Sewol Ferry Research Articles

Home Team Effect and Opinion Network after the Sewol Ferry Disaster: A mixed-method study of the influence of symbol and feedback on liberal versus conservative newspapers’ negative opinions

Studies on the symbol and feedback effects on the opinion based on the theory are lacking. Acknowledging that the media express their stance and opinion and that negative opinions are critical to policy change, this paper fills the gap in the literature by illustrating and comparing the effects of emotional and cognitive symbols and positive and negative feedback on the liberal and conservative newspapers’ negative opinions of South Korean President Park Geun-hye’s administration (Park administration) after the Sewol Ferry sank. This study used qualitative and quantitative methods to analyze the archival data, including 424 newspaper editorials and economic data published from April to December 2014. Multiple regression analyses were conducted following a content analysis of newspaper editorials, and network analysis was used to analyze the data. The results mostly supported the hypotheses that symbols and feedback affect the negative opinion on the political discourse, with new findings that deviate from the existing theories. The emotional symbols exerted a stronger influence on the negative opinion compared to cognitive symbols, regardless of the newspaper’s stance. The political system’s response to the positive and negative feedback was not definite; instead, it varied depending on the situation and newspaper perspective. The liberal newspaper responded to symbols and feedback more sensitively compared to the conservative one under the conservative administration. The conservative newspaper expressed more lenient negative opinions towards the conservative administration than the liberal newspaper, supporting the home team effect. These findings have practical and theoretical implications for future studies, highlighting the application of opinion networks in social science.

Impact of the Sewol Ferry Disaster on Physical Changes: Focused on BMI

This study aims to empirically verify whether disasters affect physical changes, linking research on the effects of disasters on psychology and the effects of psychology on physical changes. It focused on the Sewol ferry disaster, and physical changes were tracked from 2010 to 2018, including the four years before and after the disaster in 2014. We constructed panel data on obesity rates from 229 local governments and used longitudinal data to analyze the impact of large disasters on changes in obesity rates over time. The results indicated that the Sewol Ferry Disaster had a long-term effect on the increase in obesity rate over time. In the directly affected areas of Ansan and Jindo, there was not only a long-term increase but also an immediate increase in the obesity rate. The findings of this study provide an opportunity to expand our understanding of the impact of disasters on society, and can also serve as foundational data for national and local disaster-related long-term impact support policies.

Suicidality Among Bereaved Families After the Sewol Ferry Disaster: A Longitudinal Study

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between suicidality and various mental health problems using longitudinal follow-up data in bereaved families after the Sewol ferry disaster. Data from 226 participants gathered over 7 years (2015–2021) were used. Suicidal risk was measured and mental health variables including depression, insomnia, post-traumatic embitterment disorders(PTED), complicated grief were gathered. A series of Generalized Estimating Equation models were developed to identify the factors associated with potential suicide risk among the bereaved family members of the Sewol ferry disaster. Participants with depression, clinically significant PTED, and complicated grief were associated with suicidal ideation, suicide plan, and having suicide preventive factors. Participants with prolonged PTED were also associated with suicide plan and having suicide preventive factors. The probability of having suicide ideation (from the fourth to the seventh year) and suicide preventive factors (in the fifth year) was significantly decreased compared to the first year since the disaster occurred. This study provided evidence by illuminating the long-term prognosis of suicide risk in disaster-affected families and its correlation with mental health factors. It offered a valuable insight that interventions addressing depression, PTED, and complicated grief are necessary in the long term to reduce their suicide risk.

치유공간 이웃의 세월호 유가족 돌봄 시민활동가의 간접외상 경험에 대한 자전적 내러티브 연구

This study attempted to explore the experiences that I had to go through while caring for the bereaved families of the Ferry Sewol disaster as a citizen activist, the impact of indirect trauma on life, and what the meaning of those experiences has been reconstructed. To this end, research was conducted with a narrative inquiry method. As a researcher and research participant, I did this study by looking back on my experiences by referring to a record journal, diary, and contribution containing the process of caring for the bereaved families in Ferry Sewol. As a result, based on the experiences I had while caring for the bereaved families of the Ferry Sewol disaster as a citizen activist, the indirect trauma, and the results of the analysis and interpretation obtained by looking back on the experiences, three themes were derived: “In the middle of despair”, “The boundary between blurred life and death”, and “Me who met again through death”. In the discussion, discussions on the main results of this study and suggestions for further research were presented.

The impact of coping strategies and positive resources on post-traumatic stress symptoms among bereaved families of the Sewol ferry disaster.

