The Understandings of Happiness and Its Condition among Children, Adolescents, and Their Mothers
AUTHOR : 유미숙,차지량,정계숙
INFORMATION : page. 81~104 / 2013 Vol.20 No.4
ABSTRACT
This study explored children’s and adolescents’ understandings of happiness and the conditions of it||| and
it further examined how their own understandings of happiness differed from their mothers’ perspectives.
The survey data were collected from 452 elementary school-level children (213 boys||| 239 girls) and their
mothers||| as well as from 257 junior high and high school students (214 boys||| 42 girls) and their
mothers||| from both Busan Metropolitan City and Yangsan City. Means and paired t-tests were performed.
The results indicated that both children and their mothers agreed that happiness was most positively
related to ‘self-development and goal-orientation’ as well as adolescent-mother pairs||| and it was least
positively related to ‘health and looks’. They believed that ‘positive emotions’ was the most important
factor in happiness||| while ‘health and looks’ and ‘social relationships’ were the least important factors.
Additionally||| adolescents and their mothers agreed that happiness was least positively related to ‘social
status and acknowledgement’. Adolescent-mother pairs exhibited some disagreement in terms of the
importance of ‘school adjustment’ as well as child-mother pairs. Lastly||| they believed that ‘self-development
and goal-orientation’ was the most important factor in happiness||| while ‘religion’ and ‘health and looks’
were the least important factors.