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Article History

Received: 29 May 2025

Accepted: 29 April 2026

First Online: 20 May 2026

Competing interests

: The authors declare no competing interests.

: This study was exempt from formal ethical review board approval under South Korean national legislation. In accordance with the Bioethics and Safety Act (enacted 2005, Republic of Korea), institutional review committee approval is required only for research conducted through face-to-face interviews with human participants. The present study did not involve any face-to-face interaction between researchers and participants; questionnaires were self-administered by respondents independently, and completed forms were subsequently collected by a distributor. Additionally, exemption from ethics committee review was applicable under Article 13 of the Enforcement Decree of the Act, which provides that research not involving the collection or recording of personally identifiable or sensitive information — as defined under Article 23 of the Personal Information Protection Act (Republic of Korea) — is exempt from bioethics committee review. The present study did not collect any such information, and all exemption criteria under the applicable legislation were therefore satisfied.

: Written informed consent was obtained from all participants prior to their involvement in the study. Each respondent was provided with a written consent form through which they voluntarily confirmed their willingness to participate and agreed to the use of their responses for research purposes. Participation was entirely voluntary, and respondents were informed that their data would be used solely for academic research.