Elderly Korean Immigrants Research Articles

The Effects of the U.S. Public Welfare System Upon Elderly Korean Immigrants' Independent Living Arrangements

ABSTRACT Elderly Korean persons who immigrated to the United States often live in a situation coined ‘multiple jeopardy’ (being old, poor, and minority; having low educational attainment, language problems, and cultural differences). Contrary to the assumption that Asian elders often live with their adult children, these elderly tend to live separately, thus ignoring their traditional custom of intergenerational co-residence. Consequently, the lives of these elderly are dramatically different from their peers in Korea where the tradition of filial piety is still prevalent. This divergence of customs for elderly Korean Americans living in the United States has given rise to our research. Based on a review of the findings of three studies about elderly Korean immigrants, we discuss major factors influencing their decisions to live separately from their adult children. The results of this review show that public welfare programs are a major factor associated with their preference for more independent lifestyles.

Health-promoting behaviors of elderly korean immigrants in the United States.

The purpose of this study was to explore health-promoting behaviors among elderly Korean immigrants, and to examine the relationships of their health-promoting behaviors with self-efficacy and perceived health status. One hundred ten elderly Korean immigrants residing in the United States were interviewed using a structured questionnaire. The mean score of health promoting behaviors of elderly Korean immigrants was 2.54 on the 5-point Likert scale. Nutrition was the subdomain with the highest mean score (M=3.01) and exercise was the subdomain with the lowest mean score (M=1.92). Both self-efficacy (r=0.49, p=0.01) and perceived health status (r=0.19, p=0.043) were significantly related to health-promoting behaviors. Education (F=3.61, p=0.016) and economic status (F=3.01, p=0.034) were significantly associated with health-promoting behaviors. This study showed poor practices of healthy lifestyles of elderly Korean immigrants. Low exercise scores indicated the need for community based exercise and health promotion programs for the elderly Korean immigrants population.

Book Review: Virtuous Transcendence: Holistic Self-Cultivation and Self-Healing in Elderly Korean Immigrants

Book Review: Virtuous Transcendence: Holistic Self-Cultivation and Self-Healing in Elderly Korean Immigrants

The use of traditional and Western medicine among Korean American elderly.

With the current wave of Asian immigration to the United States, awareness of their use of traditional medicine, often in combination with Western medicine, is an increasingly salient issue for health care professionals. This paper describes the use of traditional and Western medicine by Korean American elderly and factors that are associated with their health-seeking behaviors and health service utilization. Data were obtained from a convenience sample of 205 Korean elderly immigrants through interview. The findings revealed that health service utilization among Korean American elderly covered a broad spectrum of health resources, including the use of Western medicine, the traditional Korean medicine (hanbang), or both Western and traditional clinics. In addition, health insurance status and the source of health care were found to relate to the types of health service that Korean American elderly chose to utilize. Better understanding of patterns of health service utilization may improve the quality of health care by increasing health providers' cultural sensitivity and facilitating adequate communication between Asian immigrant clients and their care providers. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Stress, Coping, and Depression Among Elderly Korean Immigrants

Summary The effects of life stresses and social support on depressive symptoms in older Korean Americans (n = 67), recruited at senior centers and meal sites, were examined. Those who reported poorer health, who had more stressful life events, who were dissatisfied with help received from family members, and who reported few good friends were more likely to be depressed than those who did not. The impact of these factors on the quality of life of elderly Korean immigrants can be understood in the context of their immigration experience and Korean cultural values.

Symptom Expression and Somatization Among Elderly Korean Immigrants

In a study of expression of symptoms of somatization, depression, and other biopsychological conditions, 70 elderly Korean immigrants in the greater Washington, D.C., metropolitan area (35 who met the criteria for major depression and 35 who did not meet those criteria) were administered a Korean version of the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI). Subjects who met the criteria for depression had the highest mean score on the BSI somatization dimension compared with other normative samples including a sample of psychiatric inpatients. A factor analysis of data from the BSI showed that for elderly Korean immigrants, a factor of somatization was identified that included the items from the original BSI obsessive-compulsive, somatization, and anxiety dimensions. Items loading on the somatization factor suggest that elderly Korean subjects experience body and mind as a unitary system and tend to communicate the distress associated with old age, cultural adjustment, and family and social changes through somatic symptoms.

Predictors of loneliness in elderly Korean immigrant women living in the United States of America.

The purpose of this study was to examine the predictors of loneliness in elderly Korean immigrant women. The sample was derived from a larger study designed to examine loneliness in elderly Korean immigrants. Subjects were 110 elderly Korean immigrant women who were at least 60 years of age and lived in a large metropolitan city area in the United States of America. Data were collected by telephone interview using the Revised University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Loneliness Scale (RULS), Social Support Questionnaire, Ethnic Attachment Questionnaire and Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (ADL) Scale. Measures were prepared using translation and back-translation procedures. Results indicate that elderly Korean immigrant women were more lonely than those found in other studies. Satisfaction with social support, social network size, ethnic attachment and functional status were predictive variables of loneliness. Satisfaction with social support was the largest predictor of loneliness in elderly Korean women. Marital status was not a predictor of loneliness.

