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CYBERPSYCHOLOGY & BEHAVIOR

Volume 8, Number 2, 2005
© Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.

Impact of the Mobile Phone on Junior High-School

Students’ Friendships in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area

KIYOKO KAMIBEPPU, R.N., Ph.D. and HITOMI SUGIURA, R.N.

ABSTRACT

The proportion of having keitai (Japanese mobile phone) has increased rapidly in young chil-
dren. To research how junior high school students use their own keitai and to examine the im-
pact of using it on their psychology, especially on their friendship, we recruited 651 students,
grade 8, from five public junior high schools in the Tokyo metropolitan area. Each student par-
ticipant completed a questionnaire that we had created. The response rates were 88.8% (n =
578) for participants. The proportion of having their own keitai was 49.3% (n = 285) and that of
not having it was 50.7% (n = 293). We found that they used it much more frequently for e-mail
than as a phone. Most of them exchanged e-mails between schoolmates, and more than a half
of them exchanged e-mails more than 10 times a day. Sociable students estimated that their
own keitai was useful for their friendship. But they experienced some insecurity or started
staying up late at night engaged in e-mail exchanges, and they thought that they could not live
without their own keitai. Our findings suggest that keitai having an e-mail function play a big
part in the junior high-school students’ daily life, and its impact on students’ friendships, psy-
chology, or health should be discussed among students to prevent keitai addiction.

INTRODUCTION been studied in various academic fields, including

media studies, communication and linguistics. Some

J APAN IS ONE OF THE MOST developed mobile phone

markets in the world, and keitai (Japanese mobile
phones and PHS phones) are regarded as a uniquely
used media, to the extent that they are, perhaps, a
lingua franca.1 The number of keitai subscribers in
Japan was 77,710,000 as of the end of September
2002, amounting to an ownership rate of 60% of the
total population.2 The Japanese telephone business
has been developing towards being “user-oriented,”
“needs-oriented,” “user-friendly,” and “fun-to-use.”
In that respect, the Japanese telephone industry has
departed greatly from its counterparts in Europe
(Scandinavian countries, in particular), whose busi-
ness has been focusing on technology research
backed up by national investment.1
This unique development of keitai in Japan and
the relations with personal communication have
argue, however, that even in those early-starting
fields, this phenomena, which has been rapidly de-
veloping and is so noticeable but yet already so
ubiquitous, has not been studied as much as it
should have been.3 The authors believe that this
theme could be studied also in health science, nurs-
ing, mental health, educational psychology, and
clinical psychology, since the changes in communi-
cation style might lead to changes in inter-personal
relationships. However, few relevant studies have
been conducted in those fields.
In the present study, the authors focused on ju-
nior high school students (early adolescents) who
are in that critical development stage when rela-
tionships with their peers play a key role and they
are potentially highly susceptible to outside influ-
ences. There were no other studies focusing on this

Department of Family Nursing, Graduate School of Health and Nursing, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.

