Nifty Research recently took a look at crime prevention.
Between the 14th and 20th of February 2014 4,833 members of the Nifty monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. No detailed demographic information was provided.
I’ve not experienced any crime here in Japan (except getting a parking ticket once…), and I don’t take any particular anti-crime measures when out and about.
Note that in Q6, carrying pepper spray is illegal.
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A recent Cabinet Office Japan survey into public order, much to my surprise found that the populace no longer pinned the blame for Japan’s ills on foreigners, even when compared to the same survey three and six years ago.
Between the 5th and 15th of July 2012 3,000 randomly-selected Japanese citizens were selected from resident rolls and approached for face-to-face interviews. 1,956 people agreed to take part, but a further demographic breakdown was not provided.
I’m not really sure why the figures for fear of foreigners have changes so dramatically for the better in the last six years, and I’m not sure how I would go about finding out the reason behind it. However, it does also seem clear that the new bogeyman is Reefer Madness, especially as round about the time of the survey there was no end of stories about a current social problem of legal highs, dubious cannabinoid derivatives sold as incence in a multitude of shops in Japan’s big cities.
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Central Research Services Inc recently published a survey looking at victims of crime, etc in Japan, and comparing it with similar surveys from Europe.
In 2011 2,000 people over the age of 15 were randomly selected from resident registers to take part in the survey. At the end of May all bar those from two sampling points in Tohoku that were affected by the earthquake were interviewed face-to-face, and the remaining people were interviewed at the end of July. In total 1,251 responded to the questionnaire, with 50.5% of the sample female and 49.5% male. The age breakdown was not given.
These are really very surprising figures for me! I didn’t expect Japan to be so low on police legitimacy, for one thing. Recently there has been a spate of reports of police uselessness when responding to crimes, miscarriages of justice, etc which would have influenced public distrust of the overall criminal justice system, but questions on direct interactions with the system would suggest that even the average bobby on the beat is a bit bent.
Note that the European data was taken from European Social Survey, 2009, “Trust in Justice: European Social Survey”.
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DIMSDRIVE Research recently reported on a not-so-recent survey into crime prevention, which revealed one surprising statistic, that people are currently tooled up with illegal weapons for self-defence.
Between the 4th and 18th of February 2010 7,165 members of the DIMSDRIVE Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.4% of the sample were male, but rather than a breakdown by age there was a breakdown by residence area and type. 4.4% of the sample lived in Hokkaido, 5.2% in Tohoku, 2.5% in Shinchuetsu, 44.9% in Kanto (Tokyo and surrounding area), 10.4% in Tokai, 1.8% in Hokuriku, 17.2% in Kinki (Osaka and surrounding area), 4.2% in Chugoku, 2.2% in Shikoku, and 7.2% in Kyushu and Okinawa. Next, 37.3% lived in a big city, 24.6% in regional towns, 17.5% in the countryside around a big city, 20.0% in the regional countryside, and 0.6% elsewhere. 48.0% were home owners, 3.9% in rental homes, 16.5% owned an apartment, 30.0% rented one, and 1.6% lived elsewhere.
I’m really surprised about the one in eight who want to use bugging device detectors – I’d like to know more about the demographic. Is it single women in rented accomodation, people worrying their family members are spying on them, or just a general paranoia? Furthermore, 11.5% want to carry pepper spray or tear gas, 7.3% a taser, and 5.1% some form of night stick, all three of which are illegal to use, and probably even just carrying them is likely to fall foul of the law. By the way, this is a colour ball.
I’ve personally never had any worries about personal safety in Japan from a crime perspective, and the only preventative measure I take is to turn on the built-in alarm system whenever I leave the flat.
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A recent survey from goo Research, conducted in conjuction with the All About Japan web site, looked at awareness of crime prevention in those living alone.
Between the 21st and 23rd of January 2008 1,017 members of the goo Research online monitor panel aged between 20 and 34, single and living alone, and regular full-time employees completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.2% of the sample was female, 28.0% was aged between 20 and 24, 39.4% between 25 and 29, and 32.6% between 30 and 34.
I’m very suprised by the results of Q6 as shown in the pie chart above. Barely one in twenty are on speaking terms with the neighbours, which is much lower than I might have expected. I’d love to hear the reasons why.
Just to explain the anti thumb-turn covers, these try to prevent one kind of housebreaking attack where someone sticks a wire through your letterbox and turns the lock from the inside.
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This is a story I saw reported in the English press as merely a snippet of the results of Q6, that 79% of Japanese want internet filtering for children, but that one figure is perhaps one of the more dull numbers to come from this survey from the Cabinet Office Japan on ensuring internet safety.
Between the 8th and 25th of November 2007 5,000 people were randomly selected from presumably the voter rolls to take part in the survey. Of the 5,000, 3,006 agreed to complete the survey, conducted by means of face-to-face interviews. The sample was 52.7% female, 8.8% in their twenties, 16.0% in their thirties, 16.1% in their forties, 20.2% in their fifties, 21.2% in their sixties, and 17.7% seventy or older. 26.3% of the sample had children under the age of 18. Of these 790 people, 35.3% were under school age, 45.6% of elementary school age, 28.6% of middle school age, 26.7% of high school age, and 6.5% had already graduated, quit school, or other. Of the parents with school age children, 23.9% gave mobile phones to all their children, 17.0% gave them to some, 58.6% to none, and 0.5% didn’t know.
Note that human rights abuse, slander, shopping fraud and copyright infringement are out of scope for the Internet Hotline Centre. In addition, for all you music and video thieves out there, only 20.0% of the survey think the police should be targeting them.
