世論 What Japan Thinks

Yet another positive noise that the Democratic Party of Japan have made since coming into power is the discussion of a smoking ban to prevent second-hand smoking, a topic that was the subject of this recent survey from iShare. Like many other of the DPJ’s proposals, however, this is a rather half-baked idea that doesn’t at the moment have any fines proposed for non-compliance, and a lack of joined-up government has seen talk of punative cigarette tax shelved.

Demographics

Between the 18th and 23rd of February 2010 411 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.5% of the sample were male, 28.7% in their twenties, 32.6% in their thirties, and 38.7% in their forties.

Quite frankly, I find the smoking rates hard to believe. The usual figures I hear quoted are a little over 30% of men and 10% of women, yet here we have 23% and 12%, yet 19% male quitters and an incredible 18% female quitters!

I think there’s only one restaurant that I frequent that makes no particular attempt to separate smokers; all the rest are either all non-smoking or at least make a decent attempt to keep the smokers at bay.
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Last year Kirin started with Kirin Zero, a completely alcohol-free drink that supposedly tastes like beer, and they were soon followed by all the other major brewers. To see how people drink them, iShare conducted a survey into these beer taste soft drinks.

Demographics

Between the 15th and 18th of February 2010 509 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.6% of the sample were male, 31.8% in their twenties, 30.8% in their thirties, and 37.3% in their forties.

I’ve drunk one can once - well, I drunk half a can and poured the rest away. It did look quite beer-like in colour and head, but the taste was just like what I imagine fizzy hops tea would be.

It gets promoted at a couple of the restaurants that I frequent, but it always seems to be priced just the same as real beer, and much higher than ordinary fizzy drinks. I’d stick with ginger beer if I was in the situation of needing to drive after a drinking party!
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I’m not really sure how the pie chart I have extracted from this survey by iShare into body complexes relates to the subject, but I thought it was interesting enough to graph.

Demographics

Between the 3rd and 8th of February 2010 497 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 56.1% of the sample were male, 31.6% in their twenties, 29.4% in their thirties, and 39.0% in their forties.

I don’t have any complexes, I don’t think, although I used to have a thing about my teeth, but that was a justified complex as they were in a terrible state, so a good few visits to the dentist fixed all that.

I’d love to have seen hair as a separate category, as I think many Japanese men are conditioned by the media to expect to have a full head of black hair well into their middle age. I’m going a bit thin on top and silver in the stubble myself, but it seems to bother my wife more than me!
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With the economy going down the toilet and quite a few interesting in earning a bit on the side, this recent survey from goo Ranking takes a look at what side jobs people would like to try.

Demographics

Between the 20th and 22nd of January 2010 1,071 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 51.1% of the sample were female, 19.9% in their teens, 29.5% in their twenties, 30.5% in their thirties, and 20.1% in their forties. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

Since everyone completing the survey is already a questionnaire monitor, although for just a nominal reward, the number one answer is either completely predictable or is implying that people would really want to answer questions for money.

Which reminds me, Get paid to take surveys! Join for free now! Just follow that link and you too can earn money by answering questionnaires, but more importantly I can earn money doing job number two…

iShare took a look at looking people in the eye when talking and found over one in four don’t usually do so.

Demographics

Between the 29th of January and the 3rd of February 2010 501 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.9% of the sample were male, 34.7% in their twenties, 32.5% in their thirties, and 32.7% in their forties.

I decided to check how I did tonight as I was meeting a whole bunch of new foreigners at work (the company-sponsored social event really pushed the boat out with a few boxes of Mister Donut and pots of coffee. Let’s talk about doughtnuts for a while in these parentheses - there wasn’t even a single Pon De Ring or any of their new range; since they got a bulk order they must have filled up with the most boring selection possible) Ah yes, back at the party (I want to have another parenthetical digression, but I’ll resist) I did find I looked people in the eyes just about all the time when they were talking, and most of the time when I was, I hope, which was quite a bit more eye contact than I thought I did do.
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This very comprehensive study by DIMSDRIVE Research into convenience store usage found out many interesting facts, such as almost two-thirds of those living alone frequent them quite frequently.

Demographics

Between the 2nd and 17th of September 2009 8,317 members of the DIMSDRIVE monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.4% of the sample were female, 0.8% in their teens, 12.0% in their twenties, 33.2% in their thirties, 31.6% in their forties, 15.8% in their fifties, and 6.6% aged sixty or older.

I pop into a convenience store about two or three times a week, usually ones inside stations run by the railway company, although I don’t know if they were in scope of this survey or not. The other times I use convenience stores it’s mostly to pay bills or to use the photocopier or occasionally to pick up tickets.
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I have an irrational dislike of seeing people using toothpicks, the subject of a survey from iShare.

Demographics

Between the 27th of January and 1st of February 2010 500 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54.7% of the sample were male, 30.2% in their twenties, 34.5% in their thirties, and 35.3% in their forties.

I have once used a toothpick in a restaurant, but it didn’t feel right. Old guys wondering around chewing the end of a toothpick in particular irritates me. Oh, and on a flight to the USA this week the American woman in the seat beside me spend a lot of time picking the remains of her beef or chicken out of her teeth.

Note that many (most?) restaurants in Japan have toothpicks at the table.
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iShare recently asked their survey panel about what food smells get their juices flowing.

Demographics

Between the 6th and 12th of January 2010 588 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54.6% of the sample were male, 32.1% in their twenties, 32.8% in their thirties, and 35.0% in their forties.

I love depachika on the whole, although I stay away from the meat counter. My least favourite food smell is buta-man, Chinese pork steamed bun, which is sold at a couple of stations on the way home, and anyone bringing it into my carriage really turns my stomach.
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Don’t say I don’t bring you rather strange surveys, as here is iShare’s look at sewing buttons, an activity that sems to be taught in most Japanese schools, to boys as well as girls.

Demographics

Between the 18th and 21st of January 2010 509 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 51.9% of the sample were male, 33.2% in their twenties, 34.0% in their thirties, and 32.8% in their forties.

I never learnt such matters in school myself, although we did have home economics, but that focused on cooking skills on the whole. If I lose a button these days I just ask wifey nicely to fix it, and sometimes she in fact actually does do it for me.
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iBridge Research Plus recently conducted a survey into family phone bills, which was reported on by japan.internet.com.

Demographics

On the 12th of January 2010 300 married female members of the iBridge monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 6.0% of the sample were in their twenties, 38.3% in their thirties, 34.3% in their forties, 15.7% in their fifties, and 5.7% in their sixties.

Both our phone bills come out of the family budget. I personally run up 2,600 yen per month on just about the cheapest plan going, wifey 8,000 yen or so depending on how many voice calls she makes.

Without knowing the number of people with school-aged mobile phone owning children, it’s difficult to judge if the 41 people in Q1SQ1 who pay children’s bills is large or small.
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