Japanese Cultural Norms Research Articles

Redefining Japan’s Tourism: Post-COVID Challenges and Cultural Dynamics

The global tourism landscape has undergone considerable transformation owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has altered its dynamics and created new challenges. Previously, travel was linked to well-being, fostering social connections, and a sense of belonging. However, the pandemic has caused substantial disruptions, leading to job losses and changes in travel behavior. Japan, which was already grappling with overtourism pre-pandemic, faced challenges such as strained infrastructure and environmental impact. Post-pandemic challenges include issues regarding tourist etiquette and labor shortages within the industry. Japan’s deeply rooted mask-wearing culture, driven by social responsibility, may lead to social stigma if norms are ignored, thus affecting tourism. Owing to an aging population and unattractive job profiles, the industry faces labor shortages, which lead to difficulties in recruiting during peak seasons. Therefore, understanding these challenges is crucial for the recovery and revival of tourism in Japan. Strategies must align with evolving societal values and sustainable practices to address behavioral norms and labor shortages. Using tweet-derived data, this study revealed an unexpected increase in discussions regarding mask use, highlighting Japan’s societal emphasis on harmony and consideration of others. This study highlights the challenges faced by tourists and industry professionals, particularly regarding foreign visitors’ comprehension of Japanese cultural norms. The results emphasize the critical factors affecting post-pandemic tourism in Japan, with the aim of exploring cultural influences on sustainable tourism in subsequent research. This endeavor aligns with the vision of the United Nations World Tourism Organization to reconstruct the industry and ensure equitable benefits for all stakeholders.

Exploring the Effect of a Cultural Gap on the Process of Absorbing Business Knowledge

This study explores the implications of the difference between Japanese and Anglo-American cultures when Japanese organizations try to absorb business knowledge generated in Anglo-American culture. It relies on Todorova & Durisin’s model of Absorptive Capacity (2007) which allows for multi-level, individual, group, and organizational levels of absorption in the process of incorporating external knowledge. It compares four cases of Japanese organizations, who sought to absorb business knowledge that could change conventional Japanese management style by introducing one of two alternative Anglo-American developmental learning methods. The study identifies some specific cultural impediments and enablers for Japanese people trying to absorbing Anglo-American business knowledge, and suggests how the impediments can be overcome, by making structural and leadership changes during the introduction of the learning activities. The research explores whether and how 43 participants who experienced one or the other learning method transformed from a mind-set dominated by Japanese cultural norms and values to one that can both recognise the benefits of Anglo-American management thinking and translate it into changed practice. Whilst Todorova and Durisin’s model does not capture the way cultural difference affects the absorbing process, the results show that the differences between Japanese and Anglo-American cultural values, in terms of collectivism vs individualism, high-context vs low-context cultures, and power relationships affect progress through the phases of absorption. Thus, the study discusses the gradual process how Japanese individuals and organizations absorbed the Anglo-American knowledge by overcoming cultural differences.

Exploring the Effect of a Cultural Gap on the Process of Absorbing Business Knowledge

This study explores the implications of the difference between Japanese and Anglo-American cultures when Japanese organizations try to absorb business knowledge generated in Anglo-American culture. It relies on Todorova & Durisin’s model of Absorptive Capacity (2007) which allows for multi-level, individual, group, and organizational levels of absorption in the process of incorporating external knowledge. It compares four cases of Japanese organizations, who sought to absorb business knowledge that could change conventional Japanese management style by introducing one of two alternative Anglo-American developmental learning methods. The study identifies some specific cultural impediments and enablers for Japanese people trying to absorbing Anglo-American business knowledge, and suggests how the impediments can be overcome, by making structural and leadership changes during the introduction of the learning activities. The research explores whether and how 43 participants who experienced one or the other learning method transformed from a mind-set dominated by Japanese cultural norms and values to one that can both recognise the benefits of Anglo-American management thinking and translate it into changed practice. Whilst Todorova and Durisin’s model does not capture the way cultural difference affects the absorbing process, the results show that the differences between Japanese and Anglo-American cultural values, in terms of collectivism vs individualism, high-context vs low-context cultures, and power relationships affect progress through the phases of absorption. Thus, the study discusses the gradual process how Japanese individuals and organizations absorbed the Anglo-American knowledge by overcoming cultural differences.

