhimurium was achieved within 6 hr of incubation at the concentrations of $3,500{\mu}g/ml$ TPP or $256{\mu}g/ml$ NA, whereas only partial bactericidal effect was achieved under the same conditions. However, the combinations of $3,000{\mu}g/ml$ TPPs and $32{\mu}g/ml$ NA against NAS-S. typhimurium and $3,500{\mu}g/ml$ TPPs and $64{\mu}g/ml$ nalidixic acid against NAR-S. typhimurium showed complete removal within 5 hr of incubation. The stress shock proteins (SSPs) were induced at different concentrations of TPP o rNA used as stressors against cell culture of S. typhimurium. The proteins were identified as 70-kDa DnaK and 60-kDa GroEL by SDS-PAGE and Western blot. SSPs induced by the stressors were found to increase in proportion to the TPPs or NA. Scanning electron microscopy analyses revealed the presence of perforations and irregular rod shape with wrinkled surfaces for cells treated with TPPs or NA.

• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.195-211
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• 2004

Stress is a primary health promotion issue in worksite research because psychological distress is closely related not only to workers' health status but also to their job performance. This study identified the significant health behaviors affecting workers' job-related stress in Korean manufacturing industry with the national survey data conducted by the Korean Occupational Safety and Health Agency in 2003. A total of 7,818 factory workers in 1,562 manufacturing companies participated in the Korean nation-wide occupational health survey and 3,390 workers answered that they had any stressors in their workplace among the 7,818 workers finally participated in the analysis. Participants were selected by the stratified proportional sampling process by manufacturing industry classification, company size, and company locations (8 metropolitan and 8 non-metropolitan regions) in Korea. Trained interviewers visited the target companies and interviewed the factory workers randomly selected in each company. Smoking, drinking, weight control, exercise, sleeping, break time at work, and perceived fatigue were included in the health behavior construct. Stress symptoms was consisted of physical and psychological stress with 8 items. All survey responses were anonymously coded into the SPSS statistical program and testified using stepwise multiple regression analysis. Male workers were 73.5% and the 30s were 40.0% among the age groups. The married and the high school graduate were majority with 52.1% and 61.8% each. Current smokers were 44.7% and More than 50% of the participants drank alcohol sometimes. No exercise group was 59.3% and the participants who dissatisfied with their daily sleeping hours were 43.5%. In t-test and analysis of variance, the significant general characteristics associated with physical and psychological job stress were young age (p<0.001), single marital status (p<0.001), and short working period at the present company (p<0.001). The health behaviors related to physical job stress were current smoking, weight change during the past one year (p<0.001), weight control effort (p<0.001), exercise (p<0.001), daily sleeping dissatisfaction (p<0.001), break time, and perceived fatigue (p<0.001). All 10 health behavior factors were significantly associated with psychological job stress (p<0.05). Weight change, weight control effort, exercise, daily sleeping dissatisfaction, little break at work, and high perceived fatigue were significant factors affecting job stress. Daily sleeping dissatisfaction, little break at work, little exercise, weight change for the past one year and young age were selected as the significant health behavior and general factors affecting physical job stress symptoms in stepwise multiple regression analysis. The five factors explained 18.9% of the physical stress score variance. Six factors were selected as the significant health behaviors affecting psychological job stress: daily sleeping dissatisfaction, little exercise, frequent drinking alcohol, high perceived fatigue, little break at work, and little weight control effort. The six factors explained 10.6% of the psychological stress score variance.

• Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
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• v.29
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• pp.2.1-2.7
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• 2014

Objectives Heat shock protein 90 (HSP90) is a highly conserved molecular chaperone important in the maturation of a broad spectrum of protein. In this study, an HSP90 gene was isolated from Asian paddle crab, Charybdis japonica, as a bio-indicator to monitor the marine ecosystem. Methods This work reports the responses of C. japonica HSP90 mRNA expression to cellular stress by endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs), such as bisphenol A (BPA) and 4-nonylphenol (NP) using real-time. reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. Results The deduced amino acid sequence of HSP90 from C. japonica shared a high degree of homology with their homologues in other species. In a phylogenetic analysis, C. japonica HSP90 is evolutionally related with an ortholog of the other crustacean species. The expression of HSP90 gene was almost distributed in all the examined tissues of the C. japonica crab but expression levels varied among the different body parts of the crabs. We examined HSP90 mRNA expression pattern in C. japonica crabs exposed to EDCs for various exposure times. The expression of HSP90 transcripts was significantly increased in C. japonica crabs exposed to BPA and NP at different concentrations for 12, 24, 48 and 96 hours. The mRNA expression of HSP90 gene was significantly induced in a concentration- and time-dependent manner after BPA or NP exposures for 96 hours. Conclusions Taken together, expression analysis of Asian paddle crab HSP90 gene provided useful molecular information about crab responses in stress conditions and potential ways to monitor the EDCs stressors in marine environments.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.33-37
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• 2013

Autophagy is a degradation process that acts in response to environmental stressors. Recently, autophagy has been detected in normal term, preeclamptic and intrauterine growth-restricted placentas. The object of this work was to investigate the presence of autophagy in first trimester voluntary interruption of pregnancy placental villi by the expression of autophagy-related proteins, light chain 3 (LC3), and Beclin-1. In first trimester placental villi laser scanning confocal microscopy (LSCM) analysis revealed LC3 and Beclin-1 immunoreactivity prevalently located in villous cytotrophoblasts. Using LSCM, LC3, and Beclin-1 were localized to the cytoplasm of the trophoblast layer in human full-term placentas. Beclin-1 expression and LC3 activation were confirmed by western blotting. These data emphasize that autophagy activation is different among cytotrophoblasts and syncytiotrophoblasts depending on the gestational age and thus we speculate that autophagy might play a prosurvival role throughout human pregnancy.