This study investigated the long-term prevalence of, and factors associated with, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among the bereaved families of the Sewol ferry disaster, in which 250 students lost their lives during a school excursion. Eight years after the disaster, 181 family members were surveyed, and the prevalence of clinical PTSD symptoms was estimated. The Positive Resources Test (POREST), the Duke-UNC Functional Social Support Questionnaire, and the Brief COPE were evaluated using self-report measures. The multivariable binomial logistic regression was used to identify protective and risk factors for PTSD. PTSD symptoms were present in 49.7% of the family members 8 years after the incident. A one-point increase in the score on the optimism subscale of the POREST was associated with a 20.1% decreased likelihood of having clinical PTSD symptoms (OR = 0.799; p = 0.027; 95% CI = 0.655-0.975). Conversely, a one-point increase in the score on the avoidant subscale of Brief COPE was associated with a 13.2% increased likelihood of having clinical PTSD symptoms (OR = 1.132; p = 0.041; 95% CI = 1.005-1.274). Our results provide evidence of the need for long-term mental health monitoring of bereaved families of disaster victims, along with valuable insights for the development of mental health intervention programs.

Measures to improve ship inspection system in Korea by amending administrative crime provisions of the Ship Safety Act

ABSTRACT Following the tragic sinking of the Sewol Ferry, there was a significant increase in the prosecution of criminal cases involving ship surveyors and their professional responsibilities. In 2015, the Ship Safety Act of Korea introduced new Paragraphs 13-2, 13-4, and 13-5 in Article 83. These amendments aimed to penalize individuals who engage in fraudulent or improper practices during surveys. It classified such actions as a serious offense. Accordingly, the elements of the crime of interference with business in criminal law have become less complex and easier to prove. Given that ship surveyors were already legally liable for obstructing business activities under the Criminal Act before the implementation of this provision, it is necessary to assess whether the existing legislation allows for disproportionate penalties. This study aimed to assess the validity of legislative principles, including the constitutional proportionality principle, the violation of legalism in criminal law, the limitations of dangerous criminal law, and the issue of overcriminalization. We conducted a comparative review of laws and assessed their potential impact on the industry through an online questionnaire distributed to ship surveyors and professionals in related fields. As a result, we proposed amending the related penalty provisions of the Act.

Do community-related traumatic events affect academic outcomes among adolescents? Quasi-experimental evidence from the Sewol disaster in South Korea

The sinking of the South Korean ferry Sewol in April 2014 claimed a total of 304 lives. Among the victims were 250 students from Dan-won High School in the city of Ansan and 11 of their teachers. For the residents of Ansan, the tragedy marked the beginning of widespread psychological distress and overwhelming grief. Exploiting the disaster’s quasi-experimental nature, we employ a difference-in-differences (DID) strategy to measure its impact on the academic performance of Ansan’s high school students in 5 major subjects. Using peers from Ansan’s neighboring cities as the control group, our results reveal that the disaster impaired performances particularly in mathematics and natural science, a finding that is more pronounced for female students. Our results highlight that it is of uttermost importance to provide comprehensive psychological support and interventions to traumatized students but also to the communities they live in to minimize adverse effects on educational attainment.

Collective Adaptive Responses Through Coping and Sensemaking Under Stress

This study explores adaptive response mechanisms as an appraisal of confronted stress through people’s activities of sending and receiving tweets with other Twitter users to share their thoughts, opinions or information on responses to a man-made disaster. We propose a model with a theoretical integration that represents the varying relations between stress and individuals’ responses over time. Using Twitter data from April 16, 2014, on the Sewol ferry disaster in Korea, our study found that the development of the collective response was characterized by individuals’ recurrent attempts to make sense of the causes and outcomes of an unexpected event in terms of time-dependent flows during the occurrence of the event. Collective sensemaking recurred when people could not make sense of the causes and results of unexpected events to facilitate the coping process. Our model provides insights into when and how a trigger event such as a disaster influences the development of shared collective response patterns.

Parents’ lived experiences of losing adolescent children in the Korean Ferry Sewol disaster: Lessons through a qualitative meta-synthesis

This study meta-synthesized qualitative studies on the parents’ experiences of losing their adolescent children due to the human-made disaster, Ferry Sewol disaster in Korea, 2014. Five Korean and five international electronic databases were searched. Twenty-one studies were selected and critically appraised. Thematic analysis was employed. Four themes (with 10 subthemes) were derived: screaming in excruciating pain at the unbelievable deaths of children, family love evolving amidst pain and deepening into higher value, relationships collapsed and reformed while experiencing various social perspectives, and transitioning from a life of holding on to a life of progress. Bereaved parents experience psychological, physical, social pain for a long time, but gradually tried not to waste their children’s death, forming new values and life goals. There is pressing need to devise sustained recovery strategies that account for distinct characteristics and needs of affected population groups.

