世論 What Japan Thinks

Over one week in the middle of December infoPLANT gathered responses to a survey on baseball. 5,272 people, 57.4% female, successfully completed a self-selecting survey through DoCoMo’s mobile phone iMode menuing system.

In Q2, almost a quarter of all men and a sixth of all women questioned said they attended a professional baseball match at a stadium last year, a figure I find a little hard to believe, quite frankly, making me suspect there might have been a lot of self-selecting bias going on. I shall have to investigate other surveys to see how the numbers compare.

In Q3, not surprisingly the team most people saw was the season’s champions, Nippon Ham Fighters, but perhaps surprisingly they were the only team with more female than male viewers, no doubt helped in part by the biggest Ham of them all.

Q1: What sports do you often watch? (Sample size=5,272, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=2,246	Female N=3,026
Baseball	52.0%	63.0%	43.8%
Football (soccer)	44.6%	52.4%	38.9%
Volleyball	31.5%	22.0%	38.6%
Ice skating	23.5%	11.0%	32.7%
Athletics	11.6%	12.5%	10.9%
Golf	10.8%	16.0%	7.0%
Tennis	8.4%	8.7%	8.2%
Swimming	8.3%	6.7%	9.4%
Other	20.3%	25.6%	16.3%
Don’t watch sports	9.8%	6.6%	12.2%

Looking at the detailed age breakdown, for both sexes the groups aged 29 years old or under football was the top sport; for all groups 30 years old or more it was baseball. Golf also showed a definite age bias; only 8.3% of teenage boys selected it as a favourite sport, whilst 30.7% of men 50 or over did.

Q2: In which of the following ways did you watch this season’s (2006) professional baseball games? (Sample size=4,755, sports watchers, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=2,097	Female N=2,658
Terrestrial TV at home	72.0%	80.6%	65.2%
Watched live at stadium	21.3%	25.0%	18.4%
Satellite TV at home	20.4%	22.1%	19.0%
Radio	16.7%	24.8%	10.3%
Terrestrial TV outside home	10.6%	14.3%	7.87%
Satellite TV outside home	4.3%	5.9%	3.1%
Free internet broadcast	3.0%	4.5%	1.9%
Mobile phone 1-seg broadcast	1.3%	2.0%	0.7%
Pay internet broadcast	0.4%	0.4%	0.3%
Didn’t watch at all	19.4%	12.8%	24.6%

Q3: Which professional baseball teams did you watch this year? (Sample size=3,834, 2006 season game watchers, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=1,829	Female N=2,005
Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters	66.6%	64.7%	68.3%
Yomiuri Giants	57.1%	60.7%	53.8%
Hanshin Tigers	46.6%	49.4%	44.1%
Fukuoka Softbank Hawks	33.7%	38.3%	24.0%
Chunichi Dragons	33.3%	36.9%	30.1%
Seibu Lions	28.4%	33.1%	24.0%
Chiba Lotte Mariners	25.1%	30.9%	19.9%
Tokyo Yakult Swallows	24.5%	27.7%	21.6%
Yokohama Bay Stars	22.1%	26.6%	18.1%
Hiroshima Carp	19.4%	23.6%	15.5%
Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles	18.1%	22.0%	14.5%
Orix Buffaloes	16.6%	19.9%	13.6%

Q4: In the last five years, how has your professional baseball game viewing changed? (Sample size=4,755, sports watchers)

	All	Male N=2,097	Female N=2,658
Greatly increased	7.2%	5.7%	8.3%
Slightly increased	12.6%	10.3%	14.4%
Not changed	34.5%	31.9%	36.6%
Slightly decreased	17.4%	20.6%	14.8%
Greatly decreased	28.4%	31.5%	25.9%

Note that overall over twice as many have reported watching less baseball as have been watching more, and in particular over three times as many men have decreased their viewing when compared to those who have increased. Indeed there has been a drastic decrease amongst the older generation, with nearly five times as many over-fifty males watching less rather than more, and nearly two in five of both sexes reporting a drastic reduction in their viewing habits.