世論 What Japan Thinks

Nepro Japan recently reported on an interesting report on parent-child relationships and email. This perhaps could be considered a follow-up to a previous survery on how people have seen society change due to mobiles.

Demographics

Between the 5th and 6th of April 2007 Nepro Japan collected 3,866 responses through a menu option available through the public menu systems of NTT DoCoMo’s iMode, SoftBank’s Yahoo Keitai and au’s EZweb. 42% of this self-selecting survey was male, 3% in their teens, 36% in their twenties, 42% in their thirties, and 18% aged forty or older.

Not being a parent, and not having a parent in this country, I cannot comment on any personal experiences.

In Q1 there seems to be rather a lot of orphans! Perhaps it includes people who have fallen out of touch with their parents.

Research results

Q1: Do you exchange mobile phone mail in a parent-child relationship sense? (Sample size=3,866)

Often	15%
Sometimes	36%
No, although both carry phones	21%
No, one side doesn’t carry a phone	23%
Don’t have any parents or children	5%

Q2: About what sorts of matters do you exchange mail as parent and child? (Sample size=3,866 perhaps, multiple answer)

Plans for going out, returning home	26%
Shopping lists	19%
Gossip	18%
Instead of daily conversation	17%
Food requests, whether coming for food	16%
Where one currently is	12%
Discussions about job-hunting and other societal matters	2%
Love and relationship matters	1%
Other	28%
Don’t exchange mail	33%

Q3: When you have important parent-child matters to talk about, what do you do? (Sample size=3,866)

Talk face-to-face	65%
Talk on the mobile phone	15%
Talk on the fixed-line phone	5%
Write mobile phone email	5%
Write PC-based mail	1%
Write a letter	0%
Other	9%

Q4: Do you think parent-child communication has increased due to mobile phones? (Sample size=3,866)

Increased	11%
Slightly increased	15%
Can’t say either way	68%
Little decreased	2%
Decreased	4%

Q5: As a parent and child, have either of you had a peek at the other’s mobile phone? (Sample size=3,866)

No, one or the other doesn’t have a mobile phone	25%
No, both of us don’t carry mobile phones	50%
Address book only	2%
Email only	2%
Call records only	1%
Address book and email only	1%
Address book and call records only	1%
Email and call records only	1%
Everything	6%
Other	11%