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A study has shown that South Koreans feel closer to foreign migrants than North Korean defectors. In addition, the percentage of Koreans willing to mix with social minorities such as foreigners or sexual or gender minorities in public or work environments is on the rise. At the same time, many report being reluctant to accept them as neighbors or friends.

The 2023 “Korean Social Trends” report released on Friday by Statistics Korea shows the results of the 2022 Korea Social Integration Survey administered each year by the Korea Institute of Public Administration. The survey collected responses from 8,294 people aged 19 and older nationwide in September and October.

The survey found a level of acceptance of North Korean defectors of 40.3 points, lower than the level of acceptance of foreigners living in Korea (44.6 points). The disparity in the level of acceptance for the two groups increased from 2.8 percentage points in 2021 to 4.3 percentage points in 2022.

Social acceptance level was calculated by taking the average of respondents’ feelings about each social minority on a temperature scale (0 to 100 degrees, where 0 is very cold and 100 is very warm) and converted to a 100-point scale.

When asked to what extent they were willing to accept different types of minorities in a relationship as neighbors, coworkers, close friends, spouses, or not at all, 22.2% of people responded that they wouldn’t be able to accept any relationship with North Korean defectors at all, which was significantly higher than the people who responded similarly about foreign nationals (10.0%).

The percentage of people who responded that they were willing to accept North Korean defectors as neighbors, coworkers, and friends was at 77.1%, which was also significantly lower than the result for foreigners (88.7%).

The biggest difference in the attitude towards social minorities could be seen in the public and private spheres. While the percentage of those who say they are willing to accept North Korean defectors as coworkers has increased from 20.0% in 2013 to 34.2% in 2022, the percentage of those who stated that they would be able to accept them as neighbors or close friends dropped from 57.5% to 42.9% over the same period.

“This shows that even though South Korean society has grown significantly in recognizing diversity in general, the acceptance of minorities is not yet high,” said Ha Shang-eung, a professor of political science at Sogang University who conducted the analysis of the social integration survey for Statics Korea’s report.

By Ahn Tae-ho, staff reporter

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