Individual-level analysis of social capital and health: a comparison of Arab and Jewish Israelis

Discrepancies exist in existing research regarding the association between social capital and self-rated health, most of which has been undertaken in the developed world. The aim of this study is first to assess the levels of the various variables describing individual social capital in Jews and Arab residing in Israel, and second to assess the association between individual social capital and self-rated health in these two population groups. The data were obtained from an Israeli health interview survey (knowledge, attitudes and practices (KAP)) conducted during 2004-2005, which is based on 3,365 interviews with adult Jews and 985 adult Arabs. Social capital measures included social trust, neighborhood safety, perceived helpfulness, trust in local and national authorities and social support. Data were also obtained on self-rated health and socioeconomic and demographic variables. Multivariate logistic regression revealed that Jews reported higher levels of social trust, perceived helpfulness, trust in authorities, and social support compared to Arabs, after adjusting for demographic and socioeconomic variables. Social contacts, however, were reported more frequently in the Arab population. Neighborhood safety was similar in the two population groups. Among Jews, those reporting higher levels of individual social capital reported better self-rated health after adjusting for demographic and socioeconomic variables. Among Arabs, only those reporting higher levels of social support reported better self-rated health. In Israel, individual levels of social capital seem to be lower in the Arab minority than in the Jewish majority. Individual social capital was associated with better self-rated health mainly in the Jewish population and less so in the Arab population. Social capital factors may be associated with health to a higher extent in affluent populations with relatively high social capital and less so in low social capital and more traditional communities. More research is needed to verify these differences.     

Perception of place and health: Differences between neighbourhoods in the Québec City region

This paper addresses two questions: (1) Can people's perceptions of problems and social cohesion in the neighbourhood be considered as contextual variables; and (2) are these perceptions related to people's health? Data come from a general health survey carried out in 2004 among 1634 individuals living in three localities of the region of Québec City, namely a downtown, a suburban and a rural area, which were further subdivided into 34 smaller spatial units, hereafter called neighbourhoods. The survey included questions on individuals’ perception of problems (social and environmental) and social cohesion (attraction to neighbourhood, neighbouring and psychological sense of community) in the neighbourhood, as well as questions on self-rated health, long-term disability and self-mastery. A first set of logistic multilevel models was performed to ascertain the existence of neighbourhood variations in the perception of problems and social cohesion, after accounting for individual attributes. A second set of multilevel models was carried out to examine the association between perceived problems and social cohesion in the neighbourhood and people's health. Results show that, after accounting for individual attributes, the perception of problems and social cohesion varies significantly by neighbourhood and/or localities and can be considered as contextual variables. Furthermore, these perceptions of place appear to be significant predictors of people's health.     

Pre-pandemic individual- and community-level social capital and depressive symptoms during COVID-19: A longitudinal study of Japanese older adults in 2019-21

During a pandemic, it is important to know whether social capital can mitigate the risk of mental disorders, given the restrictions on social interactions. However, evidence using longitudinal data is scarce. This study examined the association between pre-pandemic social capital and depressive symptoms during COVID-19 among older adults. We used longitudinal data from the Japan Gerontological Evaluation Study (JAGES), including 8291 participants aged 65 or older who were physically and cognitively independent and not depressed at baseline. We conducted baseline and follow-up mail surveys in ten municipalities in Japan from November 2019 to January 2020 (pre-pandemic period) and from November 2020 to February 2021 (pandemic period), respectively. We measured depressive symptoms using the 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale. Social capital was measured with three validated subscales, namely, civic participation, social cohesion, and reciprocity. We performed a multilevel logistic regression analysis to examine the association. A total of 1089 (13.1%) participants newly developed depressive symptoms during the pandemic. The logistic regression showed that pre-pandemic individual-level social cohesion (odds ratio = 0.79, 95% confidence interval: 0.73 to 0.86) and reciprocity (0.89, 0.82 to 0.96) and community-level reciprocity (0.93, 0.88 to 0.98) were negatively associated with the odds of depressive symptoms. Even after adjusting for declines in social capital during the pandemic, the observed associations of pre-pandemic social capital remained. Fostering social cohesion and reciprocity may increase resilience to mental disorders during a pandemic of infectious disease.     

