Fans of theater plays and musicals rally in Seoul’s Dahangno area on Feb. 25, 2018, in support of victims who exposed sexual abuses long swept under the rug. (image: Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 16 (Korea Bizwire) — Women in South Korea have higher levels of resentment, depression and anger compared to men.
The average “frustration” scale was 2.64 out of 4, according to a survey of 5,000 adult men and women in the country by the Korean Women’s Development Institute.
Broken down by gender, the “frustration” level of women was 2.73 points compared to 2.56 points for men, with women having a relatively higher level of frustration than men.
The measure of frustration represents an emotional experience of depression, unhappiness, anger and injustice.
When divided into those in their 20s and 30s and those in their 40s and older, the group with the highest level of anger was 2.79 points for the younger generation of women.
On the other hand, younger men had the lowest level of anger at 2.53 points.
The biggest gap between men and women was related to anxiety over hate crimes. Young women scored 2.66 points, but young men only scored 1.74 points, illustrating a stark difference.
Furthermore, women in South Korea felt more injustice than men. While 86.1 percent of women said they had experienced unfairness, only 78.4 percent of men responded as such.
In particular, when it came to income and wage disparity, 82.8 percent of younger women and 85.6 percent of older women found that there was a gender gap, which compares with 42.7 percent for younger men and 66.5 percent for older men.
Considering that the level of recognition of income and wage gaps by academic background and employment type is within 10 percentage points, the gap between men and women regarding gender and wage inequality is relatively wide.
As a result, 79.1 percent of younger women and 64.6 percent of older women answered ‘yes’ when asked if they wanted to leave South Korea.
Meanwhile, 72.1 percent of younger men and 66 percent of older men were interested in moving abroad.
“Regardless of generation, women felt more discrimination and unfair treatment than men. Furthermore, with increased fear and awareness of hate crimes resulting from misogyny, the gender gap has widened among young Koreans,” the researchers said.
D. M. Park (dmpark@koreabizwire.com)