121
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122
age group, except one conducted by Benesse Insti-
tute of Education.4 One reason for this situation
might be junior high school students’ lack of finan-
cial clout from the perspective of marketing,1 and
keitai are considered as taboo in the schools, the main
stage of the students’ lives.5
The age of keitai owners seems to be getting
younger. There are two major reasons why parents
allow their children to carry keitai—the need to con-
trol their children’s behavior, and to assure their
bond with their children.6 There seems to be a huge
perception gap between parents’ and children’s
motives for keitai ownership. This indicates that the
older generation of parents and teachers do not have
particular guidelines for directing the younger gen-
eration, their children. In the middle of 1990s,
Japanese high-school girls discovered new ways to
communicate by pagers (pocket bells).7 This is also
the case with keitai, new ways of communication
have been created by children and the older gener-
ation may have many things to learn from them.
Consequently, the authors conducted this study
from the viewpoint that understanding the usage
of keitai among junior high school students and
their perception on the effects of keitai use on their
relations with friends, as well as their psychologi-
cal and living aspects is very important in monitor-
ing the mental health of growing children, and it
could be beneficial for school teachers to develop
guidelines for themselves and parents, which help
the growth of children. In addition, such knowledge
is necessary because Japan is taking the responsi-
bility as a leading country in the field of mobile
technology.
This study had the following three main objec-
tives:
1. To identify the ownership and usage patterns of
keitai among junior high school students at pub-
lic schools in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area
2. To study these students’ perception about the ef-
fects of keitai on their communication, relations
with friends, and their psychological and living
aspects
3. To learn the frequency of their keitai e-mail usage
and the correlations with the findings in the sec-
ond point above
MATERIALS AND METHODS
A questionnaire survey was conducted for 8th
grade students in five public junior high schools in
the Tokyo Metropolitan Area, with the permission
of the principals of the schools. The survey period
KAMIBEPPU AND SUGIURA
was from early December to mid-December, 2002.
Our researcher made a presentation about the study
to a representative teacher at each school, who in
turn briefed the class teachers. During a class,
teachers handed out the questionnaires to all the
students, explained the objectives and the methods
of this study, and requested them to determine
whether or not they wished to participate in the
study. After that, participants wishing to take part
in the study filled in the questionnaires and the
teachers then collected all the questionnaires, in-
cluding blank ones.
An anonymous self-administrative questionnaire
was prepared under the supervision of a clinical
psychologist and a nursing teacher, and finalized
after the pre-tests in July and September 2002. The
first series of questions were about respondents’
characteristics: gender, number of friends, number
of friends who owned keitai, and ownership of keitai
(Table 1). After this introduction, questions were
separately arranged for those who owned keitai and
those who did not. The questions for the former
group included the usage of keitai (Table 2) and the
effects of keitai on their communication, relations
with friends, and their psychological and living
aspects (Tables 3 and 4). Those for the latter group
included their desire of ownership, effects of non-
ownership on their relations with friends, and any
psychological change expected on obtaining a keitai.
Analysis was made by calculating descriptive
statistics with SPSS Ver. 10.0. The statistical proce-
dures used were the chi-square test for nominal scale
items and the Spearman rank-order correlation co-
efficient for ordinal scale items. The levels of signif-
icance were 1% and 5%, respectively.
RESULTS
Of the 651 collected questionnaires, 578 were ef-
fective, which means a valid response rate of 88.8%.
The respondents consisted of 304 boys (52.6%) and
272 girls (47.1%), with two responses where gender
was not specified. Of the valid respondents, 285
students owned keitai (49.3%) and 293 did not
(50.7%). 125 boys (41.1% of boy responders) and
160 girls (58.8% of girls responders) owned keitai,
and the girls’ keitai ownership rate was signifi-
cantly higher than boys’ (p < 0.01). The number of
friends who owned keitai was significantly larger
among keitai owners than non-owners (p < 0.01;
Table 1).
The frequency of use, receivers, and contents dif-
fered among phone users and e-mail users (Table
2). If they used a keitai as a phone, they often used it
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IMPACT OF KEITAI ON CHILDREN’S LIVES IN TOKYO 123

TABLE 1. GENDER AND NUMBER OF FRIENDS OF KEITAI OWNERS AND NON-OWNERS

Owners (%) Non-owners (%) X2-test

Gender (n = 285) (n = 291)

Boy 125 (43.9) 179 (61.5) p < 0.01
Girl 160 (56.1) 112 (38.5)
Number of friends (n = 281) (n = 285)
Large 59 (21.0) 58 (20.4) N.S.
Relatively large 184 (65.5) 159 (55.8)
Relatively small 35 (12.5) 53 (18.6)
Small 3 (1.1) 15 (5.3)
Number of friends who owned keitai (n = 281) (n = 285)
Large 103 (36.7) 70 (24.6) p < 0.01
Relatively large 138 (49.1) 104 (36.5)
Relatively small 32 (11.4) 67 (23.5)
Small 8 (2.8) 44 (15.4)

