Japan Data
Society Family Education
28/06/2024
In Japan, child-rearing responsibilities typically fall on mothers, and many report feeling lonely and disconnected from society.
According to an online survey conducted by support organization Piazza among users of its local community app, many parents report feelings of loneliness or isolation while caring for children.
Piazza surveyed users with experience raising young children and received responses from 806 women, 172 men and 20 people who did not reveal their gender. These figures reflect the extent to which the responsibilities of raising children in Japan fall primarily on the shoulders of mothers.
Overall, 67.1% of respondents reported often or sometimes experiencing feelings of loneliness or isolation. Women were more than twice as likely as men to feel isolation related to raising children, at 74.2% versus 35.5%.
This feeling of loneliness and isolation was particularly prevalent among stay-at-home parents at 78%, 10.85 points higher than the total.
The time when parents most often feel a certain loneliness, mentioned by 58.1% of respondents, is when they are alone with their child(ren). Experts also note that having little social contact outside the home can lead to isolation in children’s education. Other factors that commonly trigger such negative emotions include lack of opportunities to talk to other adults (46%) and difficulty being accepted by other parents in their immediate circle (36.1%).
While 46.8% of women described having few opportunities to talk to other adults, this was only the case for 21.3% of men. This difference may be linked to the fact that men typically take short paternity leave, limiting the time they spend at home alone caring for their newborn.
(Title photo: Pixta)
education society family loneliness mother
