A Study on the Koreans’ Perception of ‘Honesty’ Using Concept Mapping Analysis
AUTHOR : 장희선
INFORMATION : page. 49~73 / 2015 Vol.22 No.2
ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study was to examine how Koreans conceptualize honesty and whether there are
the difference about they think the sub-concept of honesty according to age, gender. Participants
consisted of 1,091 people, ranging from primary school students to adults. A free-listing survey was
conducted to find out their perceptions of honesty, and the collected qualitative data was analyzed
using a ‘Concept Mapping’ methodology. As a result, 5 categories were identified, there was a
difference in the weight of honesty perception among different age groups. First, honesty as
recognized by Koreans was classified into the five categories of ‘truthfulness’, ‘lawfulness’,
‘faithfulness’, ‘righteousness’, and ‘principledness’. Second, all age groups valued ‘truthfulness’ the
most. Third, particularly, the higher the age, the more the subjects tended to emphasize
‘principledness’; the lower the age, the more they tended to stress ‘lawfulness’. Forth, in terms of
gender differences, males placed more importance on ‘faithfulness’ while females placed more
importance on ‘truthfulness’. This study makes up for the lack of empirical evidence in the existing
Korean literature on honesty. It can also lead to a new direction of moral education by providing
empirical resources on the analyzed perception of honesty.