Preamble

Observing, measuring, and visualising the Korean Wave itself is a difficult task. When we look back on the reports in the series, rather than the general phenomenon, they most frequently cover constituents of the K-Wave, such as individual pieces of media (e.g., Squid Game) or pop-cultural domains (e.g., K-Pop). Other notable themes include how the K-Wave manifests on particular platforms (e.g, Netflix or Google search). While it has been possible to examine reactions to the phenomenon as a whole (e.g., in UK newspaper coverage), it remains the case that observing, measuring, and visualising the thing in itself is a difficult task.

Nevertheless, in order to determine the key aspects of the K-Wave’s general disposition at particular points in time and its future prospects, summary measures have been developed. In the following report, we review these measures and see what insights their visualisation might shed on how the K-Wave has changed since they were first recorded and what its immediate prospects are.

The Data

This month, we visualise the change in the Hallyu Status Index (한류현황지수) and the Hallyu Perception Index (한류심리지수). In summary, the former is a score from one to five which represents the popularity of the K-Wave, broadly defined, for the corresponding year and country. The latter is a score centred around 100, representing the future prospects for the K-Wave, that is, whether it is ascendant or declining in the corresponding year and country. Scores lower than 100 represent a projected future decline, while scores between 101 and 129 represent moderate projected future growth in interest. The magnitude of the change in interest is represented numerically, so index scores over 130 represent a projection for strong future growth in interest in the K-Wave.

The index scores, along with details of their calculation and some supplementary analysis, can be found here in a series of publications on the outcomes of the K-Wave with highly variable titles, for example “2015 한류의경제적효과에관한연구”, “2018 한류 파급 연구”, “2021 한류 파급효과 연구”, and “2024 한류 생태계 연구”.

For more on the raw data underlying these indices, it is best to refer to the series of reports entitled 한류실태조사 (here), which have also been the basis for a number of entries in this series (for example, here, here, and here).

The Indices

While the above summary and visualisations could stand alone, here we present details of the calculation of the indices in greater depth. This may have some benefit for a more nuanced interpretation of the visualisations, but it is in no way essential for understanding. Throughout this section, we quote extensively from the report 2015 한류의 경제적 효과에 관한 연구, as it is the most comprehensive account of the calculation of the indices. The page references supplied for quotations refer to this report. Some later reports refer back to it explicitly for the methods by which they calculate the indices, but this is not universally the case. Therefore, while we do not have reason to believe that the method of calculation for the indices changed significantly (or at all), we cannot have complete certainty that these methods were applied unchanged over the entirety of the surveyed period.

Turning first to the Hallyu Status Index, it is described in summary as follows (p. 11)

  • 한류 현황 지수는 현지 소비자들을 대상으로 한류 8개 상품(한국 TV드라마 및 방송 프로그램, 한국 영화, 한국 음악, 한국 애니메이션과 만화 캐릭터, 한국 게임, 한국 패션 및 뷰티, 한국 음식, 한국 도서)에 대한 인기 정도를 5점 척도를 활용하여 측정함

  • The Hallyu Status Index measures the popularity of eight K-Wave products (Korean TV dramas and programs for broadcast, Korean films, Korean music, Korean animation and comic-book characters, Korean games, Korean fashion and beauty, Korean food, and Korean books) for local consumers using a five-point scale

The precise instricution given for supplying ratings was (p. 49):

현재 귀하가 속한 나라에서 다음의 한국 문화상품의 인기가 어느 정도라고 생각하시는지 응답하여 주십시오.

Please tell us the extent to which you think the following Korean cultural products are currently popular in your country.

And the answers on the five-point scale corresponded to the following statements (p. 49):

1 - 이용하는 사람이 거의 없다
2 - 일부 마니아층에서 인기가 있는 상태이다
3 - 일부 마니아층 뿐만아니라 일반인들도 상당수 알고 있다
4 - 일반인들에게 널리 알려져 있고 관련 상품이 판매되고 있다
5 - 일반인들에게 널리 인기가 있고 관련 상품의 판매가 원활한 상태이다

1 - Almost no engagement
2 - Popular with a few enthusiasts
3 - Not just popular with a few enthusisasts, but known by quite a few normal people
4 - Widely known among normal people and relevant products are available for purchase
5 - Widely popular among normal people and relevant products are easily available for purchase

While ratings for eight pop-cultural domains were sought, factor analysis revealed that they in fact represented two different dimensions between them. As a result, rating of the pop-cultural domains which loaded to the first factor, Korean TV dramas and programs for broadcast, Korean movies, Korean music,Korean fashion, and Korean food, were taken into account when calculating the Hallyu Status Index (an arithmetic mean of these pop-cultural domains’ scores), while those which loaded to the second factor, Korean animation, Korean games, and Korean books, were excluded (p. 50).

Finally for this index score, the suggested interpretation was as follows (p.50):

한류현황지수를 이용하여 국가를 분류하기 위해 대중화단계(3.5이상), 확산단계(2.5~3.49), 소수관심단계 (2.49 이하)로 구분했다.

For the classification of countries with the Hallyu Status Index, we divided (scores) into the Popularisation Stage (3.5 or higher), the Diffusion Stage (2.5 to 3.49), and the Minority Interest Stage (2.49 or lower).