Performing memory and testimony after a national disaster: the Sewol mothers in Talking about Her (2016), VEGA (2016), and His and Her Closet (2016)

ABSTRACT In response to the Sewol Ferry disaster and mishandling of the South Korean government, Korean activists and artists mobilized collaboration with the victims’ families to produce activist theatre productions that center not only the trauma of those most affected by the disaster but also their lived experiences and wishes, especially those of the mothers. Furthermore, the performance community has come to include and represent the mothers not only as victims but as active participants whose grief is transmuted through performance into political activism. Combining tools of active viewing and participant observation, this article examines three of these works—Talking about Her (2016a) and VEGA (Jaguar 2016), which are performance pieces adapted from testimonies by the mothers, and Yellow Ribbon’s first performance, His and Her Closet (2016b). This article focuses on the ways these works, through utilizing the memories and testimonies of the mothers, have come to constitute a kind of collaborative public counter-memory against state cover-ups and unempathetic accounts, centering demands for change in commemoration practices and transforming the meaning of Sewol into a catalyst for political and social change.

재난대응의 단순화 방안에 관한 연구

On October 29, 2022, when the end of the long social distancing that began with COVID-19 was visible, we again looked at the terrible reality that we did not want to face in South Korea. We must pay attention to the fact that it was a disaster that could be sufficiently prevented and managed regardless of cause and effect. In the meantime, Korea has been through various social disasters that can't be found in the world. Things like the collapse of Sampoong Department Store, the Daegu subway disaster, and the Sewol ferry disaster, all of which are difficult to enumerate. At that time, we have prepared laws and systems and reorganized the organization to prevent such absurd disasters from happening again. A manual for numerous disaster response was also created, and an education and training system was prepared to compare with the past. But in the end, the disaster that could have been prevented happened again. Rather than making something new and hasty, we need to take time to really seriously look at what is the problem and what needs to be changed.
 In the meantime, we have looked at disasters too fragmentarily only by their scale. Disasters have multiple sides. In particular, disasters in modernized societies are quite complex and require the intervention of various administrative agencies and social personnel. Even if you don't, you need to think about whether it's right to create an additional manual again in a complicated and too diverse manual. Now, the manual should be simplified based on authority and responsibility. It should not happen to study manuals at disaster sites where 1 minute 1 second is urgent.
 The existing legal system, which is divided into natural and social disasters, also needs to be overhauled. While talking about the importance of complex disasters, maintaining a legal system that requires response organizations to move separately is inevitably defenseless against various multiple and complex disasters that will occur in the future. The goal should not be to figure out the number of victims at the disaster site and prepare a recovery headquarters, but to prevent more victims from occurring.

From Witnessing to Redress: Objects, Remnants, and Wreckage after the Sewol

Abstracts: On April 16, 2014, the Sewol Ferry capsized off the southwestern coast of South Korea, killing 304 people, including 250 high school students. The incident traumatized Koreans, who helplessly watched the capsized ferry sink on live news. The Korean government's (mis)handling of the disaster and its aftermaths made the sinking of the Sewol Ferry the most galvanizing event in contemporary South Korean history. In the wake of the Sewol, activists and artists created memorials in honor of the victims—or rather their absence—as well as their loved ones who remember them. Using critical scholarship from memory studies and performance studies with ethnographic methodologies, this essay explores three of these works, combining tools of close reading and participant observation. In analyzing the three works, I focus on their strategic use of physical objects belonging to victims or their loved ones—namely, childhood artifacts, a blanket, and a bus. Through these objects, activists and artists go beyond an invitation to witness the Sewol and its tragic aftermaths; rather, they index the sustained nature of loss as well as critique the persistence of government malfeasance and unaccountability. Ultimately, I theorize the three case studies as activist performances that animate the material remains of disaster in the service of materializing truth and redress.