Construction of Korean Popular Illnesses: A Qualitative Analysis of Han, Hwabyung, and Shingyungshayak among Korean Immigrants

Han, hwabyung, and shingyungshayak are the idioms that seem to represent explanatory models and semantic networks of depression among Korean elderly immigrants in Washington. Labeling with these illnesses is an efficient way of communicating with significant others who share the same holistic biosociocultural perspective. Labeling with Korean popular illnesses serves as an evaluating and diagnosing process of one's life based on life review. This type of reminiscence functions as a life-healing process among Korean elders who believe they can endure and overcome adversity by studying and applying principles of human nature, the natural world, and the universe. To attain harmony within the self and with others, they practice noonchi (thinking and feeling out what others feel and think), chenyom (right thinking), chemyun (face-saving), and confiding in others. They also find nature walks, music, and a sensible diet to be helpful—these conform to the Korean cultural orientation toward nature, religion, and spiritual matters.

Causes of Dysphoric Experiences Among Elderly Korean Immigrants

ABSTRACT Causes of depression among elderly Korean immigrants are examined in relation to their meaning to the individuals and their sociocultural traditions. The most common causes of depression mentioned are death of family members, past marital problems, concerns about their children, financial problems, and health problems. Depression is seen as causing health problems or making them worse. Self-care appears to be the main coping mechanism. Some informants gave Korean folk illnesses as causes of depression. The multidimensional dynamics of depression are discussed in light of cultural factors.

Self-care strategy of elderly Korean immigrants in the Washington DC Metropolitan Area

The elderly Korean immigrants in the Greater Washington, DC Metropolitan Area use emotional self-care practices to counteract sad and depressive experiences. They tend not to use professional medical help and/or prescription medicine. Their choice of a self-care mental health strategy is a function of several sociocultural and historical factors: the Korean concept of self, life-long caring role, concepts of a morally exemplary emotional life, religious and cosmological beliefs, beliefs about depression and mental illness, systematic and holistic medical principles, political and social upheavals in Korea. Additional factors include the challenge of transition and immigration to a new culture and country, the USA, with its lack of available resources for the immigrants, such as time with their adult children, lower socioeconomic status, language facility, and transportation. Specific self-prescribed self-care strategies for depression include cognitive strategies, religious strategies, physical strategies, social strategies, and artistic strategies.

Social support and depression among elderly Korean immigrants in the United States.

Based on the integrative concept of social support, we investigated the effects of quantitative, structural, and functional aspects of social relationships on the level of depressive symptoms among elderly Korean immigrants, taking into account their level of acculturation and life stress. Korean elders having more close persons and more frequent contacts with them exhibited fewer depressive symptoms. Networks providing instrumental support consisted mainly of family ties; networks for emotional support included diverse relationships as well as family members. Emotional support was found to moderate the harmful effect of life stress, and thus to be more relevant than instrumental support to the mental health of Korean elderly.

A Cross-Cultural Understanding of Depression Among Elderly Korean Immigrants

In the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, both the DIS-III and Lee's version of the DIS-III, modified for Koreans living in Korea, were administered to 674 elderly Korean immigrants. Subsequently, a semi-structured interview guide for depression, with open-ended questions designed explicitly for Korean immigrants, was administered to 34 of the people judged to be depressed under the Korean DIS-III and 35 people randomly selected from the group that scored as not depressed under the Korean DIS-III. With the DIS-III, the lifetime prevalence rate for these immigrants was 7.12%; with Lee's modified version, the rate rose to 8.31%. The semi-structured interview guide for depression, however, showed loneliness, sadness, and somatic symptoms among both groups of people, those judged depressed and those judged not depressed. Clinicians working with elderly Korean immigrants consequently are advised to ask questions that specifically focus on loneliness, family harmony, health problems and popular Korean illnesses before ruling out depression.

Understanding Depression among Elderly Korean Immigrants through Their Folk Illnesses

Twenty‐four elderly Korean immigrants living in the Washington, DC, area were interviewed to explore their conceptualization of depression and its relationship to the Korean folk illnesses han, hwabyung, and shinggyongshaeyak. Informants perceived depression as a mood, but not as a serious illness except when it was related to the folk illnesses. Informants did not associate physical complaints with depression, which they saw as subject to control by the sufferer's will. Clinicians who recognize similarities between the folk illnesses and depression may be able to help Korean immigrant clients recognize that depressive affect may be a sign of illness that can be treated by medical professionals.

Prevalence of depression and somatic symptoms among Korean elderly immigrants.

Forty-one Korean immigrants in Washington, D.C. (of the United States) metropolitan area over age 60 were interviewed using the Diagnostic Interview Schedule (Korean version) with additional questions about culture-specific somatic symptoms identified in previous research with Korean populations. The lifetime and current prevalence were 29.27 percent and 14.63 percent, respectively, for major depression; 9.76 percent and 2.44 percent for generalized anxiety disorder; and 9.76 percent and 7.32 percent for somatization disorder. The lifetime and current rates of co-occurrence of major depression and somatization disorder were 25 percent and 33.33 percent. Subjects who met criteria for depression were more likely to experience culture-specific Korean somatic symptoms than subjects who did not meet those criteria.

Hwabyung: The construction of a korean popular illness among korean elderly immigrant women in the United States

The cultural construction of Hwabyung, a Korean culture-bound syndrome, is explored among a sample of 20 elderly Korean immigrant women in the United States. Hwabyung results when distressed emotions associated with the specifically Korean way of perceiving and reacting to intolerable and tragic life situations cause bodily symptoms by interfering with the harmony of "Ki" (vital energy). Korean elderly immigrants report a broad range of symptoms associated with Hwabyung; they less frequently report the epigastric mass, which had been considered the cardinal symptom by cosmopolitan and traditional medical writers. Hwabyung is treated holistically with psychosocial support from family, spiritual comfort, home and popular remedies, traditional Korean medicine, and biomedical treatments. Hwabyung provides a way of conceptualizing and resolving emotional distress through somatization among Korean elderly immigrant women.