Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Clin Cases. Jul 26, 2023; 11(21): 5097-5107
Published online Jul 26, 2023. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v11.i21.5097
Time usage analysis and satisfaction comparison by occupational area according to the sex of single-parent families
Woo-Hyuk Jang, Jong-Sik Jang, Jin-Hyuk Bang
Woo-Hyuk Jang, Jong-Sik Jang, Jin-Hyuk Bang, Department of Occupational Therapy, College of Health Science, Kangwon National University, Samcheok-si 25949, Gangwon-do, South Korea
Author contributions: Jang WH was the guarantor and designed the study; Bang JH participated in the acquisition, analysis, interpretation of the data, and drafted the initial manuscript; Jang WH and Jang JS revised the article critically for important intellectual content; all authors have read and approved the final manuscript.
Institutional review board statement: The study was reviewed and approved by the Kangwon National Institutional Review Board (Approval No. KWNUIRB-2021-07-002).
Informed consent statement: Patients were not required to give informed consent to the study because the analysis used anonymous clinical data that were obtained after each patient agreed to treatment by written consent.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors declare having no conflicts of interest.
Data sharing statement: All data are available on reasonable request from the corresponding author.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement—checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement—checklist of items.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Jin-Hyuk Bang, Master's Student, Department of Occupational Therapy, College of Health Science, Kangwon National University, 346 Hwangjo-gil, Dogye-eup, Samcheok-si 25949, Gangwon-do, South Korea. lyote@naver.com
Received: March 17, 2023
Peer-review started: March 17, 2023
First decision: May 12, 2023
Revised: March 23, 2023
Accepted: July 3, 2023
Article in press: July 3, 2023
Published online: July 26, 2023
Processing time: 131 Days and 23.6 Hours
Abstract
BACKGROUND

Single-parent families are burdened with dual roles as parents amidst economic poverty due to the lack of a spouse. Single parents also face the complications of time poverty.

AIM

To examine the time use of single-parent families by dividing their time into occupational area and explore the differences in time deficiency and life satisfaction.

METHODS

In this study, the time usage in the ‘2019 time of life survey’ data of the National Statistical Office is classified based on the fourth edition of the Occupational Therapy Practice Framework, and the time use and satisfaction of single-parent families classified according to sex. In the ‘2019 time of life survey’ of the National Statistical Office, the subjects who selected single-parent families in the ‘single parent-parent-grandchild households’ item were first selected. The data of 404 parents from single-parent families were selected next. The time usage, time deficiency, and life satisfaction were analyzed by occupational area.

RESULTS

The subjects spent the most time resting and sleeping, followed by engaging in instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs), work, and health management. As a result of comparing the subjects by sex, it was found that the male subjects spent more time on work than the female subjects, and the female subjects spent more time on IADLs, education and social participation. As a result of comparing time deficiency and life satisfaction, the male subjects felt that they lacked time compared to the female subjects. There was no significant difference in life satisfaction. By examining whether single-parent families' time use by occupational area affected the time deficiency, it was found that male's working time make them feel they have less time, while female's leisure time makes them feel they have more time.

CONCLUSION

This study made it possible to determine the characteristics of single-parent households’ time use and sex differences. Furthermore, it is expected to be used as basic data for measures to solve not only time poverty, but also economic poverty in single-parent families.

Keywords: Life satisfaction; Occupational area; Single-parent; Time deficiency; Time use

Core Tip: Based on the Occupational Therapy Practice Framework-4, it was possible to find out the time use of single-parent family parents by dividing the occupational area. In addition, by examining the difference in time use according to sex, we felt the need to find an approach to solve the problem.