a few times a week to impart necessary messages to
family members. When using it for e-mail, how-
ever, they often used it to chat with friends in rela-
tively close proximity, and 148 students, more than
half of the surveyed owners (54.3%), sent or re-
ceived more than 10 messages a day.
The correlations between “Number of friends”
and “Number of friends who owned keitai,” and
“Frequency of use (E-mails)” were 0.263 (n = 268)
and 0.224 (n = 268), respectively, which were both
significant.
Those who “Agree completely” or “Agree” that
“Keitai are good for casual use for e-mailing,” “It is
easier to express real feelings using keitai compared
to face-to-face contact,” “Using keitai enables wider
inter-personal relations,” “Using keitai enables deeper
inter-personal relations” and “Using keitai enables
better relationship-building with friends” in each
case was more than 55% (Table 3). There were sig-
nificant correlations between “Number of friends,”
“Number of friends who owned keitai” and “Fre-
quency of use (E-mails)” and those agreeing that

TABLE 2. USAGE OF KEITAI

Calls (%) E-mails (%)

Frequency of use (number of calls/mails) (n = 258) (n = 272)
Once a month 44 (17.1) 3 (1.1)
Once a week 51 (19.8) 4 (1.5)
Several times a week 115 (44.6) 24 (8.8)
Once a day 22 (8.5) 3 (1.1)
2–10 times a day 26 (10.1) 90 (33.1)
11–20 times a day 0 (0.0) 64 (23.5)
21–40 times a day 0 (0.0) 42 (15.4)
More than 40 times a day 0 (0.0) 42 (15.4)
Receiver/sender of calls or mails (n = 255) (n = 265)
Friends relatively close proximity? 92 (36.1) 234 (88.3)
Friends relatively far away 10 (3.9) 23 (8.7)
Family members 148 (58.0) 3 (1.1)
Others 5 (2.0) 5 (1.9)
Contents of calls or mails (n = 258) (n = 268)
Must-convey messages 157 (60.9) 22 (8.2)
Just chat (non-messages) 65 (25.2) 211 (78.7)
Relatively serious matters 2 (0.8) 3 (1.1)
Talks only to limited receivers 5 (1.9) 26 (9.7)
Others 29 (11.2) 6 (2.2)
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TABLE 3. EFFECTS OF KEITAI ON COMMUNICATION OR RELATIONS WITH FRIENDS

Correlation with Correlation with the Correlation with

Agree completely/ the number number of friends e-mail
Responses agree (%) of friends who own keitai frequency

Keitai are good for casual use for e-mailing (n = 271) 150 (55.4)
0.04 (n = 267) 0.01 (n = 267) 0.09 (n = 269)
It is easier to express real feelings using keitai compared to face-to-face 182 (66.9) 0.04 (n = 268) 0.20** (n = 268) 0.24** (n = 270)
contact (n = 272)
Using keitai enables wider inter-personal relations (n = 272) 204 (75.0) 0.27** (n = 267) 0.23** (n = 267) 0.29** (n = 269)
Using keitai enables deeper inter-personal relations (n = 272) 179 (65.8) 0.18** (n = 267) 0.13* (n = 267) 0.25** (n = 269)
Using keitai enables better relationship-building with friends (n = 272) 171 (62.9) 0.07 (n = 267) 0.21** (n = 267) 0.13* (n = 269)
Messages misunderstood (n = 273) 76 (27.8) 0.14* (n = 269) 0.06 (n = 269) 0.36** (n = 271)
Felt insecurity on not receiving a reply to e-mails (n = 272) 131 (48.2) 0.05 (n = 268) 0.15* (n = 268) 0.28** (n = 270)
Felt bad after e-mailing (n = 273) 144 (52.7) 0.04 (n = 269) 0.10 (n = 269) 0.19** (n = 271)

**Level of significance, 1%
*Level of significance, 5% (two-tailed).
KAMIBEPPU AND SUGIURA
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TABLE 4. EFFECTS OF KEITAI ON PSYCHOLOGICAL AND LIVING ASPECTS

