世論 What Japan Thinks

Healthy beer is a phrase one doesn’t hear too often, but that’s basically the title of a recent survey conducted by MyVoice into health-related beer-like drinks.

Demographics

Over the first five days of March 2008 14,373 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed an internet-based questionnaire. 54% of the sample was female, 15% in their twenties, 39% in their thirties, 30% in their forties, and 16% in their fifties. Note that since the legal drinking age is twenty, teenagers were excluded from this survey.

I got a free can of Kirin ZERO for going to see a cross-dressing dancing General Douglas MacArthur (don’t ask!) but my wife gave it away to the father-in-law before I got a chance to sample it. I tried Tanrei Green Label and it was just as much swill as the full-sugar Tanrei!

In Q7, being good for health is an interesting answer. I suspect it is not just a poor wording (“can control calorie intake” might have been better), but I’ve seen people on television interpret “not so bad for you” as “can consume as much as I like.” One strong memory is of an actor knocking back two or more bottles of red wine a night and being shocked when the doctor told him that that was a bad thing.
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I’m sure many other people like to grab a bit of chocolate as comfort food to cope with the stresses of daily life, and this survey from MyVoice into mood-changing and sweets showed that the Japanese are no different!

Demographics

Over the first five days of March 14,773 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54% were female, 1% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 38% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 17% in their fifties.

I rate pretty highly on the stress scale, and I do eat perhaps too much chocolate, especially at work to get me through the afternoon I snack on Petit Bit chocolate, with kinako (soya bean flour) flavour being my favourite at the moment.
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Ahh, excessive overtime, and especially the dreaded euphemistic-named “service overtime”, or unpaid overtime in proper English, is perhaps the biggest culture shock to foreign office workers when they come to Japan. We all have our pet theories about why, but this recent survey conducted by goo Research and reported on by CNET Japan into overtime and work efficiency perhaps answers some questions.

Demographics

Between the 22nd and 24th of February 2008 1,080 members of the goo Research monitor panel employed as businesspeople completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 68.2% were male, 24.5% in their twenties, 24.9% in their thirties, 25.3% in their forties, and 25,3% aged fifty or older.

My employer is one of the rare companies that has embraced Work-Life Balance as a slogan at least. However, some recent news that I don’t think I should mention has revealed that they are about to take a very bold, perhaps even unique in Japanese large companies, step to address one issue regarding this balance. We shall see how it all pans out…

The title of the survey implies that there was some questions regarding how people view the effectiveness of overtime; outside crunch times there is a general perception amongst foreigners that the Japanese spin out an 8 hour working day over 12 or more hours, so I’d have loved to have seen the outcome of questions regarding that issue. Sadly, the original Japanese article did not report this aspect.
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With the hay fever season upon us, and predictions of between three to five times the amount of cedar pollen flying around compared to last year, and with yellow sand from China also paying a visit, this recent survey from DIMSDRIVE Research into hay fever is quite timely.

Demographics

Between the 6th and 14th of February 2008 10,665 members of the DIMSDRIVE Monitors completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.8% of the sample was female, 1.2% in their teens, 14.9% in their twenties, 35.8% in their thirties, 29.1% in their forties, 13.3% in thei fifties, and 5.7% aged sixty or older.

Pictured above is Hello Kitty-branded Hana (nose) Celeb lotion-impregnated tissues that may or may not prevent redness after blowing one’s nose a lot while suffering from hay fever.

The thing that irritates me the most about hay fever in others is the Japanese reluctance to blow their noses in public, as it is too embarrassing compared to pulling a face as one makes sniffing noises at regular intervals. It’s almost enough to get me over my dislike of MP3 players and drown out the rest of the carriage on the ride home.

I don’t get cedar hay fever fortunately, although I do have a couple of other allergies that usually result in a runny nose and the occassional sneeze.

Last year I looked at a similar survey into hay fever by MyVoice that might be a useful cross-reference.
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The big health buzzword last year and this has been metabolic syndrome, or metabo as it is abbreviated in Japan. For Japanese people to be diagnosed as metabolic syndrome you must have at least three of the following five signs. For men, waist over 90 cm, for women over 80 cm; blood pressure greater than 130/85 mmHg, neutral fat of 150 mg/dL or more; HDL (good cholesterol) of under 40 mg/dL for men, 50 mg/dL for women; and blood sugar over 100 mg/dL. However, there appears to be slight regional variations for these measures. Anyway, DIMSDRIVE Research recently performed a survey to find out about health checks.

