世論 What Japan Thinks

Neo Marketing recently conducted a survey, reported on by japan.internet.com, into seniors and cars, targeting the over 60 age group.

Demographics

Between the 16th and 20th of May 2013 500 male and female car licence holders between the ages of 60 and 79 years old completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The respondents were drawn from Neo Marketing’s monitor panel, presumably.

I think the Daihatsu system (Toyota also has the same feature?) has an excellent feature that detects trying to run over a curb or block when starting to move, to assist people who would otherwise mash the wrong pedal and drive through a shop window and other such accidents that we often hear of.

I don’t like many of the collision avoidance advertisements, though, as they seem to suggest that one doesn’t really need to pay much attention when driving.
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japan.internet.com recently reported on a survey into driving and navigation systems, conducted by Micware, a company that not coincidentally makes a oddly-spelt navigation Android app Comcierpass…

Demographics

Between the 17th and 19th of July 2012 600 respondents between the ages of 20 and 59 were chosen by some means to complete a survey. The only further demographic information was that they all drove a car at least once per month.

I’lll be doing one of my three drives a year on Friday, when I go off to visit various graves for Obon. The car I rent from Toyota comes with a navigation system as standard, but the maps are often a year or so out of date, unfortunately. Indeed, one of the graves we’ll be visiting has had a new housing estate built nearby and opened about two years ago, but the maps are not yet updated and every time I almost miss the turn as there is no announcement!
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iShare recently took a look at drivers’ first road accident, and found that almost half of all license holders are still to have their first.

Demographics

Between the 24th and 28th of February 2011 641 members of the CLUB BQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54.9% of the sample were male, 28.4% in their twenties, 32.6% in their thirties, and 39.0% in their forties.

The figure of almost half the drivers having never had an accident may be high in part due to a lot of “paper drivers”, the name for people with driving licenses but who never actually drive. Although I got a parking ticket last year I’ve never had an accident in my time in Japan, but that’s mainly due to only driving about four or five times a year! Back in the UK my first accident was scraping the side of the car against a post as I was parking, a feat I repeated a mere month later.
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If there’s one thing Japanese drivers hate, it’s fags and other rubbish being tossed out of car windows, according to this survey from iShare into driving manners.

You’ll notice that there are a couple of questions regarding insurance. This is because the survey was conducted in conjunction with American Home and their car insurance arm, American Home Direct.

Demographics

On the 6th of September 2010 1,067 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-base questionnaire. All of the respondents had free use of a car that they drove at least once a week. 85.0% of the sample were male, 3.0% in their twenties, 38.5% in their thirties, 44.0% in their forties, and 14.5% in their fifties.

The demographics are quite different from the usual CLUB BBQ ones – the male:female split is usually closer to 50:50, and the twenties age group around 30%, indicating that younger and female ownership of cars is pretty low.

My worst manners in others is poor indicating, although my own driving manners are perfect. People who dangle their hand holding a ciggie out the window irrationally annoy me too. Being driven by someone who doesn’t anticipate is my way of spotting a useless driver.
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As well as being one of the more popular hobbies in Japan, driving is also a popular date activity. However, the mood can be spoilt, so this survey from goo Ranking looked at what got the passenger annoyed at the driver and the driver annoyed at the passenger.

Demographics

Between the 21st and 24th of May 2010 1,152 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 61.0% of the sample were male, 11.2% in their teens, 20.7% in their twenties, 28.8% in their thirties, 21.8% in their forties, 10.2% in their fifties, and 7.3% 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.

Given the nature of dating and the relationship of the sexes, I would guess that most of the passengers are female and the drivers are male.

As my wife doesn’t have a licence, her back-seat driving particularly irritates me, followed closely by her terrible directions, occasionally overriding the car navigation’s correct route. Then there’s the constant toilet breaks, lack of distance awareness in both “Are we there yet?” and in setting up 500 km routes that don’t take into account the effect of tiredness on me. And then there’s… I’d better stop now.

Photo of a taxi traffic jam from MatthewRad on flickr.
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Read more on: car,date,goo ranking

Recently japan.internet.com reported on a survey conducted by Marsh Inc into car (satellite) navigation systems.

Demographics

Between the 11th and 14th of March 2010 300 driving license-holding car owners completed a private internet-baed questionnaire. 50.0% of the sample were female, 20.0% in their twenties, 20.0% in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, 20.0% in their fifties, and 20.0% aged sixty or older.