Correlation with Correlation with the Correlation with

Agree completely/ the number number of friends e-mail
Responses agree (%) of friends who own keitai frequency

Felt insecurity on not receiving a reply to e-mails (n = 272)a 131 (48.2) 0.05 (n = 268) 0.15* (n = 268) 0.28** (n = 270)
Felt bad after e-mailing (n = 273)a 144 (52.7) 0.04 (n = 269) 0.10 (n = 269) 0.19** (n = 271)
Felt a sense of security brought by keitai ownership (n = 272) 156 (57.3) 0.12* (n = 267) 0.07 (n = 267) 0.28** (n = 269)
IMPACT OF KEITAI ON CHILDREN’S LIVES IN TOKYO

Cannot do without keitai (n = 272) 171 (62.6) 0.17** (n = 267) 0.28** (n = 267) 0.43** (n = 269)
Interferes with regular daily schedule (n = 273) 101 (37.0) 0.11 (n = 268) 0.15* (n = 268) 0.37** (n = 270)
aThe same responses as shown in Table 3.
**Level of significance, 1%.
*Level of significance, 5% (two-tailed).
125
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126
“Using keitai enables wider inter-personal relations”
and “Using keitai enables deeper inter-personal re-
lations (Table 3).” Of the 273 respondents, six re-
spondents (2.2%) said that they did not want to
allow non-keitai owners to join their social groups.
Some 27.8% of the surveyed owners have had
their keitai “Messages misunderstood,” and 48.2%
and 52.7% of them had “Felt insecurity on not re-
ceiving a reply to e-mails” or “Felt bad after e-mail-
ing” (Table 3). The more e-mails they sent or
received, the more they experienced such troubles
and emotional instability.
Of the surveyed owners, 57.3% “Strongly felt” or
“Felt a sense of security brought by keitai owner-
ship,” and 62.6% of them “Agreed completely” or
“Agreed” that they “Cannot do without keitai”
(Table 4). 37.0% of them agreed that keitai use “In-
terferes with regular daily schedules” after they got
keitai. There was a strong correlation between “Fre-
quency of Use (E-Mail)” and the two statements,
“Cannot do without keitai” and keitai “Interferes
with regular daily schedule”. More girls than boys
thought strongly that they “Cannot do without
keitai” (p < 0.001).
Of the 293 “Non-keitai owners,” 201 (68.6%) said
they want to have one and 86 (29.4%) do not have
any desire to have one, with six non-responses
(2.0%). When asked about any experience of exclu-
sion caused by non-keitai ownership, 12 students
(4.1%) said they had had such experience. When
asked if they think they would also feel that they
“Cannot do without keitai” once they get one, 108
students (36.9%) said they “Agree completely” or
“Agree.”
DISCUSSION
Ownership and usage of keitai
A total of 49.3% (58.8% of girls, 41.1% of boys) of
the surveyed junior high school students owned
keitai. There were only two materials available about
the ownership of keitai among this age group.4 The
only survey for 2001 junior high school students in
the Tokyo Metropolitan Area was conducted by Be-
nesse Institute of Education from October to Decem-
ber 2001. The survey results showed that 39.1% of
688 students in the 8th grade owned keitai (46.0% for
girls, 30.1% for boys). In our study, the ownership
rate was 1.3 times as much as the figure in Benesse’s
survey. They indicated that the keitai ownership rate
among junior high school students might have in-
creased rapidly in the past one year. More girls
owned keitai than boys in both survey as well.
KAMIBEPPU AND SUGIURA
Our study revealed that the surveyed owners
used keitai considerably more for e-mailing than for
making/receiving calls. In terms of the ownership
rate, more than 80% of the population owned keitai
in Italy, Norway, Austria, Taiwan and Hong Kong.2
However, in terms of e-mail usage, the youth in Eu-
rope sent only one to three e-mails a day.8,9 In the
United States, the survey was conducted for about
800 children aged 13–17 living in Atlanta, Miami,
