THE EFFECT OF KOREAN FOLK DANCE EXERCISE TO THE KINEMATIC PARAMETERS FOR DOWN STAIRCASE WALKING OF ELDERLY PEOPLE

Abstract

According to the Statistics department of Korea in 1991, population aged over 65 years in 1970 was 991,000 people (3.1% of whole population) and it has increased to 3,370,000 people (10.7% of whole population) in 2000. By 2010 Korea will become a full-scale aged society with an estimated population of about 7.53 million, 13.7% of those being the elderly. This phenomenon was occurred primarily due to the fertility reduction by the family planning project which was held since 1962 and extension of average life expectancy. Compared to the foreign countries which manage the aging population over long periods of time, the growth of the elderly population in Korea was faster than any other country in the world. Thus, the preparation for this is very urgent matter. Aging changes their movements and activities of people. Physical and functional degradation due to the aging process affect muscle atrophy, muscle loss, and loss of muscle function (Schlicht, Camaione & Owen, 2001). Muscle weakness affects the balance keeping which is an important factor to cause a falling. Falling is the most common injury of elderly people and even a light fall seriously hurts the elderly and can often lead to death (Leibson, Toteson, Gabriel, Ransom & Melton, 2002). Elderly’s falling occured more often to elderly women than men and 60% of this accident happens during daily activities. Startzell et al. (2000) also indicated that stair decending falls occured three times more often than for stair ascending. Walking downstairs is not only an essential motion but also is the most fearful action for elderly’s daily life process. However, most previous research on the characteristics of stair walking were targeted to normal young people. Thus, in this study, Korean folk dance program as part of rhythmic movement exercise was applied to the elderly women for increasing dynamic balance, stalility and range of motion, and the determined effect of it will be analyzed selected kinematic parameters.