Jisu Song 201001709/Assignment5: Timed Writing/Tue 11a.m.

201001709 Jisu Song

           The Causes and Effects of New Living Trend on Society

           As time has passed and values have changed, people around the world are more likely to live alone or have much smaller families. The Korean society can be a good example since it went through rapid development and transition for some of the last decades. Especially, individualism, technological advancement, and extension of women's rights effected Koreans to change the way they live.

           First, rise of individualism among young Koreans led them to change their lifestyles. In the past, Confucian ideas which emphasize community dominated the Korean society. However, these thoughts are fading away nowadays. Modern Koreans care more about themselves than the society. As a result, people are choosing to live by themselves or with small families to enjoy more of their free time.

           Second, technological development made people communicate easily with each other. Thanks to the Internet, e-mails, smartphones, and free messengers like Kakao Talk, people can contact each other almost whenever and wherever they want. Before this kind of advance, communication cost a lot of money and time. So, most people were reluctant to live by themselves far away from their families. But the advanced technology helped people to change from traditional lifestyles.

           Lastly, expansion of women's rights that led to higher education among females influenced the society. Before, women often didn't get much education and lived their entire lives as housewives. In contrast, these days, women's rights have improved and their educational achievements are far better than from the past. So these women become professionals and some of them decide not to get married for the sake of their careers. Consequently, they remain single and birthrate goes down which could have an impact on the society in many ways such as increase of people living alone.

           The trend of people living alone or with smaller family is because of three reasons: individualism, technological development, and improved women's rights. Nothing is wrong with this new tendency, but we have to be more conscious about the effects. Because too much of this lifestyle could lead human beings, the social animal, isolated from others.