Salir Adelante: Social capital and resilience during the Covid-19 pandemic in Argentina

The Covid-19 pandemic has stimulated new appraisals of how social cohesion, including neighborhood-level social capital, fosters resilience in the face of crisis. Several studies suggest better health outcomes in neighborhoods with higher level of social capital, in general and during the pandemic. Building on a growing body of research which suggests that those who live in close-knit neighborhoods have fared better during the pandemic, this article analyzes how social capital influences individual and collective perceptions and attitudes about the experiences of the Covid-19 pandemic in Tucumán, Argentina. To assess this question, we used a mixed-methods approach, combining focus groups, semi-structured interviews, and an online survey (n = 701 respondents) conducted in September 2021. We find widespread experiences of resilience in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, in spite of difficult socioeconomic conditions and perceived poor government performance. Results from logistic regression analysis indicate that perceptions of high neighborhood social capital are associated with more positive outcomes in many dimensions, including personal resilience, ability to cope with uncertainty, perceptions of community solidarity, and reported compliance with public health measures. We further argue that conceptualizations of social cohesion need to be adjusted to local or national-level cultural norms to accurately capture the experience of countries of the Global South.     

Social Cohesion and Mortality: A Survival Analysis of Older Adults in Japan

Objectives. We examined the association between social cohesion and mortality in a sample of older adults in Japan.Methods. Data were derived from a cohort study of elderly individuals (65–84 years) in Shizuoka Prefecture; 14 001 participants were enrolled at baseline (1999) and followed up in 2002, 2006, and 2009. Among the 11 092 participants for whom we had complete data, 1427 had died during follow-up. We examined the association between social cohesion (assessed at both the community and individual levels) and subsequent mortality after control for baseline and time-varying covariates. We used clustered proportional hazard regression models to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and confidence intervals (CIs).Results. After control for individual characteristics, individual perceptions of community cohesion were associated with a reduced risk of all-cause mortality (HR = 0.78; 95% CI = 0.73, 0.84) as well as mortality from cardiovascular disease (HR = 0.75; 95% CI = 0.67, 0.84), pulmonary disease (HR = 0.66; 95% CI = 0.58, 0.75), and all other causes (HR = 0.76; 95% CI = 0.66, 0.89). However, no statistically significant relationship was found between community cohesion and mortality risk.Conclusions. Among the elderly in Japan, more positive individual perceptions of community cohesion are associated with reduced risks of all-cause and cause-specific mortality.A growing body of research has focused on social cohesion as a determinant of population health.1 Higher levels of community social cohesion—characterized by closely knit social relationships among residents with strong mutual trust and reciprocity—have been linked to better health outcomes such as lower mortality rates and higher self-rated health.1–10However, prospective studies of social cohesion and health remain sparse, and there is continuing debate about whether such associations are driven by individual residents’ psychological perceptions about their communities or by the characteristics of the communities per se.11 In other words, cohesive communities may be healthier either because residents are psychologically healthier and express trust toward their neighbors (a compositional effect) or because the community social environment promotes health via group-level processes such as the ability to undertake collective action, for example mobilizing local volunteers to participate in health promotion activities (a contextual effect).Multilevel analytical techniques are required to tease out the compositional effects of community cohesion from its contextual effects. To date, there has been stronger empirical support for an association between individual-level perceptions of social cohesion and health outcomes and less evidence for a community-level contextual effect.11Japanese society has historically been characterized by high levels of social cohesion. The reasons for this include the roughly 2 centuries of isolationism (from 1633 until 1853) enforced by the Tokugawa shogunate (a feudal Japanese military government), as well as the comparative ethnic homogeneity of the Japanese population.12 Recent multilevel studies conducted in Japan suggest an association between community social cohesion and improved health outcomes, including higher self-rated health,13 a lower risk of depression,14 and a lower incidence of functional disabilities.15 Two of these studies were conducted among older Japanese people.13,15 However, according to a systematic review of multilevel studies of income inequality, prospective studies remain sparse, and more evidence is needed to establish the robustness of the association between income inequality and population health.11With few exceptions, the empirical evidence linking community social cohesion to health has been based on cross-sectional study designs, and there is a dearth of longitudinal evidence. We examined the long-term associations between social cohesion and mortality in a sample of older Japanese adults.     

