世論 What Japan Thinks

[part 1][part 2]

We’ve looked before at handsomeness, but this time Macromill Inc looked at the slightly more specific topic of men’s grooming. This report is rather detailed, so apologies in advance!

Demographics

Between the 25th and 27th of September 2007 515 male members of the Macromill Monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. Exactly 20% were aged between 15 and 19, 20% in their twenties, 20% in their thirties, 20% in their forties, and 20% in their fifties. In addition, 282 people, or 54.8%, were not married.

It does seem interesting that almost a third are concerned about sweat-related issues, although there is no follow-on question regarding what people try to do to counter this. However, Q1 in the first half of the survey indicated just under a quarter purchase deodorant, so one does wonder why the extra 5% or more don’t use it.
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[part 1][part 2]

We’ve looked before at handsomeness, but this time Macromill Inc looked at the slightly more specific topic of men’s grooming. This report is rather detailed, so apologies in advance!

Demographics

Between the 25th and 27th of September 2007 515 male members of the Macromill Monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. Exactly 20% were aged between 15 and 19, 20% in their twenties, 20% in their thirties, 20% in their forties, and 20% in their fifties. In addition, 282 people, or 54.8%, were not married.

I find Q1 a bit difficult to understand, especially for basics like shampoo. I find it difficult to believe that 20% don’t wash their hair, but perhaps it is a differentiation between just cheap no-brand no-particular-effect shampoo versus a name brand. Conversely, does only 53.7% using face soap mean the rest just splash with water, or use hand soap, or don’t have a separate hand soap and face soap? Finally, just over half using rinse is surprisingly high to me.
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Following up, I suppose, on a recent ranking survey regarding what were the basic dealbreakers for potential spouses, goo Rankings came up with another entertaining survey looking at what husbands’ bad habits wives want to tell them to fix, but just can’t, and vice versa. The survey was conducted between the 28th and 30th of August 2007.

My wife informs me that she has no bad habits that I should ask her to fix (now that’s a bad habit that doesn’t feature on the list!), but my two main bad habits also don’t feature on the list, namely adjusting the lay of the land, as it were, and noxious gas emissions.

I suppose that number 15 for men and 18 for women is shorthand for a lack of rumpy-pumpy.
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I too would love an extra hour in bed at weekdays, but unfortunately one extra hour then would mean both a crowded train and extra overtime, so it’s at 5:30 am I must wake on weekdays. Recently MyVoice conducted a survey to find out how the Japanese feel about the matter, looking at the topic of mornings.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2007 13,641 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet survey. 54% of the sample was female, 2% in their teens, 16% in their twenties, 40% in their thirties, 27% in their forties, and 15% aged fifty or older.

In Q2SQ and Q4, only 1.8% and 2.1% selected doing the other if they had time in the mornings, which no doubt goes some way to explaining the low birth rate in Japan…
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I personally go to Subway about once every few months and Mister Donuts with about the same frequency; Subway for carry-out dinner, Mister Donuts to loiter and drink lots of free coffee refills! However, it is obvious that McD’s are wildly popular in Japan, and this recent survey by MyVoice on fast food backs up this casual observation.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2007 13,728 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54% of the sample was female, 2% in their teens, 17% in their twenties, 39% in their thirties, 27% in their forties, and 15% in their fifties.

I’d love to know exactly why McDonalds comes tops of frequency of use in Q3 but MOS Burger is prefered in Q5. One reason is definitely the relative number of outlets; 1,500 MOS Burgers but 3,800 McDs, and the second being price; McDs has plenty of 100 yen menu options, whereas MOS Burgers sell for about 700 yen each. Since MOS Burger’s selling point is quality, they refuse to get into price wars.

Lotteria have recently annouced a 100 yen menu to compete with McDonalds, and the bonus question in Q6 on Krispy Kreme Doughnuts is perhaps inspired by the huge queues outside their shop, even after nine months after opening!