In the west I have been getting the impression recently that dedicated car navigation devices are being pushed out by smartphones with often free navigation software. However, in Japan the market is quite well-established with large-screen feature-filled system the norm, so perhaps smartphones will have less of an impact here. That would be an interesting aspect to perform a survey on.

The report does note that compared to just seven months ago (September 2009), the share of owners has gone up by five percentage points.
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Here’s an interesting look with iShare at driving, looking in particular at poor driving habits.

Demographics

Between the 4th and 7th of January 2010 495 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 55.4% of the sample were male, 33.5% in their twenties, 31.9% in their thirties, and 34.5% in their forties.

In Q2SQ1 the issue of “paper drivers” is highlighted – paper drivers is a Japanese expression (it’s actually the English words that are used) that indicates people who are qualified on paper but never actually do much if any driving. I’m probably borderline paper myself as my driving is limited to renting a car just a handful of times every year.

In Q2SQ2, I wonder if we can assume that the 25% who drive to the speed limit are regular speeders? On empty motorways I might occasionally wander one or two kilometres per hour over the limit, but on busy urban highways and surface streets I do usually run just a little bit under the limit and I certainly do always maintain my distance from the car in front.
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Here’s an interesting look with Marsh Inc, reported on by japan.internet.com, into hands-free mobile phone equipment.

Demographics

Between the 7th and 9th of October 2009 300 members of the Marsh monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.0% of the sample were female, 2.7% in their teens, 17.3% in their twenties, 20.0% in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, 20.0% in their fifties, and 20.0% aged sixty or older.

Considering that Bluetooth is not standard on even high-end phones, and given that talking isn’t really that popular in Japan anyway, one rarely sees the earpiece kit on pedestrians (certainly not in the Osaka area, although it might be a bit more popular in Tokyo) so I suspect the devices are just as rare in cars.

The article also notes that the fine for using a mobile phone while driving is 5,000 yen for a bicycle, 6,000 yen for a car or motorbike, and 7,000 yen for a large vehicle. This goes up to 50,000 yen if you cause an accident, etc. The basic fine seems a bit low considering I got done for 15,000 yen for parking for under 10 minutes in a back-street just last month.
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The government of Japan may have changed, but the Cabinet Office Japan surveys are carrying on – it’ll be interesting to see if I can detect a change in tone in the questions. This survey was entitled a built environment for pedestrians, but also covered most other local transport means.

Demographics

Between the 16th of July and the 2nd of August 2009 5,000 members of the public were selected at random to complete the survey; 3,157 people, or 63.1%, agreed to cooperate. 54.4% of this sample were female, 7.8% in their twenties, 14.3% in their thirties, 17.1% in their forties, 19.8% in their fifties, 23.4% in their sixties, and 17.6% aged seventy or older. Additionally, 46.1% were employed, 11.6% were self-employed, 3.0% were home workers, and 39.3% were unemployed, including students and housewives, who made up 60.9% of that 39.3%. Finally, 47.8% drove some form of motorised transport almost every day, 15.7% several times a week, 7.3% several times a month, 8.3% had a licence but didn’t drive, and 20.9% did not have a licence.

For me, to walk or cycle to the shops involves traversing an exceptionally steep hill and a bit of pavement-free road, whereas instead my train season ticket allows me to hop on a train and ride one stop down the line to get right into my suburban town centre.
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The government of Japan may have changed, but the Cabinet Office Japan surveys are carrying on – it’ll be interesting to see if I can detect a change in tone in the questions. This survey was entitled a built environment for pedestrians, but also covered most other local transport means.

Demographics

Between the 16th of July and the 2nd of August 2009 5,000 members of the public were selected at random to complete the survey; 3,157 people, or 63.1%, agreed to cooperate. 54.4% of this sample were female, 7.8% in their twenties, 14.3% in their thirties, 17.1% in their forties, 19.8% in their fifties, 23.4% in their sixties, and 17.6% aged seventy or older. Additionally, 46.1% were employed, 11.6% were self-employed, 3.0% were home workers, and 39.3% were unemployed, including students and housewives, who made up 60.9% of that 39.3%. Finally, 47.8% drove some form of motorised transport almost every day, 15.7% several times a week, 7.3% several times a month, 8.3% had a licence but didn’t drive, and 20.9% did not have a licence.

I have a licence but rent a car about once every two months or so, so I don’t really know where I would fall in the demographic question above. I also managed to get a fixed penalty parking fine (15,000 yen!) last weekend, but that’s another story.

My commute is train only – my home is one minute from the station, work is two minutes away at the other end, so I cannot see any point in having a car.
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Read more on: bicycle,cabinet office japan,car,environment,transport,walking