and Sacramento during the period from July and
August 2002. The survey results showed that those
who “Use the e-mail function of keitai more than
once a week” remain at only 30%, and 23% do not
use it at all.10 There was no data on the purpose for
which young people use the e-mail function of mo-
bile phones in other countries, however in some re-
search,11 it was claimed that young American
people prefer to chat with friends by using the phone
function of mobile phones. According to our sur-
vey, Japanese students used the e-mail function
rather than the phone function for chatting, and the
distinctions found in the use of mobile phones in
Japan and other countries might affect the frequency
of use for either phoning or e-mailing. Although
the status among junior high schools in those coun-
tries is not known, the country where keitai mail is
most actively used among the youth after Japan
seemed to be South Korea.1,8
When asked about the receivers of their e-mails,
more than 90% said they send messages to the
“Friends in relatively close proximity.” This result
was consistent with the results of several other sur-
veys, such as by Nakamura,12 and this tendency
was more noticeable among junior high school stu-
dents. Since frequent messaging to such close friends
might not pose a great risk of damaging their real-
world relations, and the correlations with the “with-
drawn behavior” that concern Okonogi13 might also
be very limited.
Effects on communication and relations with friends
In terms of the effects on communication and re-
lations with friends, many students positively stated
“Using keitai enables wider inter-personal relations,”
“Using keitai enables deeper inter-personal relations”
and “Using keitai enables better relationship-building
with friends.” Students who answered that they have
a “Large” number of friends used e-mail more fre-
quently than those who did not. Sociable students
seemed to use keitai mail effectively to widen their
inter-personal relations. Kobayashi14 pointed out
that “some adults are concerned about frequent use
of keitai mail among the youth, worrying that they
might disregard relationship-building through di-
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IMPACT OF KEITAI ON CHILDREN’S LIVES IN TOKYO
rect contact while overly emphasizing e-mail rela-
tionships. In fact, however, it could be said that
keitai mail actually helps to enrich face-to-face rela-
tionships.”
Matsuda15 agreed with Kobayashi and, in addi-
tion, stated that such selective practices of main-
taining only personally comfortable relations and
making friends with people of common interests
might make people’s inter-personal relations very
closed. In the present study, about 2% responded
that they did not want to allow non-keitai owners to
join their social groups, and about 4% of the sur-
veyed non-owners stated that they actually have
experienced exclusion. In a study conducted in the
United States,11 such ostracism was identified among
teenagers. In the present study, the existence of
such psychological impact, although recognized
only in very limited cases, should not be ignored.
And the result of keitai owners’ having a large num-
ber of friends who own keitai might suggest a po-
tential risk of closed inter-personal relations.
About 28% of the surveyed owners had had their
messages misunderstood. Whether this figure is
high in comparison with the case of face-to-face re-
lations and the consequence of such misunder-
standings (i.e., remedy or reconciliation) were not
investigated in this study. Keitai are media without
non-verbal communication other than “face marks”
which help receivers understand the sender’s feel-
ings.16 Hashimoto17 stated that “failure to convey
[such non-verbal elements as gestures and facial
expressions] might lead to improper judgment of