Oh, and the MOS of MOuSe Burger is made up from the initials for “Mountain, Ocean, Sky”, apparently.
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One thing I feel is very different since coming to Japan is that the insect population is totally different from at home; there we had bees, flies and bluebottles, caterpillars and midges; in our garden now we have praying mantises, crickets, cicidas, big dragonflies, stink bugs, asian tiger mosquitoes(vicious wee black things that bring me out in big allergic bumps) and of course the occasional cockroach, although those do not last long. To find out what the Japanese think of all these various creepie-crawlies, MyVoice conducted a survey on insects.

Demographics

Over the first five days of September 2007 13,734 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54% of the sample was female, 2% in their teens, 18% in their twenties, 39% in their thirties, 27% in their forties, and 14% in their fifties.

In Q7, I wonder if most westerns are suprised that the Japanese see themselves as ants much more than as bees. Perhaps this is because the word for bee, hachi, covers (I thinks…) not just the honey bee, but wasps and hornets too.

I’ve never actually seen a firefly myself; the closest I come is passing through 蛍池, Hotaru Ga Ike, Firefly Pond, every day, but whatever water-based insect feature that may have been there in the past has, I suspect, long ago been concreted over.
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The Cabinet Office Japan recently released the results of a survey they conducted into citizens’ lifestyles. I translated a survey on the same topic conducted two years ago, which may be useful as a cross-reference. See also part 3 of the survey from 2005.

Demographics

Between the 5th and 22nd of July 2007 10,000 members of the public were randomly selected from presumably the electoral rolls. Of that number, 6,086 people actually took part in the survey, conducted by means of face-to-face interviews. The sample was 53.2% female, 9.1% in their twenties, 14.5% in their thirties, 15.4% in their forties, 21.0% in their fifties, 20.7% in their sixties, 15.2% in their seventies, and 4.5% aged eighty or older. In addition, 8.7% lived alone, 24.4% with a spouse, 48.9% in a nuclear household, 15.6% with grandparents or grandchildren, 0.7% in other types of family environment, and 1.7% in other non-family-based living arrangements. 73.7% were married, 12.1% divorced or widowed, 14.0% unmarried, and 0.2% did not answer. 80.2% lived in an owned house, 2.5% in an owned apartment, 3.9% in a rented home, 10.8% in a rented apartment, 0.3% in a company house, 1.6% in a company apartment, 0.4% in other arrangements, and 0.1% didn’t know where they lived. Finally, 27.2% were daily internet browsers at home or work, 16.5% were occasional browsers, 6.8% just used email, and 49.1% barely used it at all, with 0.4% don’t knows.

It’s been an interesting survey; almost all positive answers are up one or two percentage points on last time, although it isn’t clear as to why there has been this slight improvement. Perhaps the outlook for the economy doesn’t look quite as gloomy as it did two years ago?
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The Cabinet Office Japan recently released the results of a survey they conducted into citizens’ lifestyles. I translated a survey on the same topic conducted two years ago, which may be useful as a cross-reference. See also part 2 of the survey from 2005.

Demographics

Between the 5th and 22nd of July 2007 10,000 members of the public were randomly selected from presumably the electoral rolls. Of that number, 6,086 people actually took part in the survey, conducted by means of face-to-face interviews. The sample was 53.2% female, 9.1% in their twenties, 14.5% in their thirties, 15.4% in their forties, 21.0% in their fifties, 20.7% in their sixties, 15.2% in their seventies, and 4.5% aged eighty or older. In addition, 8.7% lived alone, 24.4% with a spouse, 48.9% in a nuclear household, 15.6% with grandparents or grandchildren, 0.7% in other types of family environment, and 1.7% in other non-family-based living arrangements. 73.7% were married, 12.1% divorced or widowed, 14.0% unmarried, and 0.2% did not answer. 80.2% lived in an owned house, 2.5% in an owned apartment, 3.9% in a rented home, 10.8% in a rented apartment, 0.3% in a company house, 1.6% in a company apartment, 0.4% in other arrangements, and 0.1% didn’t know where they lived. Finally, 27.2% were daily internet browsers at home or work, 16.5% were occasional browsers, 6.8% just used email, and 49.1% barely used it at all, with 0.4% don’t knows.

