世論 What Japan Thinks

There seems to have been a definite theme running through the goo Rankings I’ve been publishing over the recent weeks, but let me assure you anything you may read into this is purely your own imagination! This time let’s look at what people feel worried about when they get married, the marriage blues in other words, with detailed ranking for both men and women.

Demographics

Between the 21st and 24th of December 2007 1,094 members of the goo Research monitor panel completed a private online questionnaire. 45.6% of the sample was male, 8.8% were in their teens, 15.6% in their twenties, 29.1% in their thirties, 26.8% in their forties, 10.7% in their fifties, and 9.0% aged sixty or older. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

A surprising result is that for whether work will understand, where it is men who are much more worried. This reflects two aspects of Japanese social structure; first, women are expected and often expect themself to quit either after marriage or once they have children (indeed, concerns about being a working mother was very low on the list of women’s worries), and second, salarymen are often expected to work (or drink) until the last train home, so new grooms are concerned about how they are going to be able to excuse themselves from their responsibilities.

For me it was probably a combination of a change in lifestyle (no longer being able to just lie in bed until noon, not bother shaving, then order pizza for dinner), a lack of private time to wander around the shops, and no spare money to spend on bits and pieces for my computer. However, these are of course outweighed by the benefits.

Ranking results

Q: What did (or might) you get the marriage blues about? (Sample size=1,094)

Rank		Score
1	Getting on with the in-laws	100
2	Change in lifestyle	92.6
3	Making ends meet	83.4
4	Having no time for myself	77.5
5	Living with the in-laws	59.3
6	Whether partner’s character will change	55.5
7	Whether partner will help with child-care	55.1
8	Whether my work will understand my situation	53.3
9	Whether partner will help with the housework	52.4
10	Partner being unfaithful	51.0
11	Getting on with the neighbours	48.1
12	Costs of child-rearing	38.2
13	Getting on with partner’s friends	30.1
14	Whether my pocket money will decrease, disappear	28.8
15	Whether to have/can have children	28.8
16	Partner being transferred	22.5
17	Whether I can continue work if we have children	20.4
18	The magic fading	19.1
19	Partner being too busy at work	17.8
20	Me being too busy at work	14.8

Q: What did (or might) you get the marriage blues about? (Sample size=499, men)

Rank		Score
1	Change in lifestyle	100
2	Having no time for myself	97.5
3	Making ends meet	96.8
4	Getting on with the in-laws	96.8
5	Whether my work will understand my situation	79.0
6	Whether wife’s character will change	49.0
7	Getting on with the neighbours	42.0
8	Whether my pocket money will decrease, disappear	42.0
9	Costs of child-rearing	38.9
10	Wife being unfaithful	38.2
11	Living with the in-laws	32.5
12	Whether to have/can have children	28.0
13	Getting on with wife’s friends	26.1
14	Whether wife will help with the housework	24.2
15	Whether wife will help with child-care	21.0
16	The magic fading	20.4
17	Me being too busy at work	20.4
18	Me being transferred	19.1
19	Whether wife will keep her figure	17.8
20	Me being unfaithful	17.8

Q: What did (or might) you get the marriage blues about? (Sample size=595, women)

Rank		Score
1	Getting on with the in-laws	100
2	Change in lifestyle	83.3
3	Making ends meet	71.6
4	Living with the in-laws	69.6
5	Whether husband will help with child-care	69.3
6	Whether husband will help with the housework	63.7
7	Having no time for myself	62.7
8	Whether husband’s character will change	55.6
9	Husband being unfaithful	54.6
10	Getting on with the neighbours	48.4
11	Whether my work will understand my situation	36.9
12	Costs of child-rearing	35.6
13	Getting on with husband’s friends	30.4
14	Husband being transferred	28.4
15	Whether to have/can have children	27.5
16	Husband being too busy at work	21.9
17	Whether I can continue work if I have children	21.9
18	Whether my pocket money will decrease, disappear	20.6
19	The magic fading	17.3
20	Whether dates together will decrease	11.8