世論 What Japan Thinks

I hope most of my fellow readers resident in Japan have got their New Year greeting (nengajou) postcards ready, as time’s running out! To see how you should be approaching what I think is an important (in some aspects) custom, this detailed survey from MacroMill Inc looked at 2009 New Year Greetings.

Demographics

Over the 25th and 26th of November 2008 624 members of the MacroMill monitor group completed an internet-based private questionnaire. The group was split exactly 50:50 male and female overall and in each age group, and 16.7% in each of these age groups, 15 to 19 years old, twenties, thirties, forties, fifties, and sixty or older.

I’m nearly ready to go; I still have to import the addresses from my old postcard software to the new one, which involves a wee bit of Excel CSV file massage, but barring accidents I’ll be printing them out at the weekend. As for electronic greetings, I think it feels cheap to me, and unless I know it’s someone sending it in addition to a postcard, I feel hard done by.

In Q5, I’m surprised that what I thought would be the main reason for sending electronic greetings, saving money, didn’t feature as a distinct answer, and neither did some ecology-related reason.

Research results

Q1: Do you plan to send New Year greeting cards (postcard, email, mobile phone, FAX or any other medium) this year? (Sample size=624)

Yes	86.1%
No (to Q6)	13.9%

There was very little variation by age, with those in their twenties the least likely to send at 18.3% not planning to send any.

Q2: This year what kinds of card do you plan to send? (Sample size=537, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=270	Female N=267
Nengajou postcards	93.5%	92.6%	94.4%
Mobile phone email	38.9%	29.6%	48.3%
Computer email	22.3%	23.0%	21.7%
Other	0.6%	0.7%	0.4%

The biggest fans of mobile phone new year greetings were the 15 to 19 year olds, with 83.1% planning on doing so, just 2.4 percentage points behind the number planning to send old-fashioned postcards.

Q3: This year about how many of each kind of card do you plan to send? (Sample size=537, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=270	Female N=267
Nengajou postcards	49.5	57.0	41.9
Mobile phone email	6.1	5.3	7.0
Computer email	3.5	4.4	2.5
Other	0.5	0.8	0.2
Total	59.5	67.5	51.5

Again, the 15 to 19 year old demographic stood out, with an average of 18.2 mobile emails planned, the only age group planning on sending more electronically than by post.

Q4: This year who do you plan sending new year greetings to? (Sample size=537, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=270	Female N=267
Friends	96.6%	96.3%	97.0%
Family	74.1%	71.1%	77.2%
Colleagues, classmates	47.7%	49.3%	46.1%
Bosses, seniors	43.6%	49.3%	37.8%
Benefactor, former teacher	33.3%	32.2%	34.5%
Subordinates, juniors	30.5%	37.4%	23.6%
Clients, customers	16.6%	21.1%	12.0%
Other	0.9%	0.4%	1.5%

Q5: Why do you plan to send new year greetings by computer, mobile phone email? (Sample size=273, those posting email from Q2, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=121	Female N=152
Easy to send	81.0%	82.6%	79.6%
Can send right on the stroke of midnight	52.0%	60.3%	45.4%
Easy to prepare	40.7%	52.1%	31.6%
Don’t know the receiver’s address	34.8%	32.2%	36.8%
Can use emoji icons, animated cards, etc	29.3%	20.7%	36.2%
Can send photgraphs, movies	18.3%	19.0%	17.8%
Other	7.0%	5.8%	7.9%

Looking by age, not knowing the address was a much bigger reason for younger people, and emoji and animation was surprisingly a bigger reason for older people.

Now we return to the full sample.

Q6: Who do you/would you feel reluctance to send an email new year greeting to? (Sample size=624, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=312	Female N=312
Bosses, seniors	61.4%	58.0%	64.7%
Benefactor, former teacher	56.7%	51.6%	61.9%
Clients, customers	49.4%	47.1%	51.6%
Family	35.1%	32.4%	37.8%
Subordinates, juniors	12.7%	14.7%	10.6%
Friends	7.5%	7.1%	8.0%
Colleagues, classmates	7.1%	8.0%	6.1%
Other	0.5%	0.3%	0.6%
No-one	20.4%	23.4%	17.3%

Q7: Do you/would you feel it strange to receive an email new year greeting? (Sample size=624, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=312	Female N=312
Very strange	5.0%	6.7%	3.2%
Somewhat strange	18.1%	20.2%	16.0%
Can’t say either way	19.9%	19.6%	20.2%
Not really strange	37.5%	35.9%	39.1%
Not strange at all	19.6%	17.9%	21.5%

We now return to the new year greeting sending sample from Q1, with the non-senders skipping to Q9

Q8A: This year how will the number of all types of new year greetings you send change from last year? (Sample size=537, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=270	Female N=267
Increase	19.9%	17.0%	22.8%
Stay the same	66.5%	69.3%	63.7%
Decrease	13.6%	13.7%	13.5%

By age there is a definite trend for younger people to be sending more, older people less.

Q8B: This year how will the number of postcard-type new year greetings you send change from last year? (Sample size=537, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=270	Female N=267
Increase	15.6%	10.7%	20.6%
Stay the same	67.8%	71.5%	64.0%
Decrease	16.6%	17.8%	15.4%

Q8C: This year how will the number of computer email-type new year greetings you send change from last year? (Sample size=537, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=270	Female N=267
Increase	9.9%	8.9%	10.9%
Stay the same	81.9%	83.0%	80.9%
Decrease	8.2%	8.1%	8.2%

Q8D: This year how will the number of mobile phone email-type new year greetings you send change from last year? (Sample size=537, multiple answer)

	All	Male N=270	Female N=267
Increase	19.0%	14.8%	23.2%
Stay the same	72.1%	75.2%	68.9%
Decrease	8.9%	10.0%	7.9%

Almost half of the 15 to 19 year olds were planning to send more mobile greetings.

Q9: Which of the following statements do you agree with? (Sample size=624, multiple answer)

	Think so	Perhaps so	Perhaps not	Think not
It is a joy to receive a new year postcard from friends	67.0%	27.9%	4.5%	0.6%
It is more of a joy to receive a new year postcard rather than email	44.9%	38.0%	14.7%	2.4%
It’s a bother to prepare new year greetings	34.8%	47.0%	15.5%	2.7%
Exchanging new year greeting cards is an important custom	37.7%	40.4%	16.7%	5.3%
Lots of new year greetings indicate a wide network of contacts	19.1%	39.1%	35.1%	6.7%
Work-related greetings are more important than private greetings	4.0%	16.8%	55.3%	23.9%

Looking at the breakdown by sex and age, even amongst the email-keen teenage group over four in five preferred physical cards. As for exchanging cards, it was actually those in their thirties who saw it as a less-important custom.