the feelings or entire personality of the other per-
son. As a result, people may easily fail to under-
stand each other.” This aspect of lack of non-verbal
communication, combined with the convenience
and other characteristics of keitai such as “Keitai are
good for casual use for e-mailing” (about 55%) and
“It is easier to express real feelings using keitai com-
pared to face-to-face contact” (about 67%) might
produce misunderstandings.
About 28% of the surveyed respondents have ex-
perienced their messages being misunderstood,
whereas about 48% felt insecure when their mes-
sages were not answered and about 53% felt bad
after sending e-mails, indicating that relatively many
people feel some sort of emotional insecurity in
connection to using keitai. The following are factors
viewed separately from the results of this research:
as a sender of keitai e-mails, prompt messaging
whenever one likes (e.g., during class or while on
the train) and ease of sending a short message (e.g.,
“I love you”, “Disgusting!”) might cause a sense of
regret and could disturb the sound development of
the practice of thinking before conveying a mes-
127
sage. As a receiver of keitai e-mails, people also tend
to guess that “even though the other person might
have his/her keitai today, meaning he/she could
reply quickly, he/she didn’t reply” and then, almost
immediately, worry that “he/she must be ignoring
my message.” The perception of potentially being
ignored by one’s friends could cause great anxiety
among children of this age. We are no longer in the
times of “not receiving a reply a day after leaving a
message on a person’s answering machine.” In
these modern times, people tend towards feeling
insecure easily, behaving with unease at intervals
of seconds, worrying about “not receiving a reply
yet (within 10 seconds of sending an e-mail)” or
continuously checking for new e-mail. People con-
stantly monitor their keitai,17 and reply to e-mails
immediately after receiving them, out of concern
for their friends.14
Risk of keitai mail dependence
“Constant monitoring of keitai” as mentioned
above is considered as a psychology of dependency.
The Internet Addiction Diagnostic Criteria (Table 5)
developed by Young18 based on the diagnostic cri-
teria of pathological gambling in DSM-IV19 has been
often used for studies on Internet addiction.20,21 Yet,
“Felt insecurity on not receiving a reply to e-mails”
may have its origins in the same state of mind as
“(1) Is preoccupied with the Internet” as shown in
Table 5, and “Interferes with regular daily sched-
ule” may have some relation to “(3) Has made un-
successful efforts to control, cut back, or stop
Internet use” or “(5) Has stayed online longer than
originally intended.” “Felt a sense of security brought
by keitai ownership” and “cannot do without a
keitai” could have strong ties with “(4) Is restless,
moody, depressed, or irritable when attempting to
cut down on or stop Internet use.” Our study re-
sults did not identify clinical dependency, yet they
suggest that the potential risk created by keitai use
should not be ignored.
In our study, more girls felt strongly that they
“Cannot do without keitai.” One study found out
that more females tend to express their feelings by
using pictographs,16 suggesting a possible gender
gap in the usage of keitai, which had yet to be iden-
tified.
Although some quantitative and qualitative stud-
ies22,23 were conducted about Internet addiction, no
other previous studies about keitai dependency were
recognized except those of Brinkoff et al.11 and Kato
et al.24 Traditionally, various socio-psychological
phenomena have taken place in Japan almost two
decades after their advent in the United States,12
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128 KAMIBEPPU AND SUGIURA

