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“Pay it forward” and Altruistic Responses to Disasters in Japan: Latent Class Analysis of Support Following the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake

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Abstract

Since the emergence of borantia (volunteers) in 1995, Japanese society has developed disaster volunteerism to enable citizens to help one another. Survivors from areas affected by disasters over the past two decades have returned to assist survivors of the Great East Japan Earthquake (2011 Tohoku Earthquake) through volunteering. This chain of support is known as a “pay it forward” network. Using latent class analysis, this article statistically demonstrates that different patterns of support behavior appeared after the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and that people who were supported by others following disasters were more likely to help (e.g., through volunteering, donating goods, etc.). The class characterized as “pay it forward” was found to display high-support behaviors, and this was not only explained by traditional theory (i.e., dominant status model, resource model), but also by theories related to economic status and educational background. Results indicate that developing volunteerism in Japan accelerates network support.

Résumé

Depuis l’apparition des borantia (bénévoles) en 1995, la société japonaise a mis sur pied des systèmes de bénévolat qui permettent aux citoyens de s’entraider. Les survivants de régions victimes, dans les deux dernières décennies, de désastres reviennent aider les survivants du grand tremblement de terre de l’est du Japon (Tohoku, 2011) en tant que bénévoles. Cette chaîne de soutien s’appelle le réseau « donnez au suivant » . À l’aide d’une analyse de structure latente, le présent article démontre, sur la base de statistiques, que divers modèles de soutien ont fait leur apparition après le tremblement de terre de Tohoku de 2011 et que les personnes qui sont soutenues par d’autres suite à des désastres ont plus tendance à offrir leur aide (bénévolat, dons d’aliments, etc.) Nos résultats démontrent que la structure « donnez au suivant » est caractérisée par des comportements d’aide marqués et ce phénomène est non seulement renforcé par la théorie traditionnelle (modèle de statut dominant, modèle de ressources), mais aussi par des théories associées au statut économique et à l’éducation. Les résultats indiquent que le bénévolat en développement au Japon accélère l’offre de soutien au réseau.

Zusammenfassung

Seit dem Aufkommen von Borantia (Ehrenamtliche) 1995 hat die japanische Gesellschaft das ehrenamtliche Engagement im Zusammenhang mit Katastrophen entwickelt, um es Bürgern zu ermöglichen, sich gegenseitig zu helfen. Überlebende aus Katastrophengebieten in den vergangenen zwei Jahrzehnten haben wiederum Überlebenden des großen Erdbebens von Ostjapan im Jahr 2011 (Tohoku-Erdbeben 2011) ehrenamtlich geholfen. Diese Kette der Unterstützung ist als „Pay-it-forward“-Netzwerk bekannt. Anhand der latenten Klassenanalyse legt dieser Beitrag statistisch dar, dass nach dem Tohoku-Erdbeben von 2011 unterschiedliche Verhaltensmuster in Verbindung mit der Unterstützung anderer auftraten und dass Menschen, die nach Katastrophen von anderen unterstützt wurden, eher dazu geneigt waren, anderen zu helfen (z. B. durch ehrenamtliche Tätigkeiten, Sachspenden etc.). Die Gruppe in der „Pay-it-forward“-Kategorie zeigte große Unterstützung von anderen, was sich nicht nur anhand der traditionellen Theorie erklären ließ (d. h. Dominanzstatus-Modell, Ressourcenmodell), sondern auch anhand von Theorien zum ökonomischen Status und Bildungshintergrund. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die Entwicklung des ehrenamtlichen Engagements in Japan die Netzwerkunterstützung beschleunigt.

Resumen

Desde el surgimiento de borantia (voluntarios) en 1995, la sociedad japonesa ha desarrollado un voluntariado ante desastres para permitir que los ciudadanos se ayuden mutuamente. Los supervivientes de áreas afectadas por desastres a lo largo de las dos últimas décadas han vuelto para ayudar a los supervivientes del Gran Terremoto de Japón Oriental (Terremoto de Tohoku de 2011) mediante el voluntariado. Esta cadena de apoyo se conoce como una red de “favores”. Utilizando el análisis de clases latentes, el presente artículo demuestra estadísticamente que después del Terremoto de Tohoku de 2011 aparecieron diferentes patrones de comportamiento de ayuda, y que la gente que fue ayudada por otros tras los desastres era más probable que ayudase (por ejemplo, mediante el voluntariado, la donación de productos, etc.). Se encontró que la clase caracterizada como “de favores” mostraba comportamientos de ayuda altos y que esto no sólo quedaba explicado por la teoría tradicional (es decir, modelo de estatus dominante, modelo de recursos), sino también por teorías relacionadas con el estatus económico y la formación académica. Los resultados indican que el desarrollo del voluntariado en Japón acelera el apoyo en red.

