Analysis of Social Problems in Middle School Home Economics Curriculum and Text Books

The purpose of this study is to analyze the types and description styles of social problems included in middle school Home Economics(HE) curriculum and HE text books. In this study, content analysis standards were established for social problems in HE through a literature review and analyzed the HE curriculum and HE textbooks of middle school to find out the proportion of social problems covered in HE by types and description styles of social problems. The results of this study are as follows. First, the types of social problems covered in the HE curriculum and textbooks are problems related to quality of life(environment, population, health care) and family and generational problems(family, women, youth, elderly). Types of social problems with low emphasis are structural social problems(urban, poverty, crime). Second, the 2015 revised HE curriculum and textbooks mainly deal with crime, family, and health care problems, while problems of youth, population, environment, and women are slightly covered. Social problems of excessive consumption, dehumanization, information society and social problems of elderly, education, urban, and poverty are hardly covered. In contrast, the 2022 revised HE curriculum deals with problems of environment problems of excessive consumption, dehumanization, information society, youth, health care, crime, family, and women in order. Third, the most common style of describing social problems in the HE curriculum was solutions, followed by simple mentions, causes and results, and actual situations. Descriptive styles for conceptualization and generalization were rarely addressed.