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The essential concept of hospice and palliative care nursing is a humanistic approach to patient care. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a humanistic end-of-life care course on South Korean undergraduate nursing students' attitudes toward death, death anxiety, and communication skills. A nonequivalent control group design was used. Thirty-nine students from two universities were allocated to the control (n = 20) and experimental (n = 19) groups. Participants in the experimental group were enrolled in an end-of-life care course that utilized humanistic approach two hours per week for 16 weeks. The data were analyzed using the SPSS WIN 17.0. Attitudes toward death and communication skills in the experimental group were found to have increased compared with those of the control group. In conclusion, the humanistic end-of-life care course is effective in reducing negative attitudes toward death and increasing the communication skills of Korean nursing students.

The purpose of this study was to explore the factors affecting shared decision making among Korean adults. Attitudes toward advance directives and withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment explained 45.0% of shared decision making, suggesting that these 2 factors influence shared decision making in end-of-life care.

Purpose: The purposes of this study were to explore the effects of family cohesion and subjective happiness on death anxiety of Korean elders and to identify other factors contributing to death anxiety., Methods: The participants were 280 elders who lived in P metropolitan city. Data were collected between November 5, 2011 and January 12, 2012 using the Short Portable Mental Status Questionnaire (SPMSQ), Family Cohesion Evaluation Scale, Subjective Happiness Scale, and Fear of Death Scale (FODS). Data were analyzed using the SPSS/WIN 19.0 program., Results: Family cohesion, marital status, religious activity, perceived health status, and subjective happiness were included in the factors affecting death anxiety of Korean elders. These variables explained 50.1% of death anxiety., Conclusion: The results of the study indicate that these variables should be considered in developing nursing intervention programs to decrease death anxiety and increase family cohesion and subjective happiness for life integration in Korean elders.

Purpose: The study was done to develop a dignified dying scale for Korean adults., Methods: The process included construction of a conceptual framework, generation of initial items, verification of content validity, selection of secondary items, preliminary study, and extraction of final items. The participants were 428 adults who lived in one of 3 Korean metropolitan cities: Seoul, Daegu, and Busan. Item analysis, factor analysis, criterion related validity, and internal consistency were used to analyze the data. Data collection was done from March to June 2010., Results: Thirty items were selected for the final scale, and categorized into 5 factors explaining 54.5% of the total variance. The factors were labeled as maintaining emotional comfort (10 items), arranging social relationship (9 items), avoiding suffering (3 items), maintaining autonomous decision making (4 items), and role preservation (4 items). The scores for the scale were significantly correlated with personal meanings of death scale. Cronbach's alpha coefficient for the 30 items was .92., Conclusion: The above findings indicate that the dignified dying scale has a good validity and reliability when used with Korean adults.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify the relationship among self-efficacy, depression, life satisfaction and death attitude of college students., Methods: The subjects consisted of 232 college students. Data were collected by self-reported questionnaires, which were constructed to include self-efficacy, depression, satisfaction with life, and death attitude. Data were analyzed by the SPSS/PC WIN. 12.0 program., Results: Death attitude and life satisfaction of college students were significantly different according to frequency of death ideation. Death attitude for college students correlated with self-efficacy, depression, and life satisfaction. The most significant predictor of death attitude for college students was life satisfaction., Conclusion: The above findings indicate that death attitude for college students is influenced by self-efficacy, depression, and life satisfaction. These findings suggest that a death education program to improve life satisfaction and to give a positive attitude toward death is needed for college students.

The purpose of this study was to examine the subjective opinions of Korean college students about good death. Q methodology was used to analyze 34 Q-statements from 37 respondents who majored in social work, nursing, or education at a university in South Korea. With the use of a PC-QUANL software package, 4 types of perceptions about good death were identified. They are: (1) a resolute acceptance type; (2) a reasonable, natural lifespan type; (3) a relational, sentimental type; (4) and an altruistic, satisfied type. Results of this study indicate that approaches to death education need to be differentiated to take into account this typology and the characteristics of the students that fall into each category.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to develop an online education on death, 'successful life, and beautiful death' for university students and to evaluate students' changes regarding perception of self and death., Method: A quasi-experimental design was used with one experimental group pre-post test. Subjects were 154 students who enrolled for online education about death for 16 weeks. SPSS/WIN 12 was used for analyzing data., Result: The results of the study clearly indicated this class had positive effects on students' perception of death-related concepts, attitudes toward death, and self-concept, showing statistically significant higher scores in post-tests than in pre-tests. In addition, the result of class evaluations showed a positive response,, Conclusion: Findings suggested that this online education about death was effective to change students' perceptions of death related knowledge, attitude toward death, and self-concept. Recommendations for further studies were provided.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to analyze the types of suicide attitudes among the Korean elderly., Method: The Q-methodology which provides a method of analyzing the subjectivity of each item was used. Thirty-four selected Q-statements from 38 subjects were classified into a shape of normal distribution using a 9 point scale. The collected data was analyzed using a QUANL PC program., Result: Three types of suicide attitudes for research subjects in Korean elderly were identified. Type I is understanding suicide-self conquest and labor type, Type II is opposing suicide-family band foundation type, and Type III is sympathizing with suicide-painful situation escaping type., Conclusion: The results of the study indicate that different approaches of suicide prevention programs are recommended based on the three types of suicide attitudes among Korean elderly.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to develop an evaluation instrument integrated and interdisciplinary death education for the human service areas such as nursing, social welfare, and education and to test the reliability and validity of it., Method: The subjects used to verify the instrument's reliability and validity were 407 students who were enrolled in the departments of nursing, social welfare, and education in universities located in Seoul, Pusan, Daegu, and Daejeon. The data was collected from April to May, 2005, and was analyzed by SPSS/WIN 12., Result: A factor analysis was conducted. Items with over a .40 factor loading and over a 1.0 eigen value were selected. Nine identified factors were learning about death, role of professionals, personal attitudes, hospice care, ethics and legal issues, death and dying, spiritual aspect of death, transcultural aspect of death, and multidisciplinary theory of death. The instrument consisted of 44 items and the reliability was a cronbach's of .953., Conclusion: Based on the study results, the content scale developed in this study was identified as a tool with a high degree of reliability and validity.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to analyze death attitudes of students majoring in the human service area, such as nursing science, education, and social welfare., Method: The Q-methodology which provides a method of analyzing the subjectivity of each item was used. The 38 selected Q-statements from each of 42 subjects were classified into a shape of normal distribution using a 9 point scale. The collected data was analyzed using a QUANL PC program., Result: Four types of death attitudes for research subjects in nursing, education, and social welfare areas were identified. Type I is fatalistic admission, Type II is pursuit of existential life, Type III is uncertainty of life after death, and Type IV is separation-connection between life and death., Conclusion: The results of the study indicate that different approaches of death educational programs are recommended based on the four types of death attitudes.