• Journal of Home Health Care Nursing
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.34-40
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• 2003

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the job stress in home care nurses. Method: The subjects were 139 home care nurses of hospital in an urban cities. The data were collected from 26 Man to 27 June by self report adherence questionnaire. Job stress was measured using CHN-PWRSQ(Community Health Nurses Perceptions of Work-Related Stressors Questionnaire). Result: The average score of job stress was 60.8. There were significantly high levels of job stress in those who have less than 10 years office period, those who have less than 2000000 won monthly salary than in their counterparts. With regard to the level of job stress by item, 'driving long distance and traffic jam', 'risk of traffic accident', 'bad weather condition', 'uncooperative family members', and 'uncooperative client/patient' were higher than other items. The age and office period were negatively correlated with job stress. Conclusion: The average score of job stress was 60.8. 'driving long distance and traffic jam', 'risk of traffic accident', 'bad weather condition', 'uncooperative family members', and 'uncooperative client/patient' were higher than other items. The age and office period were negatively correlated with job stress.

• Journal of Korean Home Economics Education Association
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.209-223
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• 2012

The purpose of this study is to investigate the influential factors which is related to stress among the children from marrried-immigrant families. The cultural adjustment factor explored as the most affective factor to the children from multi-cultural families. Associated stress with the cultural adjustment, stress which is related to Korean ability presented as the most problematic one. As the conflict related to internalized problems increased as the stress also increased. However, as social support increased as the degree of stress seems to be decreased. For those children, schools work as the safe place compare to the other social environment. Therefore, it would be beneficial to redirect the role and the function of schools for the children from the married-immigrnat families. Various educational opportunity, which is not limited to teach Korean and Korean culture, should be offered to the children as to improve his/her self-esteem.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.81-92
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• 2008

Musculoskeletal disorder (MSD) problems have been increasingly reported in hospital sector but the problems were not addressed with respect to holistic aspects of the target population in Korea. Often, it is required to understand how MSD symptoms are associated with factors such as personal, work environmental and psychosocial stressors. To examine features of association between sets of MSD symptoms and the factors, a questionnaire survey was conducted in a university hospital. A 140-item questionnaire was developed and used for collecting information including factors (e.g., job/occupation, task/activity, job stress) and MSD symptoms. A total of 1,091 workers (male 23.7% and female 76.3%) were finally determined for data analyses. Prevalence rate for the whole body was 72% and, among body parts, the highest was 48.7% for the shoulder, followed by 34.6%(the low back), 32.7%(the leg/foot), 27.9%(the neck), 26.7%(the wrist) and 12%(the elbow). The symptoms were significantly different by job/occupational variable in each of all body parts except the neck. The symptoms were very significantly different by task/activity variables in each of all body parts while those symptoms were significantly different by psychosocial variables, depending on body part and gender. In the logistic regression analyses performed for MSD symptoms by body part and each of 3 factors, odds ratio values varied, ranging from 0.7 to 3.3. The controls for reducing the symptoms were discussed on the basis of the findings. The results show that the MSD symptoms can remarkably vary by the factors and, in particular, can be highly differential for the task/activity factor. This study suggests that MSD symptom features be examined by using various factors and then a higher differential factor be primarily utilized for controling MSD symptoms in general industry including hospital settings.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.169-175
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• 2011

Objectives: The questionnaire of occupational stress index (OSI) has been popular in the workplace, and it has been tailored for bus drivers in Taiwan. Nevertheless, its outcomes for participants are based on self-evaluations, thus validation by their physiological stress biomarker is warranted and this is the main goal of this study. Methods: A cross-sectional study of sixty-three city bus drivers and fifty-four supporting staffs for comparison was conducted. Questionnaire surveys, 24-hour urine cortisol testing, and blood draws for dehydroepiandrosterone-sulfate (DHEA-S) testing were performed. The measured concentrations of these biological measures were logarithmically transformed before the statistical analysis where various scores of stressor factors, moderators, and stress effects of each OSI domain were analyzed by applying multiple linear regression models. Results: For drivers, the elevated 24-hour urine cortisol level was associated with a worker's relationship with their supervisor and any life change events in the most recent 3 months. The DHEA-S level was higher in drivers of younger age as well as drivers with more concerns relating to their salary and bonuses. Non-drivers showed no association between any stressor or satisfaction and urine cortisol and blood DHEA-S levels. Conclusion: Measurements of biomarkers may offer additional stress evaluations with OSI questionnaires for bus drivers. Increased DHEA-S and cortisol levels may result from stressors like income security. Prevention efforts towards occupational stress and life events and health promotional efforts for aged driver were important anti-stress remedies.