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that even before the events of March 11, 2011 they felt higher levels of identification with Tohoku compared to students from other parts of the country. However, after the earthquake their identification to the Tohoku region grew even stronger; strong enough, in fact, for respondents originating from Tohoku to identify far more with being from Tohoku than any other cultural identity surveyed, even that of being Japanese.
Meanwhile, students from other regions did not feel particularly strong ties to their region of origin before the disaster, but did afterwards. This study holds that this is worthy of note as it indicates a noticeable shift in cultural identifications of regional groupings following a natural disaster (and its many complicated effects, including those from the tsunami and radiation exposure).
Overall, students surveyed in 2011 demonstrated strong identifications with their universities both before and after the Great East Japan Earthquake; whereas they had weaker identifications both before and after the disaster with being from their respective faculties, academic years, and high schools. However, average identifications with all four of these student identifications weakened after the earthquake. This signifies that students identified less with being students after the earthquake than before it. A possible explanation for this is that they placed more emphasis on other identifications after the disaster, particularly regional identifications.
Examining these figures according to academic year revealed the fourth year students as the only group to show a stronger average identification with their academic year after the earthquake. This is possibly due to the reality of being a fourth year student (along with the responsibilities of finding a job and becoming an adult member of society) having set in, which most likely would have happened irrespective of the disaster. Perhaps this group’s comparatively weak faculty and university identifications before the disaster and strengthening after (along with the contrasting high school identification figures) are also indicators of this shift in focus, which was particular to fourth year students.
Clear trends became evident when dividing the data between faculty groups, or more tellingly, between universities. Apart from Law faculty students’ high average identification with their faculty before the disaster and Business Administration students’
still moderately high average identification with their university after the earthquake, generally Toyo University students’ cultural identities moved in one direction and Surugadai University students’ in the other. Toyo University students consistently reported weaker bonds with their faculties, academic years, and university after the earthquake. Conversely, Surugadai University students displayed stronger identifications in all of these areas after the Great East Japan Earthquake. The exception
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to this was students’ ties to the high schools they graduated from; although high school ties of students from both universities weakened after the earthquake, Surugadai University students started off with stronger ties before the disaster. One possible explanation for this contrast between the universities, particularly regarding university identifications, would be if the responses to the disaster by Surugadai and Toyo universities were very different and if this affected the tendencies of their students to feel stronger or weaker ties to their universities. Whether this is a good or a bad shift in cultural identification patterns depends on your point of view. For example, is it important for Toyo University that its students feel strongly identified with it? If so, what these results mean for Toyo University and what can or should be done about it is an area of research requiring urgent attention. Or, is it more important that Toyo University students’ cultural identities - while maintaining a certain level of positive identification with Toyo University - are grounded in more diverse areas, such as the various regions of Japan and the global community?
4.2 Findings from the 2012 survey
As evident in the results presented in Section 3.2, of the cultural identities surveyed, that of being Japanese was again the most important cultural identity to the respondent group of 2012. Identifications with their gender and with being a Japanese speaker were also strong items. Identifying with being an English speaker was again the weakest item and having a global identity was also another weak link. Average faculty and year identifications were also comparatively weak. Further, the overall 2012 analysis revealed a significant strengthening of regional identifications. On the other hand, year of study and high school identifications weakened significantly after the disaster.
Gender differentiations revealed discrepancies between the genders with regard to the highest ranked identity surveyed - that of being Japanese. National ties for males appeared to strengthen after the Great East Japan Earthquake, while those of females weakened, creating a significant gap between the sexes regarding their identifications after the disaster with being Japanese. Pre-disaster average gender identification figures were also significantly stronger for the males. Although both genders displayed (insignificant) drops in levels of gender identification after the earthquake (this drop was greater for the males), gender remained a strong identification factor for both genders. Regarding claims to English speaker and global identities (both pre- and post-disaster), males in the 2012 survey identified less with both of these identities than females did (three of these four comparisons being significant). This is opposite to the
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2011 survey results, when females were the gender group displaying weak identifications with both English speaker and global identities. Regarding differences before and after the earthquake, results suggested an overall weakening of gender significance and a strengthening of regional ties.