Organizational Learning for Sustainable Semiconductor Supply Chain Operation: A Case Study of a Japanese Company in Cross Border M&A

As semiconductor usage is prevailing, sustainable growth is deemed highly dependent on the semiconductor supply chain. Accordingly, it is essential to establish robust supply chain capability for a semiconductor company. Especially for Japanese semiconductor manufacturers, it is critical to secure robust and flexible supply chain operation with the background of the experience of supply chain disruption caused by the East Japan Earthquake. So far, we identified that Japanese semiconductor manufacturers and Japanese automotive manufacturers have been in cooperation to secure the semiconductor supply chain. However, the global electronic industry environment has been significantly changed and it is not enough just to consider natural disasters. With this perspective, it is not yet fully studied how Japanese semiconductor manufacturers adapted to global operation through organizational learning. This paper examines how a Japanese semiconductor firm conducted organizational learning and adapted to environmental changes in cross-border M&A transactions. Traditionally, Japanese firms have established organizational routines for the management control systems of their overseas subsidiaries by relying on the expatriates’ transactive memory systems (TMS), which is based on their personnel experiences over the countries and cultural background understanding. Japanese firms have used TMS of expats to manage their global organizations. Recently, however, not a small number of Japanese companies have accelerated their globalization through cross-border M&A, which requires organizational capabilities different from those of conventional TMS formation. In this paper, we studied a case of cross-border M&A of a Japanese semiconductor company by modeling the organizational learning structure throughout the extracted concepts summarizing semi-structure interview outcome. As a result, it has been found out that, by shifting from Japanese cultural norms to more global values in terms of management systems, benefits can be achieved. The company unlearned organizational routines that relied on TMS and created new organizational routines. This study provides direction from a practical perspective on how Japanese firms can transform their global organizations and adapt to changes in the environment for sustainable growth.

Japanese university student responses to intercultural scenarios: Contact strategies and perceptions of otherness

The internationalisation of educational institutions continues to develop worldwide alongside and within globalisation trends, compelling universities to educate graduates capable of engaging with international issues and of living and working in increasingly pluralistic societies. In Japan, internationalisation remains at the forefront of government policies for tertiary education and closely linked to a demand for interculturally competent global human resources (GHR). Yet, outcomes assessment remains largely limited to quantitative outputs. This study aimed to explore the strategies employed by Japanese first-year university students in response to intercultural contact as well as their perceptions of culturally different others. Responses to three intercultural scenarios in the form of critical incidents were collected from 164 first-year students at two Top Global universities in Japan at the start of the 2019 Spring Semester. Findings indicate that students are generally open and respectful toward culturally different others, but that willingness to interact is context-dependent, as students were more willing to interact interculturally in formal situations. Moreover, findings suggest that despite students’ openness to intercultural contact, the non-Japanese other is nonetheless perceived as an outsider, unable to communicate in Japanese and to understand and follow Japanese cultural norms. Results from this study have implications on current conceptual models of intercultural competence as well as on future strategies to foster an interculturally competent workforce in Japan.

Conceptualizing Culture and Creativity: Perspectives on Creativity by Japanese Secondary School Students

AbstractCreativity is generally considered a personal attribute, which is individualist and cognitive and less as a relational construct situated culturally and collectively. Past comparative cultural studies of creativity involving East Asian contexts focus on an individualist and cognitive perspective with relatively limited research investigating the cultural and collective aspects of creativity. This is a phenomenographic investigation of how creativity in the Visual Arts is conceptualized by Japanese adolescents. Participants included 14 students of Art and Shodo (Traditional Japanese Calligraphy) attending a co‐educational school in Tokyo. Students were interviewed individually or within a focus group to explore their understanding of creativity. Creativity in this context was associated primarily with “thinking” as a process rather than product‐orientated notions of creativity typical in the Western context. Our findings challenge understandings of creativity as a set of characteristics predominantly associated with tangible and quantitatively measurable cognitions regardless of context and suggest that understanding the richness of creativity should engage the socio‐cultural environment. In particular, Japanese cultural norms and language significantly influence how creativity is constituted and discerned. Students’ complex, varied, and personal conceptualizations of creativity were mediated through their experiences with traditional or non‐traditional art.