Chinese

自从1995年兴起borantia(志愿者)以来,日本社会就发展了灾难志愿服务,从而让居民能够彼此帮助。过去二十年来,通过志愿服务,来自受灾难影响区域的幸存者回来帮助东日本大地震(2011年东北大地震)的幸存者。本支持链被称为“爱心传递”网络。使用潜在的等级分析,本文统计展示了2011年东北大地震后出现的不同支持行为模式,在出现灾难后得到其他人支持的人员更有可能提供帮助(如通过志愿服务、捐赠物品等)。特性化为“爱心传递”的等级被发现存在较高的支持行为,不仅可以通过传统理论(即主导的状态模式、资源模式),而且还可通过经济状况和教育背景相关的理论来解释。结果表明,日本不断发展的志愿服务会加速网络支持。

Arabic

منذ ظهور بورانتيا (المتطوعين) في عام 1995، تطور تطوع المجتمع الياباني في حالات الكوارث لتمكين المواطنين من مساعدة بعضهم البعض. قد عاد الناجون من المناطق المتضررة من الكوارث خلال العقدين الماضيين لمساعدة الناجين من زلزال شرق اليابان الكبير (زلزال توهوكو 2011) من خلال العمل التطوعي. تم تعريف سلسلة الدعم هذه بأنها شبكة “رد الإحسان بالإحسان “. بإستخدام تحليل الطبقة الكامنة، توضح هذه المقالة إحصائيا أن أنماط مختلفة من سلوك الدعم ظهرت بعد زلزال توهوكو عام 2011، وأن الأشخاص الذين دعمهم آخرون بعد الكوارث كانوا من المحتمل أكثر من غيرهم أن يساعدوا (على سبيل المثال من خلال العمل التطوعي والتبرع بالسلع وما إلى ذلك). ووجدت الطبقة التي وصفت بأنها “ترد الإحسان بالإحسان” تعرض سلوكيات دعم عالية وهذا لم يفسر فقط عن طريق النظرية التقليدية (أي نموذج الحالة المهيمنة، نموذج الموارد)، ولكن أيضا” من النظريات المتعلقة بالوضع الإقتصادي والخلفية التعليمية. تشير النتائج إلى أن تطوير العمل التطوعي في اليابان يعجل شبكة الدعم.

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Change history

  • 11 April 2018

    The PDF version of this article was reformatted to a larger trim size.

Notes

  1. In addition to this, issues with Mitani’s (2014) data analysis also remain. The data do not distinguish between survivors of the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and those of previous disasters. In determining whether the survivors of the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake were more likely to be helped by others, it is difficult to conclude that PFNs really appeared. The ratios of volunteering estimated by Mitani (2015), 3.9% in the affected area and 6.6% outside the affected area, are relatively high compared to other surveys, which estimated 2.8% in both areas (Yamamoto and Sakamoto 2012).

  2. In this article, we excluded non-relevant behaviors (e.g., collecting information, contacting acquaintances) but included variables that are impure altruistic behaviors (e.g., buying goods, traveling). This is because that they were difficult to distinguish following the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake. Recently, the government banned volunteering tours, a decision that was met with criticism from those involved in the relief effort. As a result of this opposition, however, non-profit organizations were allowed to resume the tours.

  3. The disasters covered in the survey include the three biggest earthquakes in Japan (the 1995 Kobe, the 2004 Chuetsu, and the 2007 Chuetsu-oki earthquakes) and other disasters. Other questions about disasters that respondents answered included not only earthquakes, but also general natural hazards, such as floods or landslides.

  4. For example, when a disaster happens, the prefectural government and social welfare council establish disaster volunteer centers, which effectively coordinate volunteers with survivors; the prefecture or city office also try to coordinate sending supplies by volunteers, and sometimes they asked people to send supplies to them, not to survivors because sending supplies directly confuses the affected areas. This tendency has been getting stronger over the past two decades and can be applied to the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake; it has been called the “drive for institutionalization” (Atsumi 2014). Therefore, it is important to examine the prefectural effects, especially the “experience of being helped” following a disaster in Japan.

  5. To prove that there are no confounding effects, we also show the logit model without multi-level analysis in Appendix.

  6. Education and household income also has a positive significant tendency (p < 0.10) toward donation (not shown).

  7. However, BLRT suggested that class 4 is acceptable. Considering BLRT, ABIC, which is likely to suggest a medium class between AIC and BIC, indicated that class model 3 is also acceptable. However, we used the two-class model because the class structures of the three-class model were slightly different from the two-class model, and those of the four-class model consisted of a very low percentage of the particular class. For reference, we show a three-class model in Appendix.

  8. We also conducted an analysis for the three-class model because ABIC displays similar values for the two-class model. However, the log likelihood estimation has not been replicated for 2000 trials.

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Acknowledgements

The first author is deeply grateful to James D. Goltz, Lee Young-Jun, Haruyo Mitani for their generous guidance of the article. The authors have been inspired by the ideas of survivors in Nishinomiya, Shiodani, Kariwa, and Noda, with whom we interacted through our fieldwork. We owe a special debt of thanks to them all. This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 16J02893. This work was supported by special funding for the promotion of internationalization of research activities by the Japanese Group Dynamics Association.

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Correspondence to Hiroaki Daimon.

Appendix

Appendix

See Tables 6, 7, and 8.

Table 6 Results of logit for each support behavior
Table 7 Results of three-class model
Table 8 Probabilities and proportion of three-class model

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Daimon, H., Atsumi, T. “Pay it forward” and Altruistic Responses to Disasters in Japan: Latent Class Analysis of Support Following the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake. Voluntas 29, 119–132 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11266-017-9880-y

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