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The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between personal characteristics and the development of wandering behavior in Korean community-residing persons with dementia (PWD). Subjects included a total of 72 Korean community-residing patients who were diagnosed with dementia, aged over 60, less than 24/30 on MMSE, and able to walk independently. The study design was cross-sectional. The data were collected through caregiver interviews. As results, wandering behavior occurred in 56.3 % of participants. Residents were 63.9% female, with a mean age of 77 years. The mean score of MMSE was 13.86. The average duration of PWDs' symptom was about 53 months. 77.8% of subjects had less than a high school education. The percentage of persons diagnosed with Alzheimer's type dementia was 38.9%. T-test and bivariate logistic regression were used to examine the PWDs' characteristics between wanders and non-wanderers. Wanderers had lower MMSE scores (t = 2.61, p =.01) than non-wanderers, and widowers (X2 = 9.04, p= .003) showed more wandering behavior than married persons with dementia. This study also found that cognitive impairment (OR=.902) and marital status (OR=.219) were identified as an independent risk factor for wandering behavior. Gender, age, education, dementia type, duration of dementia, and relationship to PWD were not significantly related with wandering behavior. Results of this study would help family caregivers and health professionals to better understand wandering behavior and personal factors among PWDs in Korea and be useful in developing nursing research as an exploratory study in Korea.