Moralization of Japanese cultural norms among student sojourners in Japan

This study investigated the relationship between different domains of cultural adaptation among international students in Japan and the moralization of culture-specific norms. Newcomers may adapt certain norms of the host culture and ascribe moral meanings to initially nonmoral activities or objects. Building on the existing model of sociocultural adaptation, we investigated how different types of sociocultural adaptation are associated with the moralization of Japanese cultural norms. For international students in Japan, there are three aspects of sociocultural adaptation: academic, daily living, and interpersonal. Our results showed that cultural adaptation in the interpersonal domain, but not in the academic and daily living domains, predicted harsher moral judgments of behaviors that violated Japanese cultural norms. These findings suggest that international students who are well adjusted in the interpersonal domain gain an understanding of what is sanctioned in the Japanese cultural context and come to see certain behaviors as morally appropriate. We discuss several implications for further investigating the moralization of certain behaviors within the context of acculturation.

Principles of care for women experiencing intimate partner violence: Views of expert Japanese health professionals and advocates

ABSTRACTIn Japan, interventions for Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) in the health care setting are rare, partly due to Japanese cultural norms that marginalize women's IPV experiences. A thematic analysis of narratives of eight Japanese health professionals who are experts in IPV care identified shared core values and practices that have guided their development of culturally relevant IPV interventions: supporting women's autonomy to define what is at stake for her, appreciating unique trajectories and timing for recovery, and practicing shared decision-making. These shared practices may be essential for training health professionals to respond to IPV in Japan and elsewhere.

Patient advocacy

Advocacy is an important role of psychiatric nurses because their patients are ethically, socially, and legally vulnerable. This study of Japanese expert psychiatric nurses' judgments of interventions for patient advocacy will show effective strategies for ethical nursing practice and their relationship with Japanese culture. This article explores Japanese psychiatric nurses' decision to intervene as a patient advocate and examine their ethical, cultural, and social implications. Using semi-structured interviews verbatim, themes of the problems that required interventions were inductively summarized by a qualitative analysis and their contexts and nursing judgments were examined. The participants were 21 nurses with 5 or more years of experience in psychiatric nursing. The research was approved by Institutional Review Board of research site and study facilities. The participants gave written informed consent. Analysis of 45 cases showed that nurses decided to intervene when (a) surrounding people's opinions impeded patients' safety, (b) healthcare professionals' policies impeded patients' decision-making, (c) own violent behaviors impeded treatment and welfare services for patients, (d) own or families' low acceptance of illness impeded patients' self-actualization, (e) inappropriate treatment or care impeded patients' liberty, and (f) their families abused patients' property. To solve conflicts between patients and their surrounding people, the nurses sought reconciliation between them, which is in accordance with Japanese cultural norms respecting harmony. When necessary, however, they protected patients' rights against cultural norms. Therefore, their judgments cannot be explained by cultural norms alone. The findings indicate that the nurses' judgments were based on respect for patients' rights apart from cultural norms, and they first sought solutions fitting the cultural norms before other solutions. This seems to be an ethical, effective strategy if advocates know the culture in depth.