TABLE 5. YOUNG’S INTERNET ADDICTION DIAGNOSTIC CRITERIA

Five (or more) of the following:

1. Is preoccupied with the Internet (think about previous online activity or anticipate next online
session).
2. Needs to use the Internet with increased amounts of time in order to achieve satisfaction.
3. Has made unsuccessful efforts to control, cut back, or stop Internet use.
4. Is restless, moody, depressed, or irritable when attempting to cut down or stop Internet use.
5. Has stayed online longer than originally intended.
6. Has jeopardized or risked the loss of a significant relationship, job, educational, or career
opportunity because of the Internet.
7. Has lied to family members, therapist, or others to conceal the extent of involvement with the
Internet.
8. Uses the Internet as a way of escaping from problems or of relieving a dysphoric mood (e.g.,
feelings of helplessness, guilt, anxiety, depression).

but as far as keitai are concerned, and the depen-
dence on keitai mail in particular, the question is
whether Japan is going to take the lead.
The correlation between “Interferes with regular
daily schedule” and “Frequency of use E-mails” was
relatively high. According to the research conducted
by Benesse Institute of Education,4 more students
who used keitai for many hours (keitai owners whose
telephone rates were over 2,500 yen per month)
showed interference with regular daily schedule
such as “Not coming home until after midnight,”
“Going to bed after one o’clock a.m.,” “Coming late
for school,” and “Coming late for class” than stu-
dents who used keitai for fewer hours or did not
own keitai. This aspect should be very important,
particularly at this developmental stage, although
both of researches did not identify causality.
Study limitations and future research implications
As the subjects of this research were limited to 8th
grade students of public junior high schools in the
Tokyo Metropolitan area, differences on the national
level, in private junior high schools, and/or years at
school were not known. In the five surveyed public
junior high schools, all students are banned from car-
rying keitai into school. Comparing private schools to
public schools, it tends to admit the possession of
mobile phone in private schools because of their
longer commuting time commonly, so there is certain
possible gap in perception between students in pri-
vate school and in public school. And those five
schools could have less pushback for this kind of sur-
vey among public schools. There is a probability of
creating good relationships with friends or of dis-
playing higher autonomy caused by an open atmo-
sphere in school. Influences on students are not
known yet, but a survey on the approach of each
school to media literacy education should be taken.
As for method, delivering and collecting the
questionnaires by the class teachers may have made
their students’ replies better. The authors adopted a
self-reporting method, and no objective indicators
for the frequency of keitai use (time and charge) or
the depth and spread of friendships were used for
the present study. Although it clarified how the stu-
dents perceived the impact of mobile phone, it did
not identify the qualitative changes of relationships
among friends. Moreover since valid scales for per-
sonality and health condition were not used, it was
not clear whether such impact derived from indi-
vidual variables or the media and/or comparison
between the surveyed samples and the standard
samples could not be done.
There are two possible future directions of this
study. One is a quantitative study, and the other is a
qualitative study. The former would widen the
scope of this research into the national level and
conduct a survey to see differences in public schools
and private schools, in school years, and in urban
and rural area. The latter would, for example,
study the psychology of keitai owners as to mis-
understanding caused by features of keitai and its
psychological procedure of fence-mending or ad-
dressing emotional turmoil or dependence related
to use of keitai. Moreover, a longitudinal study
might help clarify the effects of keitai use on stu-
dents’ communication, relations with friends, and
their psychological and living conditions.
CONCLUSION
Of the valid responders in the surveyed 8th
grade students in five public junior high schools in
the Tokyo Metropolitan Area, about a half of them
owned keitai. It indicated that the keitai ownership
rate among junior high school students might have
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IMPACT OF KEITAI ON CHILDREN’S LIVES IN TOKYO
increased rapidly in the past one year, with owner-
ship higher in girls than boys. The surveyed own-
ers used keitai considerably more for e-mailing than
for making/receiving calls, and more than a half of
them sent or received more than 10 messages a day.
They used the keitai phone function to impart nec-
essary messages to family members and the e-mail
function to chat with “Friends in relatively close
proximity,” which might be a usage pattern unique
to Japanese youth.
The surveyed owners positively evaluated the
effects of using keitai on relations with friends. Stu-
dents who answered that they have a “Large” num-
ber of friends used e-mail more frequently than
those who did not, and seemed to use keitai mail ef-
fectively to widen their inter-personal relations. On
the other hand, although recognized only in very
limited cases, the psychology of ostracism was iden-
tified. Keitai owners might make friends with keitai
owners.
About 30% of the surveyed owners have had
their keitai “Messages misunderstood” and about a
half of them felt insecure concerning the usage of
keitai. Worrying that “he/she must be ignoring my
message” was considered to develop a psychology
of dependency, and the surveyed owners should
have the potential risk of keitai mail dependency.
The correlation between “Interferes with regular
daily schedule” and “Frequency of use E-mails”
was relatively high.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude
to Dr. Itaru Kobayashi in the Developmental Med-
ical Sciences, Graduate School of Medicine at the
University of Tokyo, and Kanae Yoshimura, a nurs-
ing teacher at Sekimachi Elementary School in Neri-
ma-ku, Tokyo, both of whom introduced us to the
schools that participated in this study. Further-
more, we would also like to express our gratitude
to all of the students and teachers in the junior high
schools. This study was conducted with the aid of a
grant from Yasuda Seimei Shakai Jigyodan in 2002.
Part of this paper was presented at the 50th Confer-
ence of the Japanese Society of Child Health
(Kagoshima) and the 3rd Congress of the Asian So-
ciety for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Al-
lied Professions (Taipei).
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