Social capital and health: a review of prospective multilevel studies

Background

This article presents an overview of the concept of social capital, reviews prospective multilevel analytic studies of the association between social capital and health, and discusses intervention strategies that enhance social capital.

Methods

We conducted a systematic search of published peer-reviewed literature on the PubMed database and categorized studies according to health outcome.

Results

We identified 13 articles that satisfied the inclusion criteria for the review. In general, both individual social capital and area/workplace social capital had positive effects on health outcomes, regardless of study design, setting, follow-up period, or type of health outcome. Prospective studies that used a multilevel approach were mainly conducted in Western countries. Although we identified some cross-sectional multilevel studies that were conducted in Asian countries, including Japan, no prospective studies have been conducted in Asia.

Conclusions

Prospective evidence from multilevel analytic studies of the effect of social capital on health is very limited at present. If epidemiologic findings on the association between social capital and health are to be put to practical use, we must gather additional evidence and explore the feasibility of interventions that build social capital as a means of promoting health.Key words: health, literature review, multilevel analysis, prospective study, social capital     

Neighborhood social capital and crime victimization: Comparison of spatial regression analysis and hierarchical regression analysis

Crime is an important determinant of public health outcomes, including quality of life, mental well-being, and health behavior. A body of research has documented the association between community social capital and crime victimization. The association between social capital and crime victimization has been examined at multiple levels of spatial aggregation, ranging from entire countries, to states, metropolitan areas, counties, and neighborhoods. In multilevel analysis, the spatial boundaries at level 2 are most often drawn from administrative boundaries (e.g. Census tracts in the U.S.). One problem with adopting administrative definitions of neighborhoods is that it ignores spatial spillover. We conducted a study of social capital and crime victimization in one ward of Tokyo city, using a Spatial Durbin Model with an inverse-distance weighting matrix that assigned each respondent a unique level of "exposure" to social capital based on all other residents' perceptions. The study is based on a postal questionnaire sent to 20-69 years old residents of Arakawa Ward, Tokyo. The response rate was 43.7%. We examined the contextual influence of generalized trust, perceptions of reciprocity, two types of social network variables, as well as two principal components of social capital (constructed from the above four variables). Our outcome measure was self-reported crime victimization in the last five years. In the Spatial Durbin Model, we found that neighborhood generalized trust, reciprocity, supportive networks and two principal components of social capital were each inversely associated with crime victimization. By contrast, a multilevel regression performed with the same data (using administrative neighborhood boundaries) found generally null associations between neighborhood social capital and crime. Spatial regression methods may be more appropriate for investigating the contextual influence of social capital in homogeneous cultural settings such as Japan.     

Do perceived neighbourhood cohesion and safety contribute to neighbourhood differences in health?

This paper reports on a survey (N=3344) and in-depth interviews (N=80) from four socio-economically contrasting postcode areas in Adelaide. Logistic regression was used to examine locational differences in self-rated health, controlling for demographic, socio-economic factors, health behaviours, individual social capital (social networks, support, reciprocity, trust) and perceived neighbourhood cohesion and safety. Statistically significant locational differences in health emerged. Perceived neighbourhood cohesion and safety accounted for this difference. Interviews explored perceptions of cohesion and safety and found that they were intricately related and varied between the areas. The implications of the findings for understanding locational differences in health are discussed.     

