Thursday, June 19th Blog Discussion

Here is the topic for Thursday, June 18th.

Parents, children, and money is the topic for today. Think about how you interact with your parents when money is involved.

Children Visit When Parents Have Money, Study Shows

Read the following and be prepared to summarize it in class. Look up any vocabulary you don’t know.

There's a saying in Korea that your sons and daughters will come visit you when you have money. Now a research team headed by Prof. Jeong Jae-gi of Soongsil University has found that there actually is some correlation between how often children visit and how much money the parents have.

Prof. Jeong studied 158 parents who were at least 60 years old to see how their personal factors -- income, education level, age, gender, and marital status -- affected the number of visits their children made. His results, which he announced to the Population Association of Korea, showed that income was the only factor that had a direct influence on the visits.

According to the study, for each one percent rise in parental income, the possibility that the parents would meet with their children more than once a week went up 2.07 times. However, of the 27 OECD member states that were studied, 14 of them showed no such correlation. There were weak connections in countries like Australia, Spain, and Poland, but they are negligible, said Prof. Jeong.

Of all the OECD countries, only Korea showed a strong link between parental income and the frequency of visits. When asked who they would turn to in a financial emergency, 51.9 percent of Koreans said either their families or relatives.

The financial dependency of Koreans on their kin was more than 10 percent higher than the average of the other 26 countries in the study. “Unlike the common belief, Koreans rely on their families and relatives when they are under financial strain much more so than when they're undergoing mental distress,” Prof. Jeong concluded.

englishnews@chosun.com / Dec. 11, 2007 09:17 KST

http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2007/12/11/2007121161016.html

Discussion Questions

With your partner, discuss the following questions. Feel free to ask any follow-on questions you like.

1.     Who do you turn to first when you need help?  What about money?

2.     Do you often need support from your parents or are you independent?

3.     Do you agree that many Koreans are too dependent on their families?

4.     How much influence or control do your parents have over your life?

5.     Do you/will you give your children money whenever they ask for it?

Hi Mom!  I need some money. 

Role play- (for 2-4 students)

You and your partner(s) will act out a scenario in which a grown-up son or daughter is visiting his/her/their parent(s) and wants to borrow some money. 

The Son/daughter rarely visits his/her parents and usually only does so when he/she needs help.  He/she has a habit of borrowing money and has a track record of being irresponsible and careless with it.

The parents are tired of seeing their children waste their money and are reluctant to give them any more.  They are also annoyed at the infrequency of their children’s visits.

The teacher will assign you a role to act out.

Son/daughter- your objective is to try to get as much money from your parents as you possibly can by any means possible.  The money can be for any purpose and you must try to persuade your parents that they have to give it to you.  You can beg, cry, lie, exaggerate, make promises and use emotional blackmail if you have to.  Don’t take no for an answer.

Parent- you are reluctant to part with any more of your hard earned cash.  You want your children to be more responsible and stop coming to you every time they want something.   You are wealthy and you can afford to give him/her the money, but you will only do so if you feel that they really need it or are going to use it wisely.  You want to keep as much of your money as you can for yourself.  Don’t give in to them without a fight.