Two in five Japanese basically touch-type
With keyboarding skills becoming a more and more important ability to have in the modern world, although some might argue that in Japan it is mobile phone thumbing speed that is the key, japan.internet.com recently reported on a rather interesting survey conducted by Cross Marketing Inc into touch-typing abilities.
Demographics
Over the 23th and 24th of May 2007 300 members of Cross Marketing Inc’s online monitor panel completed a private internet-based survey. The sample was split exactly 50:50 male and female, 20.0% of the respondents were in their teens, 20.0% were in their twenties, 20.0% were in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, and 20.0% in their fifties.
I can touch-type to a certain extent, although I’m sure I’d not win many prizes for my accuracy. One result I’d have like to have seen is what keyboard layout people used; not QWERTY versus Dvorak, but for Japanese entry Romaji versus Kana input, which is basically either spelling things using the latin alphabet or spelling using the native Japanese kana alphabet.
Research results
Q1: Can you touch-type? (Sample size=300)
Perfectly (to SQ) 5.7% Mostly (to SQ) 36.7% Sometimes 37.0% Not at all 20.7% Q1SQ: How did you learn to touch-type? (Sample size=127, multiple answer)
Votes Percentage Naturally got the hang of it 61 48.0% Taught myself 60 47.2% Used touch-typing training software 32 25.2% Went to PC school or other lessons 12 9.4% Found out from the internet 9 7.1% Other 8 6.3% Don’t know, can’t remember 1 0.8% Q2: Which fingers do you usually use when typing? (Sample size=300)
All fingers 55.0% All bar pinkies 7.7% Thumb, index finger and middle finger 21.0% Thumb, index finger and pinkie 2.3% Thumb and index finger 3.7% Index finger 4.7% Other 5.7%
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed, or check out my weekly newsletter. Thanks for visiting!
Read more on: cross marketing,touch type
Subscribe to feed
Send to mobile
Subscribe to 世論 What Japan Thinks newsletter
Deas said,
June 12, 2007 @ 14:20
I touch type with a mix of self-learned movements and those that were drilled into me in a mandatory keyboarding class from high school. That was the biggest waste of time ever. EVER. But I digress. I can touch type quickly enough to beat a Japanese fellow I was playing in the game “Typing of the Dead” in an arcade in Hiroshima. I couldn’t understand what I was typing, but my romaji input skills blew his away. He was ashamed. I was bewildered. The zombies? They were dead. Good times.