表題番号：2024R-049
日付：2025/04/21
研究課題Well-being for Dual Earners in Pars and Tokyo under and through COVID-19: A Qualitative Study
| 研究者所属（当時） | 資格 | 氏名 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| （代表者） | 国際学術院 大学院アジア太平洋研究科 | 教授 | ロバーツ グレンダ Ｓ |
- 研究成果概要
- Thanks to the support of these Special Research Grants, I was able to make significant progress on this research. First, in the winter of 2024, I resided in Paris and conducted several interviews with business stakeholders, mostly managers, on how they managed their employees during the Covid pandemic, and whether they felt any differences in employee management since the end of the pandemic. I also spoke with a therapist about her experience working with elderly clients during and after the pandemic. The grant enabled me to have some transcriptions made of the Paris interviews. I could also complete several research interviews in Tokyo in September 2024, and to have them transcribed and ready for analysis. Over the winter months in 2025I have been busy with writing and analysis of another research project, but I will be turning to the analysis of the Paris/Tokyo data from the summer of 2025. I hope to return to Tokyo for further research in the fall of 2025 to perform more interviews of individuals there. There are certainly some similarities in how both populations dealt with the pandemic. For instance, anxieties over children not having their normal school and play routines, fears of catching the disease, stress over having to share tight living space, difficulties with work regimens—how to manage workers when they are not present in the company, for instance. But there were also major differences. Governmental policies controlling people’s mobility outside of their homes differed greatly, with Parisians being much more restricted. Telework was instituted in a more widespread manner in Paris, and children in Tokyo eventually went back to schoolrooms earlier, if only part-time. Many Parisian families left Paris for the countryside during the pandemic; some of my respondents there even said the pandemic brought their families closer together and made them appreciate each other more. So far, I have not heard this from my Tokyo interviewees. Moreover, it was much easier for Tokyo people to get used to mask-wearing, since they had already had that habit before the pandemic. For the Parisians, it was quite an onerous burden, as was the restriction on their freedom of movement outside of their dwelling. In Paris, some of the elderly were quite frightened to venture outdoors, and even after the pandemic, they remain very cautious. As for businesses, in Paris there were various ways that managers handled the pandemic situation, but there seems to be consensus that while workers enjoyed and still enjoy the freedom to work remotely, managers feel there has been a loss of camaraderie and some failures at communication in the team. My impression is that while the French have institutionalized remote work for all at least for part of the week, in Japan it has been much more common post-pandemic to recall workers back to the workplace. Although we are now a few years past the pandemic, people in both cultures point to ways that its effects have been long-lasting, including in the mental health of children and adolescents, as well as their acquisition of knowledge and ability to follow their career paths. Also, at least in Paris, some people have said that the pandemic led to a deterioration in public manners, and a widespread distrust in the government, which may have given a boost to the right-wing political parties. There is much that remains to be explored. I will be performing more literature searches in both locations in order to grasp these broader trends.