[Japanese] [Tanaka S.] [Tanaka's Research]
Caution! This page is authored by Tanaka Sigeto, who is one of the members of the NFRJ Project. It is just a personal page, so never represents other members or whole the project. [NFRJ Official Page is Here]

National Family Research of Japan (NFRJ)

A project by Japan Society of Family Sociology to collect data concerned with family with national representative samples in Japan.

Only members of Japan Society of Family Sociology can join the project. Please contact NFRJ office.

Follow-Up Surveys (NFRJ-08Panel)

Follow-up surveys (a panel study) is being conduted. This project is called “NFRJ-08Panel”. Questionnaires are annually delivered to subjects via mail or with home-derivery. Subjects are a subsample from the respondents of NFRJ08, who agreed to participate this follow-up surveys.

We are conducting a mail survey in January-February 2011.

See the official page by the NFRJ Committee.

The Third Survey (NFRJ08)

Conducted in January to February 2009.

About 9,000 persons were randomly sampled from the population of Japanese people aged 28-72 (as of December 31 2008). In January-February 2009, a canvasser visited respondents' home, delivered the questionnaire, and collected it later.

The first report was published in April 2010. Now the data is subjected to the Joint Use Project by JSFS members. The second reports will be published by summer 2011, carrying findings from the Jonin Use Project.

See NFRJ08 Publication official page

The Second Survey (NFRJ03)

The 2nd Survey (NFRJ03) was conducted in Jan.-Feb. 2004. Details are on the NFRJ official page.

Special survey (NFRJ-S01)

Between the first and the second surveys, a special project on “Trails of Families in Post-War Japan” (NFRJS01) was held. The survey was conducted in Jan.-Feb. 2002. (Tanaka did not participate this project.) Details are on the NFRJ official page.

The First Research (NFRJ98)

The First Research was carried out in Janualy 1999.
Name

Dai 1 Kai Zenkoku Kazoku Tyousa (NFRJ98).

Survey date, method, and implementation

In January 1999, a canvasser from Tyuuou Tyousa-sya visited each respondent and handed a questionnaire. Later the same canvasser picked up it, which the respondent had filled in.

Sampling scheme

The population was Japanese women and men born 1921-01-01 through 1970-12-31. Based on a stratified two-stage probability-proportional-to-size sampling, 10500 residents were extracted from 535 Census districts. Zyuumin Kihon Daityou [the principal resident registor] for 502 districts and Senkyonin Meibo [the voter registration list] for 33 districts were used.

Questionnaire

The sample was split into two subsamples by age: the young sample born after 1941-01-01 and the aged born before. For these two subsamples, we used two different questionnaires:

The same questions as the Basic Questionnaire constitute pages 1-19 of the Questionnaire for Aged; only the latter has additional pages 20-25.

Questions in the Basic Questionnaire:

o Face sheet
Sex. Age. Where born. Education. Father's occupation. Experienced of leaving home. Occupation (the first and current one). Income. Household composition. (and more...)
o Conjugal relations
Marital status. When they got married. The same/different surnames. Spouse's character (age, education, occupation, income, and so on). Degree of companion. Division of household labor. Marital support. Power relationship. Marital satisfaction. Experiences of divorce or bereavement. Experiences of labor force exit on marriage. (and more...)
o Quality of life, etc.
Normative consciousness on the family. Role strain. Stress scales. (and more...)
o Children
The number, sex, age, and marriage status of children. Relations with the children. (and more...)
o Parents
When the parents were born (and died). Ralations with the parents. (and more...)
o Siblings
The number of siblings. Relations with siblings. (and more...)
o Parents in law
When the parents-in-law were born (and died). Ralations with the parents-in-law. (and more...)
o Other relatives
Supports and troubles with relatives within the past one year. Support resouces from non-relatives. The number of relatives and the subjective domain of the "family". (and more...)

Additional quetions in the Questionnaire for Aged:

o Experience of nursing
Experience of nursing parents, parents-in-law, spouses, and so on.
Valid samples

From the designed sample of 10500 persons (5163 men and 5337 women), we obtained 6985 valid responses (3323 men and 3662 women). The valid response rate thus becomes 66.5% (64.4% for men and 68.6% for women).

[Information in the NFRJ official site]
[NFRJ98 Questionnaire]

NFRJ98 data were first subjected to a joint research among NFR members. The dataset was settled a logical checking, and has been distributed to the members since September 1999. I gratefully acknowledge the voluntary data-checking task.

After the publication of the final reports in 2001, NFRJ98 data was opened to public via SSJ Data Archive (No. 0191) by Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo.

In future, similar surveys will be repeated to obtain data on changes in Japanese families. The next research is designed to be carried 2003-2004.

NFRJ Publications

Table of contents of the reports (NFR official page; in Japanese).

Other papers and presentations using NFR data (NFR official page; in Japanese).

Tokyo Preliminary Surveys

Before the first national research was designed, two preliminary surveys were conducted in the Tokyo metropolitan area. Each of those was granted by Monbusho Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research. Reports were submitted to Monbusho:

National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH)

NSFH is the largest family research in USA.

The NFR members have compared the NSFH data to Japanese ones, especially to the above two preliminary surveys in Tokyo.

The NSFH data are available via FTP.
Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison / Center for Demography and Ecology / NSFH Data | Working Papers

Internet Resources on Family Sociology and Social Research

Tohoku Univ. / Faculty of Arts and Letters / Applied Japanese Linguistics / Tanaka Sigeto
Last updated at 2011-01-23.