KIHASA has published this year’s September issue of Health and Welfare Forum, No. 299 with a focus on “promoting women’s health by raising their healthy activity levels.”

Foreword: "Women's healthy behaviors and health promotion," by Park Hyun-young, Head, Future Medical Research Department, National Institute of Health

Article I: "Women's Dietary Problems over the Life Course," by Choi Seul Ki, KIHASA

This paper examines the dietary problems of Korean women and suggests policy actions for women's healthy diets. Dietary intake during the entire life, including nutritional status before birth, affects a woman's health. Thus dietary management is necessary for optimal nutrient intake throughout the life course. Inadequate nutrient intake is more prevalent in Korean women than in men. Korean women's dietary problems are: nutritional imbalance due to body image perception and consumption of convenience foods among female adolescents, difficulties in managing the diet of young women, nutritional imbalance in adult women, and poor dietary quality in elderly women. In order to improve the nutritional status of women, it is suggested to consider women’s life-course nutritional problems as a policy target.

Article II: "The Types and Levels of Physical Activity in Adolescent Girls," by Lee Nagyeong, KIHASA

Physical activity in adolescence is important that it affects not only physical and mental health in adolescence, but also health behaviors and chronic disease in adulthood. To understand the physical activity of adolescent girls, this article analyzed differences in physical activity between adolescent girls and boys. Adolescent girls had lower rates of physical activity than adolescent boys, and there was a large difference between girls and boys, especially in muscle strengthening exercise. In terms of the types of exercise experienced in adolescence, girls participated in many daily sports such as walking, jumping rope, and hula hooping, while boys participated in team sports such as soccer, futsal, foot volleyball, and basketball. Policy efforts such as activating school sports are needed to encourage physical activities of girls and to enable them to experience various physical exercises from an early age.

Article III: "Preparation for Health in Old Age Through Healthy Behaviors," by Park Eunja, KIHASA

Concerns for healthy aging have recently increased. This paper analyzed preparation for health in old age using data from a 2019 survey of preparation for old age. Forty three percent of women who participated in the survey were in good health and practicing health behaviors, while 17.4% were in good health and not practicing healthy behaviors. The proportion of women who were in ill and not practicing unhealthy behaviors was 22.2%. Moreover, nearly a third of women answered that they did not exercise regularly. Active physical activity is required not only for old women but also for middle-aged women considering the postmenopausal cardiovascular disease risk and the risk for falls in old age.

Article IV: "Body Image Distortion and Appearance Management Behaviors in Women and Their Policy Implications," by Kim Dongsik, Korean Women's Development Institute

In this paper, we analyze the differences between male and female body image distortion and appearance management behaviors. Women have a lower obesity rate than men, but the distortion rate of their physical images are relatively high. In particular, women in their teens and 20s have a very high rate of body image distortion, and among women with excessive distortion, the proportions of unhealthy behaviors and cosmetic surgery to manage their appearance management are the highest. It is confirmed that such body image distortion and unhealthy appearance management behaviors are attributed to the pressure and standards on the appearance of women in our society. The results of this analysis suggest that the government should strengthen policies in various fields to raise positive perception of women's appearance and eradicate discrimination against women's appearance that deviates from social standards.