The Japanese sense of information privacy

We analyse the contention that privacy is an alien concept within Japanese society, put forward in various presentations of Japanese cultural norms at least as far back as Benedict in The chrysanthemum and the sword: patterns of Japanese culture. Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1946. In this paper we distinguish between information privacy and physical privacy. As we show, there is good evidence for social norms of limits on the sharing and use of personal information (i.e. information privacy) from traditional interactions in Japanese society, as well as constitutional evidence from the late 19th century (in the Meiji Constitution of 1889). In this context the growing awareness of the Japanese public about problems with networked information processing by public sector and commercial organisations from the 1980s (when a law governing public sector use of personal information was first passed) to recent years (when that law was updated and a first law governing commercial use of personal information was adopted) are not the imposition or adoption of foreign practices nor solely an attempt to lead Japanese society into coherence with the rest of the OECD. Instead they are drawing on the experience of the rest of the developed world in developing legal responses to the breakdown of social norms governing interchange and use of personal information, stressed by the architectural changes wrought by networked information processing capabilities. This claim is supported by consideration of standard models of Japanese social interactions as well as of Supreme Court judgements declaring reasonable expectations of protection of privacy to hold in Japan.

Education for Global Integration in Japan: A Case Study of the JET Program

At a time when nations around the world are struggling with ethnic unrest, Japan is under international pressure to solve a problem of precisely the opposite order: to "create" diversity and to expose its insulated population to foreigners in keeping with its growing status as a world economic leader. This article, based on two years of fieldwork in Japan, examines the contradictions and ironies in a high-profile government policy to transform the nation's vaunted "internationalization" campaign from rhetoric to reality. With an annual budget of over $300 million, the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program invites nearly five thousand college graduates each year from primarily Western countries to team-teach foreign language classes and foster international perspectives in secondary schools throughout the country. Many observers thought the JET Program would equal Japan opening up to the West and freeing itself of biases; this article, however, chronicles the many ways in which the foreign teachers are treated according to Japanese cultural norms and bureaucratic priorities. While Japanese teachers and administrators at all levels see JET as a "cause" and are willing to salute the flag of internationalization, there is a striking gap between the abstract symbolization of internationalization and the day-to-day priorities of prefectural offices of education and local schools. Nevertheless, as with Peace Corps, the program has been very successful in generating a feeling of "closeness" towards Japan in the minds of some of the foreign teachers.

Japanese residential air-conditioning: natural cooling and intelligent systems

Japanese residential heap pumps (which commonly combine cooling, dehumidifying and heating in a single system) are unlike American room air conditioners in a variety of ways. A key to the difference follows from the traditional Japanese focus on heating or cooling persons rather than spaces. When this focus is coupled with the widespread use of inverter technology, solid-state electronics, Japanese cultural norms, the constraints of house form, and the islands' climate, the result is a sophisticated system unlike anything available elsewhere. In addition to a large number of standard remote-control options, some Japanese systems can perceive and learn user preferences, while others can generate pre-recorded and algorithmic fluctuations of wind and temperature. We discuss some of the implications (both for users and for energy consumption) of these innovations. We also consider the results of a small survey of Japanese air-conditioner owners in which we found that despite the sophistication of their heat pump systems a significant majority prefers natural cooling. Most, for example, open windows and pursue other natural cooling strategies before using their air conditioners. While they view the devices as urban necessities, they also report limited knowledge of their machines' advanced features. This research examines the design, cultural context and use of Japanese air-conditioning systems, along with some of the behavioral and theoretical issues raised by their unique form. After discussing traditional Japanese housing and heating and cooling technologies, we describe contemporary Japanese heating/ cooling systems, speculate about the differences between US and Japanese systems, and present preliminary findings on Japanese cooling behavior from a small sample of Japanese air-conditioner owners.

Paths to Advancement in Japanese Bureaucracy

Based on biographical data, this study analyzes the factors affecting advancement in Japan's higher civil service. Through path analysis, it evaluates in a systematic way not only the relative importance of three widely acknowledged factors of advancement—university background, field of study, and higher civil service examinations—but also the manner in which they interact with one another. It also assesses the impact of a civil servant's “track record” on advancement. Finally, after examining the seniority principle in the context of Japanese cultural norms and the findings pertaining to merit-oriented variables, the study suggests that the seniority principle does not produce stagnation but rather facilitates mobility at the highest levels of Japanese bureaucracy.