世論 What Japan Thinks

Having previously looked at rumours about girls’ schools, here we have goo Ranking looking at the characteristics of men educated in boys’ schools.

Demographics

Between the 17th and 18th of January 2012 1,048 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 61.6% of the sample were female, 12.3% in their teens, 15.6% in their twenties, 27.9% in their thirties, 25.8% in their forties, 9.5% in their fifties, and 8.9% in their sixties. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample. This survey was presumably for the women only.

Looking at the list, I must have gone to a boys’ school! Except for number 20, I hasten to add.

I don’t know much at all about Japanese boys school, although I do have a very strong image about British boys’ schools, which tend to be public boarding schools that foster a lot of number 4 in particular, if you catch my drift.
Read the rest of this entry »

A recent survey from goo Research into communication with school in times of disasters was conducted in conjunction with http://wdsd.net/, another company in the same NTT Resonant group as goo Research that provides mailing list services to schools for communicating with parents and guardians in times of disaster and other occasions.

Demographics

Between the 27th and 30th of October 2011 350 parents or guardians of middle school or high school children who lived in the Eastern or Northern areas of Japan (one of Tokyo, Kanagawa, Chiba, Saitama, Tochigi, Ibaraki, Gunma, Yamanashi, Nagano, Niigata, Aomori, Yamagata, Akita, Iwate, Miyagi, or Fukushima Prefectures) completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54.0% of the sample were male, 8.0% in their thirties, 64.0% in their forties, 27.7% in their fifties, and 0.3% in their sixties.

Note that the areas surveyed were those that were affected the most by the March 11th earthquake, which is a focus of many of the questions below.
Read the rest of this entry »

April is the start of the new school year, thus is also the time for gift-giving to children starting at new schools, the subject of a survey from goo Research and reported on by japan.internet.com. They also looked at starting work, but the data was not reported in the article.

Demographics

Between the 30th of March and the 1st of April 2011 1,082 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.1% of the sample were male, 16.5% in their teens, 18.3% in their twenties, 21.8% in their thirties, 16.1% in their forties, 15.7% in their fifties, and 11.6% aged sixty or older.

I’m a bit surprised that a tablet computer didn’t figure higher within any of the lists – I’ve seen a lot of people rave over the educational uses of an iPad, and even I would consider giving it to any primary school age kids I might have in the future.

Note that the questions were only for people planning to give or who had already given gifts this season. 127 people fell into this category for primary school, 77 for middle school, and 90 for high school.
Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s silliness is from goo Ranking as usual, this time looking at what surprises people have when encountering after many a year male friends from middle school. The surprises for both men and women were ranked. I translated the female version previously.

Demographics

Between the 23rd and 25th of March 2010 1,128 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.5% of the sample were female, 15.1% in their teens, 16.9% in their twenties, 28.8% in their thirties, 21.1% in their forties, 9.4% in their fifties, and 8.7% 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.

I’m surprised that “He used to have a cool hair but is now going bald/grey” or the like doesn’t feature in the list! I also don’t know what the surprise is about people starting up their own businesses.
Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s silliness is from goo Ranking as usual, this time looking at what surprises people have when encountering after many a year female friends from middle school. The surprises for both men and women were ranked. I’ll be sure to report on the old school male friends whenever it appears.

Demographics

Between the 23rd and 25th of March 2010 1,128 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.5% of the sample were female, 15.1% in their teens, 16.9% in their twenties, 28.8% in their thirties, 21.1% in their forties, 9.4% in their fifties, and 8.7% 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.

I don’t think I’ve ever really had a surprise from meeting old school friends of either sex, but I suppose I don’t really make much attempt to keep in contact, whereas in Japan keeping track of your ex-classmates appears to be the norm.
Read the rest of this entry »

Recently goo Research conducted a survey into private junior and senior high school information systems for influenza outbreaks, quite a relevant survey with currently around 25% of all schools reporting class or whole school closures due to new-type ‘flu, as it’s known as in these parts.

Demographics

Between the 1st and 18th of October 2009 1,396 private middle and high schools from all over the country were contacted by post, with 220 schools responding, a pretty poor 15.8% response rate. The schools responding were 5.5% middle schools, 59.5% high schools, and 35.5% others, chiefly joint middle and high schools. The responding people were 7.3% school principals, 36.1% head teacher or vice-principals, 8.7% teachers, 1.4% school office staff, 44.3% health-related staff, and 2.3% others.

Also this week vaccination against swine flu has started in Japan, but despite having a national health service where most people pay just 30% of their bills, the vaccine is going to be paid for, at about 4,000 yen a shot, I think. Non-priority cases such as myself are at the end of the queue, so it will be next spring at least before I might be due one, but by that time I think enough people will have caught it (including myself?) making the jab unnecessary. If people start dropping dead in their hundreds this winter I’ll adjust my attitude, but for now I’m not interested.

Read the rest of this entry »

Recently there has been a lot of moral panic (some justified, some unjustified) about schoolkids and their mobile phone usage in Japan, with a number of schools introducing various bans on usage. To find out what kids are up to these days, MacroMill Inc looked at high school students and mobile phones.

Demographics

Between the 15th and 17th of September 2009 300 high school students (therefore aged between 15 and 18) completed a private mobile phone-based questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female. Note that the sample will be over-represented by heavier mobile phone users, so perhaps the figures here for usage of mobile phones in class, for instance, are higher than they are in reality, or at least I hope that is the case.

As I know there are a few people who teach in Japanese schools amongst my readership, I’d love to hear from you on how the results of this survey fit with your experiences at the chalkface.

I find it quite amazing that more students use their phones in the bath than in class! However, the fact that almost one in six admit to using them regularly in class is a pretty depressing statistic.
Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s a bit of a strange one from goo Ranking, looking at what men found embarrassing when they were in middle school (12 to 15 years old), but now wouldn’t bother them. There was a link to a female version of the survey, but it didn’t work.

Demographics

Between the 21st and 24th of July 2009 1,026 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private online questionnaire. 48.2% of the sample were male, 8.0% in their teens, 14.6% in their twenties, 28.8% in their thirties, 26.0% in their forties, 12.5% in their fifties, and 10.1% 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. Note that today’s question is for the men only.

Using a cubicle is a strange one – it’s not (only?) a fear of dirty toilets or other personal issues, but apparently students get very heavily teased for going for a number two, and some schools do worry about the state of their charges’ intestines, as I once saw a program where a school got rid of all their urinals and replaced them with cubicles only, thus no-one could tell which you were doing.
Read the rest of this entry »