Japanese General Social Survey 2008 (JGSS 2008)

Description of the situation in family, everyday life, home and living environment. Gender role. Health. Knowledge of foreign languages. Occupation. Political issues.

1. Face-to-face interview: work: sex; age (year of birth); employment in the last week; reasons why not employed; employment in the past; age at dismissal of last job; weekly working time in full-time occupation and in possible side jobs; professional position; supervisor function; travel time to the workplace (hours and minutes); employment in the public service, in a self-employed company, headquarters or branch of a company; sector; profession (ISCO); weekly working days; regular number of hours per week; length of service in years; company size; union membership; job satisfaction; intention to terminate employment; endangerment of employment; assessment of opportunities to find an equivalent job in the case of job loss; current job search; foreign trade relations of the company.

Family: marital status; description of the employment situation of the partner: weekly working hours in full-time jobs and possible part-time jobs, professional status, supervisor function, industry, profession (ISCO), number of working days per week, regular weekly working hours; years of employment at the company, size of company; age of partner; cohabitation with the partner; living together with one or both parents of the respondent or his or her partner; details of the respondent´s and partner’s parents: age, marital status, current employment of the parents; number of children (including deceased); details of all children: sex, still living in the parental household, age, marital status, occupation; household size; household composition; information on all family members with regard to: kinship, sex and age; number of family members who are temporarily separated from the family, their relationship to the respondent and reason for living apart from the family; head of the household; sources of household income and main source of income; self-assessment on an top-bottom scale; degree of urbanization; gross household income of the last year; income of the respondent and his or her spouse; siblings of the respondent and his or her spouse (including deceased); position in the line of siblings.

Related to the respondent when he was 15 years old: size of the place of residence at that time; village character of the place of residence; parent’s style of upbringing; professional position and profession (ISCO) of the father; size of the company of the father´s employer company at that time; professional position of the mother; educational level of respondent, partner and parents; degree or abandonment of the last school attended; attendance of a technical school.

First job after graduation: duration between graduation and start of work; professional position and profession (ISCO) of the respondent; company size.

2. Self-administered questionnaire (drop off): two different questionnaires are used. Methodically variations of questioning for individual questions or question complexes.
Daily life: television consumption per day; number of books read monthly; frequency of reading newspapers; computer use (at home, at work/school); searching for information on the Internet, Internet shopping, online banking and creation of web pages; frequency of use of a mobile phone; sending e-mails via PC or mobile phone; frequency of: family dinners, dinners with friends, cooking dinner, grocery shopping, laundry, house cleaning and disposal of waste; frequency of holidays longer than two days; frequency of: sports activities, driving for fun, karaoke singing, going to the cinema, listening to music, video games or computer games, gardening, playing shogi or go, playing pachinko, and buying lottery tickets.

Health: self-assessment of the state of health; smoker status; attempts to quit smoking; drinking habits; traumatic experiences in the last five years; satisfaction with: living environment, leisure activities, family life, financial situation of the household, friendships, health, partnership; happiness; frequency of hospital stays in the last year; reasons for not going to hospital in spite of disease; used health checks: at the workplace or in school; check financed by the local government or private; concerns about future lack of access to medical care; experienced physical violence through beatings and beatings in the childhood and adulthood (victimization experience); relationship of the respondent to the user of violence; experienced criticism or yelling in the last five years and relationship of the respondent to this person; concern about the existing emergency medical system at the place of residence.

Living conditions and politics: residential status and housing situation; duration of residence; feeling connected to the place of residence ; change in the financial situation in the last few years; comparison of the financial situation with other Japanese families and in comparison to the financial situation in the respondent’s youth; self-assessment of the rank of success in school; assessment of opportunities to improve one´s standard of living (social mobility); expected development of the pension or pension level in comparison with the current pension level; self-assessment of the class affiliation; concern about personal future financial situation; preference for governmental or individual responsibility for subsistence, medical care and care of elderly people as well as the training and education of the children (welfare state); self-assessment of political classification (conservative or progressive); assessment of personal tax burden; recruitment for the legalization of euthanasia; attitude towards the revision of juvenile criminal law; attitude towards the death penalty; attitude to the government´s responsibility for income transfer of high-income to low-income families; evaluation of the role of the government; attitude towards the balance between the social welfare services and tax burden (strengthening of the public social welfare services through tax increases versus tax reduction and weakening of the social welfare services); attitude regarding: political efficacy, complexity of policy, duty to participate in elections, observance of election promises by Members of Parliament; reasonable term of office for a governor; knowledge of the governor of the prefecture at the place of residence; support of this governor; party preference; parties that are able to assume governmental responsibility; frequency of own ecological behaviour: switch off the lights, use public transport, use your own shopping bag, repair damaged things, buying recycled products and organically grown vegetables; discontinuation on the priority of economic growth over environmental protection (Split A) or willingness to lead an uncomfortable life in order to protect the environment (Split B); attitude towards an increasing proportion of foreigners in the neighbourhood; preference for the purchase of regional food over imported; business ethics and environmental performance of a company as a motive for changing personal purchasing behaviour; waiver on the purchase of products from specific countries from political and economic diplomatic reasons; personal use of ecological products: solar energy, night current, gas-powered hot water heating with domestic power generation (Ecowill), heat exchangers (Ecocute), low-emission vehicle (hybrid cars).

