Name
Environmental Design, Sookmyung Women’s University
Journal
Abstract
Death is generally not discussed much in Korea. Furthermore, there is a shortage of death preparation services, even though the social interest for both well-being and well-dying has been increasing. Therefore, this study attempted to propose a new form of death preparation services. As research methods, we analyzed social awareness and the current state of preparation services about death based on prior interdisciplinary research on nursing, humanities, and social sciences. We conducted a survey from April 13 to 16, 2020, which contained 23 questions and was distributed to individuals aged 10–60 years. We obtained 370 responses. The survey focused on the awareness of death services, and we tried to understand diverse psychological attitudes of subjects. We reconfirmed the inadequate perception and the limitations of systems. Especially, the social atmosphere that refrains from mentioning death leads to negative images and insufficient preparedness. Specifically, we would like to propose a new service with space COMMA targeting the MZ generation, who has a distant sense of death compared to older generations. Main services include Record, Momento, and Day Comma. This study aimed to create a new culture where people can perceive death as part of life. For this reason, the brand’s ideology is on the intersection between life and death. COMMA will keep growing by accumulating traces of users’ lives and provide the stage for empathy. Experiencing the brand ultimately overcomes the negative image and limitations of death preparation, which have remained in analog forms.