I decided to highlight the figures from Q6 that suggest one in five feel they have plenty of spare time and 44.2% have some; this compares to a recent survey from MyVoice where just 46% felt they had free time. This apparent disparity can be explained partially by the sample sizes; 40% of the sample here is past retirement age, so no doubt they have much more free time than the MyVoice community, which has a high percentage of young office workers and housewifes with school-age children.
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The Cabinet Office Japan recently released the results of a survey they conducted into citizens’ lifestyles. I translated a survey on the same topic conducted two years ago, which may be useful as a cross-reference. See also part 1 of the survey from 2005.

Demographics

Between the 5th and 22nd of July 2007 10,000 members of the public were randomly selected from presumably the electoral rolls. Of that number, 6,086 people actually took part in the survey, conducted by means of face-to-face interviews. The sample was 53.2% female, 9.1% in their twenties, 14.5% in their thirties, 15.4% in their forties, 21.0% in their fifties, 20.7% in their sixties, 15.2% in their seventies, and 4.5% aged eighty or older. In addition, 8.7% lived alone, 24.4% with a spouse, 48.9% in a nuclear household, 15.6% with grandparents or grandchildren, 0.7% in other types of family environment, and 1.7% in other non-family-based living arrangements. 73.7% were married, 12.1% divorced or widowed, 14.0% unmarried, and 0.2% did not answer. 80.2% lived in an owned house, 2.5% in an owned apartment, 3.9% in a rented home, 10.8% in a rented apartment, 0.3% in a company house, 1.6% in a company apartment, 0.4% in other arrangements, and 0.1% didn’t know where they lived. Finally, 27.2% were daily internet browsers at home or work, 16.5% were occasional browsers, 6.8% just used email, and 49.1% barely used it at all, with 0.4% don’t knows.

There seems a high level of general satisfaction with their current lifestyles, which goes against the typical foreigner’s (or perhaps I hang out in the wrong neighbourhood?) perception of the miserable wage slave slogging his life away on pointless work. Perhaps the true answer is a mix of the two images; or perhaps it is my bias, the average worker is accepting of his lot.
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This is a subject where I think stereotypes diverge greatly from the reality. Ask someone what the Japanese eat and you get tales of lots of vegetable-based side dishes lovingly prepared, but if you observe the reality you’ll find that fast foods and fried foods abound, and vegetables are often limited to just a lettuce leaf or a teacup-sized salad of sliced cabbage. To find out more about this subject, DIMSDRIVE Research recently performed a survey on vegetables.

Demographics

Between the 18th and 26th of July 2007 8,135 members of DIMSDRIVE Research’s monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 57.0% of the sample was female, 0.8% in their teens, 14.9% in their twenties, 35.5% in their thirties, 28.5% in their forties, 14.1% in their fifties, and 6.2% aged sixty or older. In addition, 12.8% lived alone, 24.0% lived with one other person, 25.6% with two others, 24.1% with three others, and 13.5% with four or more other people.

Supermarket vegetable quality is very variable; I sometimes use Jusco or Daiei, and find that most of the time their veggies are average to poor quality. However, right opposite Jusco is Kohyo, a slightly more upmarket chain who are just as cheap, if not cheaper, than Jusco yet have so much higher quality. The best I’ve found in town was a farmer’s co-op shop that was almost half the price of the nearest supermarket.

In Q3SQ4, I was suprised to see that country or area of origin of food was relatively low on the list despite the recent scares about Chinese foods being laced with chemicals and the amount of emphasis that the average Japanese seems to place on foods from particular traditional localities in Japan.
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