SEOUL – Marriage and parenthood are increasingly associated with fear and anxiety among South Korea’s younger generation, according to an analysis released Tuesday.

According to an analysis of posts on Blind, an online community for young workers, two-thirds of marriage-related posts carried emotions of “sadness,” “fear” or “abomination.”

Of these, 32.3 percent displayed feelings of “sadness” while 24.6 percent exhibited “fear” and 10.2 percent were categorised under “abomination.”

On the other hand, only 9.3 percent of the posts expressed happiness.

A similar trend could be observed for childbirth and childrearing. According to the institute, over 60 percent of childbirth-related posts carried these negative emotions, with “abomination” leading at 23.8 percent, followed by “fear” (21.3 percent) and “sadness” (15.3 percent). Nearly 70 percent of posts about childrearing exhibited such emotions.

The analysis was conducted by not-for-profit private-sector think tank Korean Peninsula Population Institute for Future. It was based on some 50,000 Blind posts combined from December 2017 to November last year about marriage, childbirth or childrearing.

Despite government efforts to reverse the country’s declining birth rate through a range of policies, the study indicated that negative perceptions toward family life persist, reflecting deep-rooted societal and economic concerns.

The same analysis also showed that the word “money” appeared in nearly 30 percent of all posts related to marriage and in 13.2 percent of posts about childbirth.

Moreover, nearly 60 percent of the marriage-related posts centered around the “preparations and conditions for marriage,” while almost 20 percent of childbirth-related posts talked about “financial support related to childbirth.”

This came as South Korea showed signs of a rebound from the downtrend in its birth rate. On average, the number of children born to a South Korean woman in her lifetime was estimated at 0.75 in 2024, up from 0.72 the previous year. It was the first rebound in South Korea’s fertility rate in nine years.

However, the institute noted that young people’s perceptions of marriage, childbirth and child-rearing remain negative. It cautioned that the recent rise in the birth rate may be temporary, as it could be driven by a base effect following the COVID-19 pandemic, making it too early to conclude that the trend will continue.

Yoo Hye-jeong, director of the population research centre at the KPPIF, called for a strong policy drive to address younger generations’ financial difficulties and their struggle to achieve a work-family balance so that the rebound in the birth rate can continue.

A separate government survey also highlighted negative perceptions of marriage and parenthood.

According to the survey of some 15,000 people aged between 19 and 34 by the Office for Government Policy Coordination, those willing to get married amounted to 63.1 percent in 2024, down by 12 percentage points compared with the same survey two years before. Those wishing to have a baby also slid 4 percentage points in two years to 59.3 percent.

Meanwhile, acting President and Deputy Prime Minister Choi Sang-mok on Tuesday laid out a new batch of support plans for young married couples or couples willing to get married.

The government plans to offer families with at least three kids priority passes in airport boarding processes in South Korea when traveling overseas, and affordable public housing to a wider range of newlywed couples or couples with a newborn child.

Also, Seoul and local governments will work together in May on a pilot program in which some 5,000 senior citizens will drop off children at schools and kindergartens amid high demand for childcare workers among working parents.

South Korea is now suffering the double blow of an extremely low birth rate and an aging population. In December, over 20 percent of South Korea’s population was aged 65 or older, marking South Korea’s official transition into a superaged society.