PURPOSE
The purpose of this study was to identify the level of knowledge about dementia and to find the related factors in middle-aged adults.
METHOD
The research design was a descriptive study by using a constructive self-report questionnaire with 34 items. Data were collected from 397 middle-aged adults using structured questionnaire. Data analysis was done by SPSS/WIN Programs using frequency, range from minimum to maximum, percentage, mean, SD, chi-square-test, t-test, ANOVA, and Duncan's Multiple Range test.
RESULTS
The rate of correct answer of middle-aged adults was 68.7%, showing the mid-level of knowledge about dementia. There were significant differences according to age, education, marital status, job, income, information and information sources for dementia in middle-aged adults.
CONCLUSION
These results indicate that Korean middle-aged adults need more education and counseling on dementia. Further studies are needed to overcome regionalism in sampling of this study and to develop standard measuring tools for the level of knowledge about dementia.

Nurses in today's challenging health care settings need to be skilled critical thinkers and clinical experts. The nurse must be able to use a broad knowledge base to mobilize resources, coordinate actions and evaluate outcomes in complex new situations. So the national licensing examination for registered nurses is change to improve the quality of professional competency of nurses in Korea. Prior to this, learning objectives should be developed and improved periodically. The purpose of this study is to describe the nursing competency to provide base line data for developing learning objectives in adult health nursing. This study was conducted by means of a questionnaire which was developed by the researcher after reviewing the literature. The questionnaire was based on learning objectives which were developed by a nation-wide nursing faculty majoring in adult health nursing. The subjects were 45 nurses in a middle level hospital. The collected data were treated using SPSS Win 7.5 Statistical Package so as to obtain such descriptive statistics as mean score, frequency, and to test reliability test, nonpar-Friedman test. To summarize the major findings in this study, it showed the scope of nursing competency and can guide the direction of study and methodological criteria to develop learning objectives. Recommendations for further research are: firstly, it is necessary to state learning objectives with learners'behavioral terminology; secondly, to overcome locality in scope of this study, there is a need to analyze with nation-wide sampling by an in-depth statistical analysis; thirdly, because the subjects of this study are mostly three-year graduate nurses, there is a need to compare this study with other studies of different subjects.