The Mother–Daughter Relationship as a Resource for Korean Women's Career Aspirations

Korean college women's career aspirations were examined among 482 Korean college women in South Korea. The inability of women to envision themselves in a career has been largely attributed to formal education that perpetuates gender inequality. As such, this study investigated the inter-relationships between external factors (school experiences and peer influences) and internal factors (maternal influences with the mother–daughter relationship) in Korean women's development of self-perception and in the significance of their sex-role behaviors (career orientation and feminist identification). The structural equation model (SEM) utilized in this study revealed that Korean women's career orientation was determined directly by their nontraditional sex-role attitudes and by a close, continuous, and satisfactory relationship with their mothers. Overall, maternal influences on the development of daughters' career orientation outweigh other factors encountered in schools, and emerge as key predictor variables in Korean women's career development.     

The integrated model of smartphone adoption: hedonic and utilitarian value perceptions of smartphones among korean college students

Abstract This study aims to propose an integrated model of smartphone adoption that incorporates social influences (SIs), perceived technicality, as well as hedonic and utilitarian attitudes into the technology acceptance model. The proposed model was empirically evaluated by using survey data collected from 239 Korean college students to investigate their perception and attitudes toward smartphone adoption intention. Our results show that users' attitudes and their adoption intention are highly influenced by SI and positive self-image. This implies that a smartphone is a symbolic product that can signal affiliation and enhance the users' status in a group. The results also indicate that hedonic enjoyment is equally important as utilitarian usefulness in predicting the adoption intention, and the two variables mediate the relationships between SI, positive self-image, perceived technicality, and the intention to use. Consequently, the results reveal that smartphones are convergent media that can be viewed as both task-oriented and entertainment-oriented devices.     

Social implications of smartphone use: korean college students' smartphone use and psychological well-being

Abstract The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between motives of smartphone use, social relation, and psychological well-being. The correlation analysis shows that the motives of smartphone use were positively related to bonding relations but negatively related to bridging relations. The hierarchical multiple regression analysis finds the associations among motives of smartphone use, social relations, perceived social support, and variables of psychological well-being. The results demonstrate that needs for caring for others were negatively related to loneliness and depression and positively related to self-esteem. However, the communication motives are not a significant predictor to determine self-esteem, loneliness, and depression. In addition, bonding and bridging social relations and social support significantly increase self-esteem and decrease loneliness and depression.     

How consumers “see” a visually warm store: Differences between affective and cognitive processors

Store atmosphere can influence shoppers' perceptions and behaviors. This research contributes to the literature by showing that a visually warm store atmosphere can induce psychological warmth perception among in‐store consumers. An empirical study was conducted to investigate the effect of warmth through a visually warm or cold store atmosphere on consumers' perceptions/behaviors and the moderating role of consumers' processing styles. Results (N = 181) showed that a visually warm (vs. cold) atmosphere induces the perception of intimacy toward the store among affective processors and the perception of assortment similarity among cognitive processors. Such perceptions were found to mediate the effect of the visually warm atmosphere on consumers' approach behaviors toward the store. Based on the grounded cognition theory, this study extends the current knowledge of the warmth experience on psychological perceptions to a retail context. Findings not only contribute to the extant literature of store atmospherics and retailing but they also offer practical guidelines for retailers and designers of store environments.