*p-values were calculated using chi-square tests for categorical variables and the Mann-Whitney U test for continuous variables. Continuous variables are presented as median (interquartile range, IQR). All analyses applied sampling weights. Due to missing responses in the K-MMSE assessment, the total frequency for cognitive categories is lower than the group totals. K-ADL: Korean Activities of Daily Living; K-IADL: Korean Instrumental Activities of Daily Living; K-MMSE: Korean version of the Mini-Mental State Examination.
Declarations
Author contributions
HMK: Investigation, Writing—original draft, Writing—review & editing. MKJ: Conceptualization, Validation, Writing—original draft, Writing—review & editing, Supervision. All authors read and approved the submitted version.
Conflicts of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.
Ethical approval
This study analyzed anonymized secondary data from the 2023 Korean Elderly Survey, administered by the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs (KIHASA) under the Ministry of Health and Welfare of the Republic of Korea. In accordance with national research ethics regulations, analyses using publicly available, de-identified data are exempt from Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval.
Consent to participate
Exempted according to the institution’s policy.
Consent to publication
Not applicable.
Availability of data and materials
Data from the 2023 Korean Elderly Survey are publicly available from the KIHASA data portal [https://data.kihasa.re.kr].
Funding
This study was supported by a 2026 research grant from Dongnam Health University (2026-008). The funders had no role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Open Exploration maintains a neutral stance on jurisdictional claims in published institutional affiliations and maps. All opinions expressed in this article are the personal views of the author(s) and do not represent the stance of the editorial team or the publisher.
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