Moving on to the Hallyu Perception Index, this is described in summary as (p. 10):

  • 한류심리지수는 한국은행에서 발표하는 ’소비자 심리지수’의 개념과 산출방법을 적용하여, 현재 한류와 인기 정도와 무관하게 한류의 성장정도를 측정함

  • 한류 소비자들에게 ‘과거에서 현재까지’, ‘현재에서 미래까지’의 두 시점에 대해 ‘자신의 관심도’, ‘대중들의 관심도’, ’소비지출’의 세 가지 항목에 대해 질문한 설문조사(5점 척도)결과를 지수화, 100을 기준으로 이보다 수치가 높으면 한류에 대한 긍정적 인식이 더 강하다는 의미이고, 100보다 낮다면 그 반대임

  • The Hallyu Perception Index measures the K-Wave’s degree of growth without taking into account its current disposition or popularity by applying the method of calculation introduced by the Bank of Korea for its ‘Consumer Sentiment Index’

  • Consumers of the K-Wave were asked to rate the three items ‘personal level of interest’, ‘public level of interest’, and ‘expenditure’ on a five point scale for two points in time: ‘from the past to the present’ and ‘from the present going into the future’. These were transformed into an index centred around 100 with scores greater than that meaning positive perception of the K-Wave was stronger, while scores lower than that meant the opposite.

The following summary example calculation is then provided:

\[\small Hallyu\ Status\ Index = \frac{(Very\ positive\times1.0＋Broadly\ positive\times 0.5+Similar\times0.0－Broadly\ negative\times0.5－Very\ negative\times 1.0)}{Total\ number\ of\ respondents}\ \times100+100\]

Visualisations

While a great many countries have been surveyed over the years to calculate the two indices described above here we focus on comparing the first year for which figures are available, 2014, and the most recent at time of writing, 2024. We further restrict our sample to countries which were surveyed in both years.

We turn first to the Hallyu Status Index. Countries are ordered according to their aggregated score in this index across both years in ascending order. The solid line shows the upper bound cut-off point for the Minority Interest Stage (2.49 or lower), the dashed line shows the upper bound cut-off point Diffusion Stage (2.5 to 3.49). Scores above this represent countries in which the K-Wave has reached the Popularisation Stage (3.5 or higher).

The above tells a clear story. Of the 23 countries included in both surveyed years, only two, China and Vietnam, are characterised by a lower score on the Hallyu Status Index in 2024 than 2014. The mid-2010s to the mid-2020s can be securely considered an era of the K-Wave’s ascent. Countries which saw the largest increase over this time were India and Mexico, both of which continue to be glaringly overlooked by both research and popular discourse on the K-Wave.

Further, the number of countries in which the K-Wave attained the so-called Popularisation Stage rose from five in the 2014 survey to nine in the 2024 survey despite while only one country, China, fell from this stage to the Diffusion Stage. Of the four countries in which the K-Wave was at the Minority Interest Stage in 2014, the phenomenon developed to reach the Diffusion stage in two (Russia and Brazil) and the Popularisation Stage in two (India and Mexico).

We now turn to the Hallyu Perception Index. For ease of visual comparison the countries are ordered according to the same criterion as the above visualisation. In this case, though, the solid line corresponds to the index score of 100, the lower bound cut off for moderate projected future growth in interest in the K-Wave, while the dashed line represents the upper bound of this (i.e., an index score of 129). Scores that exceed this represent countries in which strong future growth in interest in the K-Wave is projected.

The story told by the visualisation of the Hallyu Perception Index is a little harder to interpret. In 2014, six countries in total scored sufficiently highly on the Hallyu Perception Index to project strong future growth of the K-Wave: Argentina, Mexico, the USA, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam. By 2014, strong growth was no longer projected for two of these countries (Argentina and the USA) but this was offset by the high index scores that came to characterise a further seven countries (India, Brazil, South Africa, Turkiye, the UAE, Thailand, and the Philippines). As well as countries in Southeast Asia and the Americas, this later group also includes countries in the Middle East, South Asia, and the sole representative country of Sub-Saharan Africa to be included in these surveys. Thus, by the end of the surveyed period a greater number of countries, eleven in total, with a greater geographical scope were projected to experience strong future growth of the K-Wave. Complicating this picture, however, is the fact that the index scores characterising a total of nine countries (Germany, the UK, Argentina, Australia, the USA, China, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, and Vietnam) fell overall between 2014 and 2024. While the fall in these index scores was rarely dramatic, none fell to a level that did not indicate moderate projected growth in interest in the K-Wave, after all, the rise in index scores among the remaining countries was also generally small, too. The three exceptions to this are India, Japan and the UAE. The first of two of these began the surveyed period with very low index scores. With the rise in their scores, taking this metric at face value, none of the countries included in these surveys is to be characterised by declining interest in the K-Wave in the short term.

Conclusion

The synchronic snapshots of the K-Wave these two sets of index scores represent are highly suggestive of a decade of growth with more to come. Even the lower Hallyu Perception Index scores, observed for some countries in 2024 in comparison to their 2014 scores appear to indicate at least the continuation of moderate growth for the K-Wave as it is defined by the included pop-cultural domains. There is, however, potentially much nuance to be added to this picture from the examination of the trajectory of each index score over the surveyed period. We may ask, for example, whether the increase or decline in index scores has been monotonic or whether there are countries which have similar trajectories of one or other (or both) index scores over the surveyed period. It is questions such as this, and the dynamic visualisations which may inform answers to them, to which we turn in the second part of our examination of this data.

Acknowledgement
This work was supported by the Core University Program for Korean Studies of the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and Korean Studies Promotion Service at the Academy of Korean Studies (AKS-2021-OLU-2250004)