Crime: Dangerous area in the neighbourhood; victimization: burglary or robbery.

Family and social environment: ideal number of children; preference for a boy or a girl; attitude to bringing up children: preference for disciplinary measures (setting limits) or laissez-faire; preference for parents´ sensitivity to childlike feelings, or denial of the influence of childhood feelings on parents; attitude to admonish other children for unwanted behaviour; observed behavioral changes in the neighborhood: discipline of children at home, at school, in public, psychological presence of the father and the mother, moral development of children; attitude towards physical punishment of children by their parents; attitude towards the three-generation household; gender role and marriage norms: attitude towards divorce and the wife´s occupation; connection between happiness and marriage; men and household management; role of women and men in work and marriage; influence of the professional activity of mothers on the children; necessity of children in a marriage, career of man more important than a career of women; general trust in individuals; assessment of the human nature (scale: the human being as basically good or bad); membership in selected associations and organizations; religious affiliation and religiosity; belief in a life after death; institutional trust: trust in church organizations, schools, ministries and government agencies, trade unions, media, hospitals, courts, scientists, members of parliament, municipal council, self-defence forces, police and financial institutions.

Questionnaire B: creation of web pages (including blogs); happiness (EASS scale); foreign contacts in the neighbourhood; preference for Japanese products when purchasing electrical equipment; attitude towards legalizing casinos in Japan; willingness to visit a casino; attitude to extramarital sex (adultery); attitude to homosexuality; pornography leads to moral decay; attitude to restricting pornography; East Asian Cultural Exchange: reception frequency of Japanese animated films, Chinese films and Korean TV dramas; soothsaying the first name of one´s own child; consideration auspicious or sinister days at special events such as weddings, parades or funerals; most important demands on the characteristics of personal friends; attitude to: gender role, inviolable authority of the father, adapting to the majority, criticism, job assignment to relatives or friends, local patriotism; subordination to superiors (faith in authority), leaders should decide, risk orientation, preference for risk money investment; ties to place of residence, Japan and East Asia; preferred music genres (classical, rock, jazz/blues, popular music, Enka); number of acquaintances in the social environment who are interested in sex-related amusement in different regions; frequency of discussions on international affairs in the circle of family or friends; source of information for international news (newspapers, radio, TV, Internet, people); stays abroad in China, South Korea, Taiwan, South-East Asia, Europe, North America or other countries; friends in the above countries; attitude towards foreign colleagues, neighbours and close relatives from the above-mentioned countries and regions; attitude towards a higher percentage of foreigners among workers; attitude to the increase of marriages with foreigners; relations between Japan and other countries: setting restrictions on imports to protect the national economy; attitude towards pursuing national interests despite conflicts with other nations, attitude to cultural loss by the rising flood of foreign films, music and books; advantages or disadvantages of globalization for: the Japanese economy, job opportunities for workers in Japan, the Japanese environment, consumers in Japan, own job security, own consumer habits.

Foreign languages and miscellaneous: assessment of language skills in English (ability to read a short English newspaper article, entertainment in English and writing letters); school attendance and further training abroad; interviewee is a full-time professional employee of a foreign capital company; full-time work of the respondent or his or her spouse for public services or private non-profit institution; estimated number of acquaintances as well as the family members and relatives with whom New Year´s greetings exchanged; average number of contact persons per day and occupation of the contact person.

Additionally coded was: size of location; questionnaire form A or B; interview duration; interview date (month and day); collection date of the drop-off questionnaire; weighting factor.

Interviewer rating: willingness of the respondent to cooperate; understanding of questions; character of the living environment; order of face-to-face interview and written questioning.