世論 What Japan Thinks

With the hayfever season still in full swing in Japan – we’ve moved from cedar to hinoki cypress this week – japan.internet.com reported on a survey from goo Research into hayfever, looking particularly at where people find out about the pollen forecast.

Demographics

Between the 22nd and 24th of March 2013 1,079 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.9% of the sample were male, 16.2% in their teens, 18.4% in their twenties, 21.5% in their thirties, 16.2% in their forties, 15.7% in their fifties, and 12.0% aged sixty or older.

My hayfever is a little funny this year – I had a horrendous hayfever-like reaction to something at the end of December last year, but despite this year having elevated levels of pollen, all I had was a mildly blocked nose and gentle sneezing. Instead of having to beat the ENT doctor’s door down at the start of March as usual, this time I just went as I had a free afternoon at the end of March, and the doctor seemed surprised that my nose was showing few signs of irritation, so he did a blood test for allergen markers, but I still haven’t got round to picking up the results.

Here’s a link to an online pollen forecast for my prefecture. The pink/purple mark is for “exceptionally large amounts”.
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The start of the new financial and university year this month also brings us to the house moving season, so this look by goo Research, reported on by japan.internet.com, into property searching is rather timely.

Demographics

Over the 8th and 9th of March 2013 1,085 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.2% of the sample were male, 16.4% in their teens, 17.9% in their twenties, 21.8% in their thirties, 16.4% in their forties, 15.5% in their fifties, and 12.0% aged sixty or older.

The three times I searched for a flat in Japan, the first two times were with the aid of my employer filtering offerings from an estate agent, and the third time was via fliers that came through the door, not really the most high-tech method available!
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japan.internet.com recently reported on a survey by Weather News, entitled the first survey into hayfever.

Demographics

Between the 8th and 12th of March 2013 over 40,000 users of the Weather News web site completed a public survey. No further information was presented, including how many people actually reported having hayfever, although it might be that only hayfever sufferers completed the survey.

My hayfever actually started at the end of December, and I had to go to the doctor. However, it soon went away, then restarted at the start of March, and seems to come and go, but definitely lighter symptoms than last year, and I think we’ve now passed the worse of the cedar pollen.
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This is a curious topic for a survey, conducted by goo Research and reported on japan.internet.com, namely home appliance electronic sounds, the beeps and blips that many (most?) white goods make.

Demographics

Between the 25th and 27th of February 2013 1,094 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.6% of the sample were male, 13.7% in their teens, 15.7% in their twenties, 21.6% in their thirties, 17.0% in their forties, 14.6% in their fifties, and 17.4% aged sixty or older.

It’s been so long since I’ve been in the UK, but do western kitchen goods beep much? My microwave has a tone when it finishes, then three quick beeps every two minutes afterwards until you open the door. The rice cooker has an ugly beep when it cooks, the washing machine plays a few bars of Mozart on completion, and the bath plays a tune then announces “The bath has been drawn!” once it fills itself.
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Having had a rather negative look at SNS obsessions earlier this week, today we turn round 180 degrees with a report on japan.internet.com about a survey conducted by Just Systems into how things are between married couples since they started using LINE, a free text and voice chat service that is taking Japan by storm.

Demographics

Over the 11th and 12th of January 2013 800 married men and women (400 of each sex, but it is not clear if they are 400 couples) who both talk with each other on LINE completed a private internet-based questionnaire. They were aged between 20 and 49 years old, but no further demographics were provided.

Note that “talk” in the questions below covers both text and voice chat. In Q2, I don’t know if the imbalance in the sexes indicates that it was not couples married to each other who completed the survey, or if women don’t reply sometimes, or people are poor at estimating, or some combination of these or other factors.
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japan.internet.com reported on a recent survey by Neo Marketing into the true feelings (honne) of SNS users and found rather a lot getting a bit tired of the social grind.

Demographics

As with most non-goo Research surveys, the demographic information was lacking; 1,000 SNS users of both sexes between the ages of 20 and 49 completed a (presumably private) internet-based questionnaire at some unspecified date.

I keep my SNS usage to a minimum; indeed, my wife uses my Facebook account more than me, every day checking up on a few people to see what they are up to, whereas my usage is 99% automated reposts of this blog. I am more active on Google Plus, but as I find nothing wrong with just ignoring people (sorry, that’s just my character!) it never gets too burdensome.

Regarding Q3 and the dissatisfaction of getting requests from unknown people, I believe that when you sign up with Facebook and enter where you live, Facebook prompts you with a list of people nearby, so I occasionally get requests from Facebook newbies who live in the same town and probably think it would be cool to have a foreign friend. I, of course, just ignore them.

The article also had a quote from the head of a psychiartric clinic in Tokyo, saying that they are seeing a few patients having stress from work through SNS, which they have termed “social harrassment”. The doctor recommended taking a break from SNS now and again, and suggested avoiding it just before bedtime and/or Sundays.
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Macromill Research recently conducted a survey that looked at women and crying, and this article presents the report japan.internet.com wrote about the results.

Demographics

Over the 23rd and 24th of November 2012 415 female members of the Macromill monitor panel aged between 20 and 59 years old completed a private internet-based questionnaire.

Note that the survey excluded crying at movies, books, etc. Or, no doubt, being in close proximity to a sumo wrestler.
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I missed publishing this report before New Year, but I think the data is interesting enough for you to forgive me the slight slowness. It is a look at New Year greeting situation by Furyu, with the target of the survey being middle and high schoolgirls.

Demographics

Between the 14th and 16th of December 2012 270 middle and high schoolgirls (aged 13 to 18) who used the Pictlink site run by the survey company completed an internet-based questionnaire.

I must say I’m surprised by the results here, as the media tells me that schoolgirls are always on the leading edge of trends, yet good old-fashioned paper postcards maintain their strong showings, followed by bog standard email. However, LINE does put in a very strong showing, but Twitter and SNS barely register. It would also have been useful to see how many people were contacted via each method.

Not being a schoolgirl myself, all my greetings within Japan were postcards. Internet-only friends didn’t merit individually addressed felicitations!
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A recent survey from MMD Laboratory entitled 2012 smartphone user insight survey confirmed a trend I have seen with my own eyes; SNS usage, in particular LINE, has really taken off.

Demographics

Few demographics were presented; just that over the 18th and 19th of December 2012 670 smartphone using members of the MMD monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was aged between 20 and 59 years old.

When I initially read this survey, I was surprised to see email not featured anywhere, but finally I noticed that it was considered a built-in function. What I would really like to learn, though, is what people use for their main email provider; is it their carrier’s functionality or do they choose GMail or other third-party providers?
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goo Research recently conducted a survey into scheduling, the highlights of which were reported on by japan.internet.com.

Demographics

Between the 16th and 22nd of November 2012 1,072 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.2% of the sample were male, 16.3% in their teens, 18.6% in their twenties, 21.3% in their thirties, 15.8% in their forties, 16.0% in their fifties, and 12.0% aged sixty or older.

At work, I used to use a paper calendar to note appointments as our intranet schedule app was rather awful, but recently we’ve upgraded to Exchange, which is a whole lot easier to use, and can actually produce meeting reminders! Privately, I rely on my wife as the built-in Android app is pretty useless, and she always spends lots of time making sure her feature phone’s schedule is up-to-date.

Here’s one thing you can’t do with a smartphone schedule.

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