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This is a story I saw reported in the English press as merely a snippet of the results of Q6, that 79% of Japanese want internet filtering for children, but that one figure is perhaps one of the more dull numbers to come from this survey from the Cabinet Office Japan on ensuring internet safety.
Between the 8th and 25th of November 2007 5,000 people were randomly selected from presumably the voter rolls to take part in the survey. Of the 5,000, 3,006 agreed to complete the survey, conducted by means of face-to-face interviews. The sample was 52.7% female, 8.8% in their twenties, 16.0% in their thirties, 16.1% in their forties, 20.2% in their fifties, 21.2% in their sixties, and 17.7% seventy or older. 26.3% of the sample had children under the age of 18. Of these 790 people, 35.3% were under school age, 45.6% of elementary school age, 28.6% of middle school age, 26.7% of high school age, and 6.5% had already graduated, quit school, or other. Of the parents with school age children, 23.9% gave mobile phones to all their children, 17.0% gave them to some, 58.6% to none, and 0.5% didn’t know.
Q5 and Q6 show an interesting result. First, over three in five knew nothing about filtering, but after being shown one card highlighting that 80% of crimes associated with deai-kei sites involve children, and another stating that filtering can block access to deai-kei sites, nearly four in five reach the conclusion that filtering is necessary. Q7 and Q8 repeat a similar pattern; 70% had never heard of the Internet Hotline Centre, yet 70% could conclude that it was a good thing.
That Internet Hotline Centre has some interesting information; for example, on the reporting form there is one option:
Information which is difficult to judge illegal but seems to be illegal (Example: Displaying child pornography)
Is that saying what I think it’s saying?
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This is a story I saw reported in the English press as merely a snippet of the results of Q6, that 79% of Japanese want internet filtering for children, but that one figure is perhaps one of the more dull numbers to come from this survey from the Cabinet Office Japan on ensuring internet safety.
Between the 8th and 25th of November 2007 5,000 people were randomly selected from presumably the voter rolls to take part in the survey. Of the 5,000, 3,006 agreed to complete the survey, conducted by means of face-to-face interviews. The sample was 52.7% female, 8.8% in their twenties, 16.0% in their thirties, 16.1% in their forties, 20.2% in their fifties, 21.2% in their sixties, and 17.7% seventy or older. 26.3% of the sample had children under the age of 18. Of these 790 people, 35.3% were under school age, 45.6% of elementary school age, 28.6% of middle school age, 26.7% of high school age, and 6.5% had already graduated, quit school, or other. Of the parents with school age children, 23.9% gave mobile phones to all their children, 17.0% gave them to some, 58.6% to none, and 0.5% didn’t know.
In part one, Q1 notes that just over two in five are regular internet users. This may cause some of you to dismiss the results, but these non-users may very well have children or grandchildren that may encounter nasty stuff on the internet, so their opinion should not be readily dismissed. In Q2SQ, there is the very Japanese crime of “One-click fraud” – perhaps like Amazon’s One Click Shopping™, you click on a link on a dodgy site and up comes a message telling you you owe them a vast sum of money for membership fees.
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The Cabinet Office Japan recently released a survey into people’s thoughts about public safety in Japan. 3,000 people aged 20 or older were chosen by random, and between the 14th and 24th of December 1,795 of them, or 59.8%, took part in face-to-face interviews. Of those who did not participate, 124 had moved, 79 were on long-term absenses from home, 365 were not at home, 58 could not be found, 514 refused to participate, and 65 did not take part for other reasons. Demographically, 54.1% were female, 8.9% between 20 and 29, 15.0% between 30 and 39, 16.9% between 40 and 49, 21.9% between 50 and 59, 20.7% between 60 and 69, and 16.7% aged 70 or older.
The “gaijin hanzai” comment is related to the uproar regarding of widespread availability of a magazine playing on precisely the fears expressed in this survey.
I was surprised by the results in Q11 – my sterotypical image of the Japanese is that on the whole they would tend to help the police to the best of their efforts, but we see that they have reservations, especially if the crime is a relatively minor one that doesn’t involve family or friends.
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The Cabinet Office Japan recently released a survey into people’s thoughts about public safety in Japan. 3,000 people aged 20 or older were chosen by random, and between the 14th and 24th of December 1,795 of them, or 59.8%, took part in face-to-face interviews. Of those who did not participate, 124 had moved, 79 were on long-term absenses from home, 365 were not at home, 58 could not be found, 514 refused to participate, and 65 did not take part for other reasons. Demographically, 54.1% were female, 8.9% between 20 and 29, 15.0% between 30 and 39, 16.9% between 40 and 49, 21.9% between 50 and 59, 20.7% between 60 and 69, and 16.7% aged 70 or older.
The “gaijin hanzai” comment is related to the recent uproar regarding widespread availability of a magazine playing on precisely the fears expressed in this survey.
When I first heard about this survey I was really keen to get hold of it and translate it, but when I saw quite how much the fear of the foreign peril seems to have been stirred up, I got quite depressed. When the news of this poll appeared on Japan Today I posted a sarcastic comment (that got pulled by the moderators!) about how I was disappointed that foreigners did not make the list of dangers in that summary by Kyodo News. Little did I know that it was perhaps selective editing by the press so as not to hurt our English-speaking feelings. About the only bright spot I can find is that international terror organisations, etc, (with that “etc” covering local terror groups, the main ones so far that have actually attacked Japan) are not high in people’s concern. Note though that Q5 mentioned only international terrorists, there is no “etc”, or other questions on local loony groups.
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