실내수영장 안전규정과 안전성과와의 관계에서 지각된 위험 및 안전실천행동의 다중 병렬 매개효과

After the Ferry Sewol accident in 2014, interest in survival swimming has increased, and swimming, an underwater activity, is one of the basic sports events, and there is a healthy sports culture as well as elite sports. Most of the swimming experiences experience exercise through lectures and lectures by leaders, and at the same time, they receive education such as safety knowledge related to swimming. Nevertheless, there are many accidents in indoor swimming pools. This study aimed to analyze the multiple parallel mediating effects of perceived risk and safety practices in the relationship between safety regulation and safety performance of swimming pools for indoor swimming education managers and leaders. The survey for analysis was conducted for 15 days from February 1 to February 15, 2023, and data from 172 people obtained through online surveys were used for analysis. The SPSS 25ver, PROCESS macro for SPSS, and AMOS 22ver programs were used, and model analysis of PROCESS macro 4 was conducted to derive multiple parallel mediating effect results along with preliminary analysis such as reliability analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, frequency analysis, technical statistical analysis, and correlation analysis. As a result of the analysis, the mediating effect of safety practice behavior was significant in the relationship between safety regulations and safety performance, and the mediating effect of perceived risk was not significant. In other words, it was confirmed that in order to increase safety performance, safety performance can be improved by preparing regulation that can lead to practical actions rather than simply guidelines that can increase the level of awareness of risks. Based on these results, implications such as the need to introduce a system that enables continuous monitoring of safety regulation in the sports field and the need to establish strategic safety regulations to enhance practical behavior were suggested. In addition, the direction of the follow-up study was also presented, reflecting the need to discuss in-depth experience and awareness of safety through a qualitative approach, not limited to safety managers and leaders, but to include actual trainees in the analysis.

재난을 표상하기, 그리하여 재난을 정치화하기

This article aims to analyze the political conflict over disasters in Korean society from a cultural-political perspective. The term “cultural politics” refers to the political work of defining the meaning of events such as disasters through the specific construction of representations such as symbols, narratives, images, and speech, and in doing so, regulating or reconstructing the public's sense of such events. Through Rancière's concepts of policing and politics, this article aims to identify how the political is performed at the level of the sensible. Furthermore, I will analyze the operation of policing in the formation of the public sense of disaster in Korean society through the concept of disaster narrative, focusing on the Sewol ferry disaster. I will then discuss how the Safe Society Movement, which challenges the work of policing in regulating the sense of disaster, has politicized the sense of disaster by constructing alternative representations. Finally, I will clarify the meaning of cultural politics through this interpretive research work.

Communal Mourning and Contemporary Elegy in Korean Poetry

Abstract An extended period of public mourning followed the 2014 Sewol Ferry disaster, one of South Korea’s largest maritime disasters which resulted in over three hundred passenger deaths. This article examines leading contemporary South Korean poet Kim Hyesoon’s narration of collective trauma in her elegy for the dead, Chugŭmŭi chasajŏn (Autobiography of Death, 2016). Drawing on the oral tradition, particularly the songs of female shamans, Kim facilitates a radical empathy with which her speaker enters the physical bodies of the dead and invokes their spirits. Kim’s polyvocal speaker traverses historical memory to excavate these deaths: Autobiography of Death connects the recent loss of life involved in the sinking of the Sewol Ferry with the structural injustice experienced by dissidents who were killed during South Korea’s democratization movement. I argue that Kim places her elegy in the public sphere by engaging the embodied memory of individuals to voice the transhistorical grief of the Korean community.

수영지도자 자격 운영체계 선진사례 비교 연구 : 일본, 호주, 미국을 중심으로

Considering the case of swimming instructors in Korea, the structure nor the certificates of trusted instructors in the Korea Swimming Federation are composed. Policies of Childhood Swimming Education and Survival Swimming Education have taken its place since the Sewol Ferry incident; however, standardized and systematic educational operating systems and programs are being required today. Study intentions are to extract practical implications through analyzing cases of swimming instructor education management systems in developed countries abroad. This study utilizes the literature analysis method to present implications for the Korean swimming instructor education system through comparison and analysis of cases of swimming instructor education in countries such as the United States, Japan, and Australia. Results show that first, education of swimming instructors in foreign countries advanced in swimming is conducted through selected federations or control towers. Second, qualifications of leaders in foreign countries are divided into different areas such as daily sports- which includes school sports, and swimming guidance for fostering elite swimmers. For each purpose, leaders are educated, fostered, and interconnected. Last, each instructor is classified and graded based on teaching level and target, then creating a suitable curriculum of scientific theory and practice for each educational purpose to promote the effectiveness of qualification education.

