ABSTRACT
Influenced by a favorable environment, volunteer activities are integrated into medical education in the United States. Volunteer activities by medical students in hospitals are also becoming more common in Japan. With this background in mind, we performed a survey examining the nature of medical students' volunteer activities at the University of Hawaii in the United States and Saga University in Japan. By analyzing the percentages of students participating in volunteer activities and the location and content of the activities, we found that volunteer activities of medical students in Japan and the United States are strongly influenced by differences in the respective premedical education systems. We found that a premedical education that includes volunteer activities plays an important role in the United States. We suggest that further debate on premedical education that includes volunteer work is necessary for Japan to develop its own methods of medical education.
ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study was to examine factors influencing the meaning of life for middle-aged women. The subjects for the study were 190 middle- aged women who live in Busan. Data were collected from May 25 to June 20, 1999. The instruments for this study were as follows : the meaning of life scale developed by Jung D. R(1978) ; the self-esteem scale developed by Ro, E. Y, Kwon, J. H.(1997) ; the volunteer activity scale developed by Park G. J.(1999), the marital satisfaction scale developed by Choi G. Y.(1999) ; and the health status scale developed by Kim S. Y. (1991). SPSS PC+ was utilized for data analysis. Data were analysed according to frequency and percentage, mean and standard deviation, t-test, ANOVA, Sheffe's test and Pearson's correlation coefficients and stepwise multiple regression. The reliability of the tools was tested by Cronbach's aloha : and it showed reliability scores of 0.88(for the meaning of life tool), 0.81(for the self-esteem tool), 0.94(for the marital satisfaction tool) and 0.78(for the health status tool). The results were as follows: 1)The scores showed that middle-aged women had a moderate level of meaning of life, with a mean of 30.31 and standard deviation of 6.24 (with values ranging from 12.00 to 48.00). The scores showed that middle-aged women had a moderate levels of self-esteem, with a mean of 28.92 and standard deviation of 4.67 (with values ranging from 10.00 to 40.00). The scores showed that middle-aged women had a very low level of volunteer activity, with a mean of 0.87 and standard deviation of 0.93(with values ranging from 0.00 to 1.00). The scores showed that middle-aged women had a moderate level of satisfaction in their marriages, with a mean of 31.99 and standard deviation of 7.84(with values ranging from 12.00 to 48.00). The scores showed that middle-aged women had a moderate level of health status, with a mean of 6.63 and standard deviation of 1.57(with values ranging from 3.00 to 9.00). 2)There was a statistically significant difference of the meaning of life of middle-aged women according to their religion(F= 8.930, p= .000), christian (31.94+/-5.96) had more meaning th life than buddhists (28.40+/-6.23). 3)There was a statistically significant correlations between the subject's self-esteem and the her meaning of life(r=o.477, p=0.000), the subject's level of volunteer activity and meaning of life(r= .428, p= .000), her level of marital satisfaction and meaning of life(r= .417, p= .000), and her level of health status and meaning of life(r= .261, p= .000) among these middle-aged women. 4)Self-esteem was the highest factor influencing the level of meaning of life in middle-aged women. 40.0% of the total variance of levels of meaning of life by was dependent on self-esteem, volunteer activity, marital satisfaction and health status. In conclusion, the higher the self-esteem and levels of volunteer activity, marital satisfaction, and health status of middle-aged women, the higher the meaning of life for them. Therefore, it is necessary to elevate levels of the self-esteem and volunteer activity, marital satisfac -tion and health status in order to help middle -aged women have more meaning of life.