Individual-level social capital and self-rated health in Japan: An application of the Resource Generator

Despite accumulating evidence of associations between social capital and health in public health research, a criticism of the field has been that researchers have exclusively focused on concepts of social cohesion to the exclusion of individual-level approaches. In the present study, we evaluated the association between social capital measured by the Resource Generator (an individual-level assessment of access to social capital) and self-rated health among Japanese population in a cross-sectional study. A postal survey of 4000 randomly selected residents in Okayama City (western Japan) was conducted in February 2009. We divided the overall scores from the Resource Generator Japan scale into quartiles. Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for self-rated health were calculated separately by sex. Individuals with the highest quartile of scores had significantly lower odds of poor health compared to the lowest group after covariate adjustment among both men and women (men; OR: 0.45, 95% CI: 0.24–0.86, women; OR: 0.44, 95% CI: 0.25–0.79, respectively) and there were also significant dose–response relationships. In the sub-domains of Resource Generator Japan scale, a differential pattern was observed by sex. Women showed a clear dose–response relationship with health across all four sub-scales (domestic resources, expert advice, personal skills, and problem solving resources). In contrast, only the domain of expert advice exhibited a strong association with men's health. Among both men and women individual-level social capital measured by the Resource Generator was related to reduced odds of poor health even after taking into account individual confounders. Although we cannot exclude reverse causation due to the cross-sectional design, our study adds to the accumulating evidence of the potential utility of the Resource Generator for evaluating the relationship between individual-level access to social capital and health.     

Perceived neighborhood social cohesion and stroke

Research in the last three decades has shown that negative neighborhood factors such as neighborhood violence, noise, traffic, litter, low neighborhood socioeconomic status, and poor air quality increase the risk of poor health. Fewer studies have examined the potential protective effect that neighborhood factors can have on health, particularly stroke. We examined whether higher perceived neighborhood social cohesion was associated with lower stroke incidence after adjusting for traditional risk and psychological factors that have been linked with stroke risk. Prospective data from the Health and Retirement Study—a nationally representative panel study of American adults over the age of 50—were used. Analyses were conducted on a subset of 6740 adults who were stroke-free at baseline. Analyses adjusted for chronic illnesses and relevant sociodemographic, behavioral, and psychosocial factors. Over a four-year follow-up, higher perceived neighborhood social cohesion was associated with a lower risk of stroke. Each standard deviation increase in perceived neighborhood social cohesion was associated with a multivariate-adjusted odds ratio (O.R.) of 0.85 for stroke incidence (95% CI, 0.75–0.97, p < 0.05). The effect of perceived neighborhood social cohesion remained significant after adjusting for a comprehensive set of risk factors. Therefore, perceived neighborhood social cohesion plays an important role in protecting against stroke.     

Perceptions of social capital and the built environment and mental health

There has been much speculation about a possible association between the social and built environment and health, but the empirical evidence is still elusive. The social and built environments are best seen as contextual concepts but they are usually estimated as an aggregation of individual compositional measures, such as perceptions on trust or the desirability to live in an area. If these aggregated compositional measures were valid measures, one would expect that they would evince correlations at higher levels of data collection (e.g., neighbourhood). The aims of this paper are: (1) to investigate the factor structure of a self-administered questionnaire measuring individual perceptions of trust, social participation, social cohesion, social control, and the built environment; (2) to investigate variation in these factors at higher than the individual level (households and postcodes) in order to assess if these constructs reflect some contextual effect; and (3) to study the association between mental health, as measured by the General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12), and these derived factors. A cross-sectional household survey was undertaken during May-August 2001 in a district of South Wales with a population of 140,000. We found that factor analysis grouped our questions in factors similar to the theoretical ones we had previously envisaged. We also found that approximately one-third of the variance for neighbourhood quality and 10% for social control was explained at postcode (neighbourhood) level after adjusting for individual variables, thus suggesting that some of our compositional measures capture contextual characteristics of the built and social environment. After adjusting for individual variables, trust and social cohesion, two key social capital components were the only factors to show statistically significant associations with GHQ-12 scores. However, these factors also showed little variation at postcode levels, suggesting a stronger individual determination. We conclude that our results provide some evidence in support of an association between mental health (GHQ-12 scores) and perceptions of social capital, but less support for the contextual nature of social capital.     

