Speaker: Mito Akiyoshi, Professor of Sociology at Senshu University More event details: https://www.tuj.ac.jp/icas/event/beyond-the-gender-gap-in-japan/

1. “Busy, Happy, and
Withdrawn”
Director’s cut
Mito Akiyoshi
Senshu University

2. Japanese women
sleep and leisure deprived (Nakamura and Akiyoshi 2015)
2

3. Average sleep per day by gender and
age (minutes), married individuals
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
Women Men
Source: Survey on Time Use and Leisure
Activities
(The Ministry of Internal Affiairs and
Communications 2016)

4. Stretched thin, but
“Smile goes a long way!”
Life of a working mother
who gets by with 4 hours
of sleep is glamorized as
an “ideal”
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5. Typical moms’ timetables show the extent of sleep
deprivation
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6. 6

7. Research Problem
How much “return” they get from time
investment in various leisure activities?
RQ1. What kind of leisure activities do
Japanese women engage in?
RQ2. What kind of activities contribute to
greater happiness?
RQ 3. How much happiness do women gain
from various leisure activities?
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8. Data and Methods
The 2007 International Social Survey
Program (N=31,330)
Argentina, Australia, Austria, Flanders (Belgium), Bulgaria, Chile, Cyprus, Czech Republic,
Dominican Republic, Taiwan, Croatia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary (dropped),
Ireland, Israel, Japan, Latvia, Mexico, Norway, the Philippines, Poland, Russia, Slovak
Republic, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan (dropped), the
United Kingdom, the United States, Uruguay.
Implicit valuation function to assess the
happiness gain on time investment
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9. Implicit valuation function of the
quality of leisure activities
HAPPYi -=DEM′iβDEM+SEC′iβSEC+LEISURE′iβLEISURE +εi
• Happy
Four point value multiplied by 10
• DEM (demographic variables)
age, gender, marital status, health, household composition (children)
• SEC (socioeconomic variables)
education, employment status, community type, income decile
(Stanca 2009)
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10. Types of leisure activities
•Media consumption
•Physical activities
•Attending sporting events
•Attending cultural events
•Handicrafts
•Getting together with relatives/ friends
•Association/group participation
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11. The Japanese socialize more with
relatives than with friends
-1 -0.5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2
Friends Relatives
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12. Limited participation in
associations/groups
-1.4 -1.2 -1 -0.8 -0.6 -0.4 -0.2 0
Politics Community Church Culture Sports
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13. Activities/Groups that increase
happiness
Activities
• Watching TV
• Reading
• Handicrafts
• Listening to music
• Time with relatives
• Time with friends
Participation in
• Sports association
• Church or religious
organization
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14. Activities
that
suppress
happiness
14
Internet use
Participation in
cultural
associations/groups

15. Quality of leisure activities
-0.200
0.000
0.200
0.400
0.600
0.800
1.000
1.200
1.400
Men Women
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16. Findings
• Japanese women experience time paucity.
• As a result, they are not active in media
consumption and group participation.
• Whatever leisure time they have, they
“invest” wisely, engaging in high-return
activity selectively.
• Differences in availability of leisure time
between sexes DO NOT translate into
differences in qualities of leisure activities.
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17. Policy implications I
•Women’s “utility maximizing” behavior
leads to their withdrawal from political
groups/associations and community
groups/associations.
•The focus on the private/family is partly
a function of optimizing behavior.
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18. Policy implications II
• To promote women’s involvement in
politics and economy
(1) Make pertinent activities worthwhile and
attractive.
(e.g. eliminate statistical discrimination)
(2) Redress the leisure imbalance to allow
women “waste” their time on activities whose
payoff are not always immediate and clear.
(e.g. politics, community building)
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