Demographics

Between the 23rd and 31st of January 2008 9,863 members of the DIMSDRIVE Monitor pool completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.3% of the sample was female, 1.2% in their teens, 14.8% in their twenties, 36.3% in their thirties, 29.1% in their forties, 13.0% in their fifties, and 5.6% aged sixty or older.

All Japanese companies are required to provide regular health checks for their employees; the company I work for once a year gets everyone in for eyes, ears, blood pressure, urine test, poo test and chest xray, and for older people barium meal, ECG, and blood test. In addition they have another annual test of physical strength, with grip strength measurement, bike riding, sit-ups, reaction time, blood vessel hardness and balancing on one leg.
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My new place, being a bit posh, is serviced by a Co-op home delivery service that perhaps at least 10% take advantage of, but we’ve never tried, and I don’t know if people order via the phone or by the internet. Wifey also occasionally orders ready-made foods via phone, fax, and internet, so this survey reported on by japan.internet.com and conducted by JR Tokai Express Research Inc into food ingredient online home delivery services was of interest to me. Note that this is for ingredients, not prepared food delivery.

Demographics

On the 22nd of February 2008 330 members of the JR Tokai Express Research online monitor team employed in either the public or private sector took part in a private internet-based questionnaire. 57.3% were male, 17.9% were in their twenties, 36.4% in their thirties, 26.1% in their forties, 6.1% in their fifties, and 8.2% in their sixties. Note that usually JR Tokai Express has 80% male when they survey employed people, so I don’t know if the more even sex balance is due to them selecting a more balanced group, an error in the report, or self-selection.

I suppose the main thing stopping me from using online ordering is that for fresh items, I really want to be able to cast my eye over them to check that I am picking the best available, not just good enough.
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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.
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So you go, and you stand on your own
And you leave on your own
And you go home, and you cry
And you want to die

So sung The Smiths, in what was voted the second-best lyric of all time in Britain a few years back. Interestingly enough, that which caused so much Morrissey-inflicted student angst was voted in a recent survey conducted by goo Ranking as the thing Japanese find most unexpectedly enjoyable for one. Well, almost; a concert could be at a club, but let’s not nit-pick!

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.

Don’t ask me why cat’s cradle comes in at number 18 as I only know it as a solo activity. At 19 is “The Game of Life”, which is I believe the most popular or recognisable board game in Japan, much like Monopoly is the representative game in the UK and the USA.
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This week too was a bit thin for silly surveys, so the best I can do for you today is a not really silly and not really very long, but quite interesting pair of surveys from DIMSDRIVE Research’s 133rd ranking survey on two Japanese teeth-related subjects, frequency of brushing and oral care other than brushing.

Demographics

Both surveys were conducted between the 16th and 24th of January 2008. The first had 12,020 respondents with 52.9% female, the second 11,963 with 53.0% female.

You’ll notice in the second question that regular check-ups feature really quite low, and flossing or inter-dental brushing (uggh, dislike both and don’t bother myself) feature nowhere, not even in the detailed run-down of the results by age group. Also, there are only about 5,000 votes in total, which means about half the population don’t take extra any oral care bar brushing. For those of you who have experienced oyaji breath you might be surprised to learn that it was young men rather than older ones who were more likely to brush less than once a day or not at all.

I also chew Xylitol gum after every meal at home; PLUS X Gum from Lotte is exceptionally nice.
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As the second part of the survey published on Saturday into English study, this is a recent poll conducted by goo Research in conjuction with the Yomiuri Shimbun as part of their 13th Topi-Q Net survey into the matter of objectives for 2008.

Demographics

Between the 21st and 25th of December 2007 549 young members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sex ratio was reported as 1:1 male to female, but there obviously was one odd person left over. The ages of the respondents ranged between teens to thirties, although the exact split is not reported. 40% of the sample were students in either secondary or tertiary education, 28% were full-time employees, and 12% homemakers, with the other 20% presumably made up of part-timers, NEETs, etc.

It’s a bit depressing, I suppose, than in Q1SQ1 only one in ten is going to make 2008 the year of love, with far more people likely to have their nose stuck in a book rather than anywhere else. At least, however, there was a decent degree of positive reflection on the year past, with almost half rating the past year at 70 out of 100 or more.
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