Perceived neighborhood social cohesion moderates the relationship between neighborhood structural disadvantage and adolescent depressive symptoms

There is a dearth of research exploring the moderating role of the social environment on neighborhood structural disadvantage and depressive symptoms, particularly among adolescents. Therefore, we examined if adolescent perceptions of neighborhood social cohesion and safety moderated the association between neighborhood structural disadvantage and adolescent depressive symptoms. This cross-sectional study used data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health). The study sample consisted of 12,105 adolescents enrolled in 9th–12th grades during the 1994–1995 school year across the United States (U.S.). Mixed effects multilevel modeling was used to determine if adolescent perceptions of neighborhoods moderated the relationship between neighborhood structural disadvantage and adolescent depressive symptoms. Results showed that perceived neighborhood social cohesion moderated the relationship between neighborhood structural disadvantage and adolescent depressive symptoms (p ≤ 0.001). At higher levels of perceived neighborhood social cohesion, neighborhood structural disadvantage was associated with decreased depressive symptoms. Findings suggest that improving perceived neighborhood social cohesion may decrease adolescent depressive symptoms, particularly in neighborhoods with high disadvantage. This aspect of the neighborhood social environment may serve as a target for structural and other interventions to address the growing burden of depression among adolescents.     

Area deprivation,perceived neighbourhood cohesion and mental health at older ages: A cross lagged analysis of UK longitudinal data

Previous research on neighbourhood influences on older adults’ mental health shows inconsistent evidence for effects of neighbourhood deprivation but stronger evidence for effects of perceived neighbourhood social cohesion, often proposed as a mediator of the link between neighbourhood deprivation and mental well-being. However, it is possible that mental health influences perceptions of neighbourhoods; this has rarely been considered. We use data from a large UK longitudinal study to investigate these associations. Results from cross-lagged models indicate that greater neighbourhood deprivation is associated with worse perceived social cohesion and worse mental health. Associations between change in perceived social cohesion and in mental health were reciprocal-lower perceived cohesion predicted poorer mental health and vice versa. Further research including three waves of data is needed to further unravel underlying directions of association.     

Social capital and young adolescents' perceived health in different sociocultural settings

We conducted a cross-national study to examine the association between neighbourhood socioeconomic deprivation, social capital and child health in two countries and multiple ethnic groups. For our analysis we used data from (1) the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN), USA and (2) the Maastricht Quality of Life study (MQoL), the Netherlands. Both the PHDCN and the MQoL collected data on objective neighbourhood socioeconomic deprivation, subjective neighbourhood social capital (i.e. informal social control, ISC, social cohesion and trust, SC&T), and children's perceived health. For the present analyses, 11- and 12-year olds were selected. Multilevel analyses were conducted using both neighbourhood level and individual-level data. Lower socioeconomic deprivation scores and higher levels of ISC as well as SC&T were associated with higher levels of children's perceived health, in both Maastricht and the Chicago Hispanic subsample, but not in the Chicago non-Hispanic samples. The results suggest that associations between the wider social environment and health outcomes vary across different populations and cross-national contexts.     

Perceived health as related to income, socio-economic status, lifestyle, and social support factors in a middle-aged Japanese

