Drinking among Japanese Youth -a Paradox for Theories of Alcohol Availability?

Abstract

Aims By presenting the paradoxical case of Japan this study aims to highlight the importance of cross-cultural data to understanding different drinking patterns. Why is it that a country with high alcohol availability does not present higher figures of consumption? Why is it that Japanese youth, who can buy their alcohol even from vending machines, do not engage in heavier drinking than they apparently do? Does Japan teach Western countries a lesson in this regard? Methods and Data The discussion is based on data from the WHO Alcohol Database together with different survey-based studies undertaken in Japan. These empirical data are connected to general literature on Japanese culture and Japanese society. Results and Conclusions The data presented confirm the importance of analysing the cultural dimension when studying drinking patterns. Even though structural variables regarding availability are significant in explaining alcohol consumption, cross-cultural data alert us to the importance of including cultural values in our analyses. Japan does possibly represent a ‘deviant case’ regarding alcohol research, thus confirming this perspective. It is neither possible, nor desirable, to transplant collectivistic Japanese values into Western countries. However, we can ask what might be the Western functional equivalent to Japanese group control. Counteracting the increasing age-based segmentation in Western societies is perhaps the most potent answer to this question.

Young people and alcohol in Italy: An evolving relationship

“…This is, moreover, what the case of Japan seems to prove, where a 'wet' culture seems to be able to neutralize the influence of certain structural determining factors of alcohol consumption and misuse (low prices, availability, starting age, advertising, etc. ; Leornardsen, 2006). In this way one could overcome an alcohologic reasoning, which appears schizophrenic when, in expressing deep concern for the 'northern' direction taken by young people, it seems to call for the virtues of traditional drinking, which for many years was also rightly indicated as being responsible for a large number of alcohol-related pathologies and high human and social costs.…”