The analysis of the 2012 dataset also produced significant differences between faculties of Toyo University regarding certain aspects of their students’ cultural identifications. Such differences were found in students’ identifications with: Toyo University, their respective faculties, being a Japanese speaker, being an English speaker, and being a Japanese person.
Firstly, in this analysis, students from the Business Administration, Sociology, and Law faculties showed high average affiliations with being Toyo University students.
However, students from the Literature faculty did not. This is particularly evident with figures relating to identifications before the Great East Japan Earthquake.
Secondly, there are more complicated trends regarding faculty affiliations.
Before March 11, 2011, the average faculty identification factor for Literature students was significantly lower than that of Business Administration and Law students.
However, reported faculty affiliations after that infamous date reveal that it was students from the Law faculty, not the Literature faculty, who displayed statistical differences with students from the Business Administration and Law faculties, this time due to their stronger identifications.
Thirdly, as with university and faculty affiliations, the Literature faculty group again stood out regarding Japanese speaker identifications. This time, however, their average identification factor was high. This indicates that students from the Literature faculty, on average, had higher cultural identifications with being Japanese speakers than students from the Business Administration, Sociology or Law faculties. These differences were all statistically significant in all bar one instance.
Fourthly, the only significant difference that was found between the faculties regarding their students’ identifications with being English speakers was between the Business Administration and Sociology faculties, and only in the post-earthquake figures. In this case, Sociology students had a relatively weak average identification with being speakers of the English language, while Business Administration students had a relatively high one.
Finally, further differences in cultural identifications between students from the Literature faculty and those from other faculties were found regarding the national identity factor. Identifications with being Japanese were significantly higher on average for students from the Literature faculty than for those from the Business Administration
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and Sociology faculties. Although the national identification factor of being Japanese remained higher for Literature students than for those of other faculties after the Great East Japan Earthquake, the differences were no longer significant.
Therefore, of the ten cultural identifications surveyed, statistically significant differences between faculties of Toyo University were found in five of them. In four of these five, it was the Literature faculty that differed to the other three faculties analysed.
This research cannot fully explain the complicated cultural identity issues of students from the Literature faculty. Why do Literature students have comparatively strong identifications with being Japanese and Japanese speakers? Why do they have weaker affiliations with their faculty and with Toyo University than students from other faculties?
4.3 Findings from the Combined Three-Year Dataset
The results presented in the yearly analysis section suggest that, overall, these Japanese university student respondents were more likely to identify with both being English speakers and having a global identity in 2013 than in the previous two years.
This suggests the possibility of increased internationalization of these students for whatever reason. This will be further investigated in the second half of this thesis.
Yearly-contrasted figures relating to faculty and university identifications before the disaster were found to be significantly different in 2011, 2012 and 2013. While one may expect similar figures relating to self-identifications pre-disaster for all three years, it must be remembered that respondents were merely asked to rank their identifications before and after the Great East Japan Earthquake, thus comparing their identifications before and after the disaster, not from year to year. However, the significant changes over the three years of the reported pre-disaster faculty and university identifications, combined with the comparatively more stable corresponding post-disaster figures, results in a contrast between the relativity of pre-disaster and post-disaster figures between the years. What is of interest here is that there appears to be a difference in students’ perceptions of their university and faculty ties before the Great East Japan Earthquake as time has passed. Examination of changes over time in self-perceptions of cultural identity before and after a particular event is an area of possible further research.
The gender analysis revealed significant differences between the sexes.
Specifically, males demonstrated weaker average global and English speaker identifications, while claiming comparatively stronger gender identifications and in some instances bonds with their hometowns and the high schools they graduated from.
This suggests that despite both genders demonstrating strengthened English speaker and
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global identities, this apparent overall internationalization of these respondents’ cultural identities was more prominent in the females. Gender differences regarding the internationalization of Japanese university students’ cultural identities will be examined in Stage Two of this research project.
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