일본에서의 ｢경비업법｣개정 및 ‘혼잡경비’ 업무검정의 신설에 대한 일고찰

On October 29, 2022, at around 22:15, a large-scale crushing accident occurred in Itaewon, Yongsan-gu, Seoul, with a crowd of 100,000 gathered ahead of the Halloween festival. This accident is the largest human-caused accident in Korea since the sinking of the Sewol ferry in 2014, and the first recorded since the collapse of Sampoong Department Store in 1995 in which 502 people died in a large-scale disaster in downtown Seoul. In the process of investigation by the Special Investigation Headquarters, it is pointed out that the police's poor response made the accident bigger as the cause of the Itaewon disaster. However, on July 21, 2001, from 20:45 to 50 p.m., 11 people suffered from acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) due to full body compression on the Asagiri Pedestrian Bridge in Akashi City, Hyogo Prefecture, Japan. A large-scale accident occurred in which 183 people were killed or injured. Japan has experienced many legal and social changes, such as the revision of the “Guard Service Act” and the establishment of a new “congestion guard” work test, in the wake of the stampede accident. In this paper, the background of Japan's 'Akashi Fireworks Festival Overpass Accident', the cause of the accident, the judgment of the court, and the resulting legal and social changes were examined to examine the implications for Korea.

해양 수색구조 정보전달체계 개선 방안

From after the sinking of the Sewol ferry in 2014, ship accidents such as the sinking of small fishing boats have continued, leading to casualties. If the information delivery system is strengthened during the maritime search and rescue process after a ship accident, the loss of life will be reduced. The first way to strengthen maritime search and rescue information delivery systems is to use drones. When using drones, the search video can be shared in real time, and command-and-rescue operations can be effective. The second is the placement of VHF radio facilities. When the VHF radio station is installed in the general situation room in the Regional Headquarters of Korea Coast Guard, direct communication with the ship will be possible if necessary. Finally, it is suggested that the control of coastal passenger ships be expanded during the entire voyage from departure to arrival. Currently, however, passenger ships are controlled only within the vessel traffic service control area. If this information delivery system is improved, large-scale human casualties can be prevented.

예술 실천을 통한 세월호 참사의 기억 운동 - ‘세월호 연극제’를 중심으로 -

세월호 참사 이후 유가족, 활동가, 예술가 등 다양한 주체들이 연대하여 기억 운동 실천을 이어가고 있다. 특히 예술가들은 세월호 참사가 품은 개인적, 사회적 고통을 집단적 차원에서 해석하며 적극적인 기억 행위를 실천하고 있다. 본 연구는 ‘세월호 연극제’를 사례로 예술가가 사회적 참사를 기억하는 과정을 분석하고, 예술가의 사회 참여라는 ‘예술적 수행성’이 갖고 있는 ‘사회적인 것(the social)의 의미’를 시민사회의 맥락에서 탐구한다. 본 연구는 참사 이후 세월호 연극제의 전개 양상을 시기별로 살펴보고, 사회적 참사에 대한 기억투쟁과 예술 실천이 교차하는 ‘수행성’의 사회적 의미를 고찰한다. 특별히 사회적 참사의 기억 안에서 양립해 온 고통의 서사화와 트라우마의 ‘재현 불-가능성’이라는 이중적 문제가 예술가들에게 어떠한 의미로 구성되고 있는지 분석한다. 본 연구는 ‘참여행동연구’를 활용하며 연구 사례에 관한 ‘문헌 분석’과 연극제 참여자 6인과 ‘심층 인터뷰’를 실행하였다. 연구 결과, 세월호 연극제는 세월호 참사의 진상규명 활동, 검열과 미투 운동 등 예술계 내외부의 현안을 통과하며 시기별 변곡점을 맞았다. 참여자들의 예술 실천은 예술장(field) 내의 상징투쟁으로 국한되지 않았고, 예술가들은 작업의 미학적 자아와 시민적 주체를 오가며 ‘사회적인 것’과 ‘도덕적 보편성’의 의미를 성찰하였다. 또한 본 연구는 예술가들이 작업 안에서 고통의 ‘재현 불-가능성’을 마주하면서도 이를 문화적 기억으로 이행하기 위해 다양한 예술적 형식을 모색해 왔음을 살펴보았다.

A Systematic Review on Studies School Safety Education in Korea

This study was examined research trends in Korea on school safety education through a systematic literature review method to analyze the tasks and development directions of school safety education. The related literature search was conducted utilizing database from January 1, 2010 to February 1, 2021. By combining school safety-related terms, the final 81 documents were selected through systematic review process of PRISMA. The results showed that the predominant research type on school safety education was the qualitative research (41%). Next research type was quantitative research (33%). It is need to activate quantitative research since it can objectively explain the necessity and direction of school safety education. The research on school safety education has increased rapidly after the Sewol ferry accident. After showing the most activation at 23% in 2017, the research on school safety education declined gradually. The research on school safety education are sensitively linked to social issues such as society's interest in safety and the needs of members of society. It is need to support research reflecting teachers' opinions since there are few studies in which teachers participated.