BACKGROUND: Few studies have examined the association of perceived health with socio-economic status, especially income, and social isolation and support in Japan. The purpose of this study is to clarify the associations among perceived health, lifestyle, and socio-economic status, as well as social isolation and support factors, in middle-aged and elderly Japanese. METHODS: Subjects were 9,650 participants aged 47-77 years who completed a self-administered questionnaire in 2000 in the second survey of a population-based cohort (the Komo-Ise study). The questionnaire included items on sociodemographic and socio-economic factors, social isolation and support, lifestyle, past history of chronic disease and perceived health. Perceived health was dichotomized into excellent or good health and fair or poor health. A logistic regression analysis was used to determine the odds ratios of socio-economic status, social characteristics and lifestyle in relation to self-reported fair or poor health. RESULTS: We found that household income, physical activity, sleeping, smoking habit, and BMI had a strong association with self-reported fair or poor health in middle-aged and elderly Japanese men and women. Male subjects tended to report fair or poor health as household income decreased. The results for women differed in that social isolation and low social support had a stronger association for self-reported fair or poor health than low household income. CONCLUSIONS: The results indicated that perceived health was associated with socio-economic and social characteristics among middle-aged and elderly residents in Japan.     

After Hurricane Floyd passed: investigating the social determinants of disaster preparedness and recovery

In September 1999, Hurricane Floyd struck eastern North Carolina. Investigators from the health promotion study "Health Works for Women/Health Works in the Community" responded by initiating a focused research study, "Health Works After the Flood." Participatory research involving a multilevel design and qualitative methods was applied to investigate how community preparedness, response, and recovery are affected by social factors such as social capital, social cohesion, and collective efficacy. This article presents evidence from qualitative research conducted for "Health Works After the Flood" and links these findings to observations regarding current conceptualizations of social capital and related concepts.     

Does low workplace social capital have detrimental effect on workers' health?

While the majority of studies of social capital and health have focused on conceptualizing social capital at the geographic level, evidence remains sparse on workplace social capital. We examined the association between workplace social capital and health status among Japanese private sector employees in a cross-sectional study. By employing a two-stage stratified random sampling procedure, 1147 employees were identified from 46 companies in Okayama in 2007. Workplace social capital was measured based on two components; trust and reciprocity. Company-level social capital was based on aggregating employee responses and calculating the proportion of workers reporting mistrust and lack of reciprocity. Multilevel logistic regression analysis was conducted using Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods to explore whether individual- and company-level mistrust and lack of reciprocity were associated with poor self-rated health. Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% credible intervals (CIs) for poor health were obtained for each variable. Workers reporting individual-level mistrust and lack of reciprocity had approximately double the odds of poor health even after controlling for sex, age, occupation, educational attainment, smoking, alcohol use, physical activity, body mass index, and chronic diseases. While we found some suggestion of a contextual association between company-level mistrust and poor health, no association was found between company-level lack of reciprocity and health. Despite the thorough examination of cross-level interaction terms between company-level social capital and individual characteristics, no clear patterns were observed. Individual perceptions of mistrust and lack of reciprocity at work have adverse effects on self-rated health among Japanese workers. Although the present study possibly suggests the contextual effect of workplace mistrust on workers' health, the contextual effect of workplace lack of reciprocity was not supported.     

Perceptions of the environment, physical activity, and obesity

Obesity rates are rising rapidly across the developed and developing world. Until recently obesity research has mainly focused on biological, psychological and behavioural factors. But there is growing agreement that environmental factors play an important role as well. In this study data from the 2003 Health Survey for England (n = 14,836) were analysed from a multilevel perspective to examine (1) the associations of the perceptions of the local environment with obesity, self-rated health, and physical activity, and (2) whether physical activity mediates the association between the perceptions of the environment, and obesity and self-rated health. This study found that perceptions of the friendliness of the local environment were mainly associated with self-rated health; perceived access to leisure facilities with sports activities; perceived access to a post office with walking; and the presence of social nuisances with obesity and poor self-rated health. In addition, positive perceptions of the social environment (i.e., social support and social capital) were associated with higher levels of physical activity, and lower levels of poor self-rated health and obesity. Only limited support was found for the idea that health behaviours mediate the associations between the perceptions of the environment, obesity, and self-rated health. Controlling for the three physical activity measures only rendered a small number of associations with self-rated health non-significant, and did not affect the associations with obesity. Overall, the results show that certain aspects of the environment may contribute to the risk of obesity and poor health. More research is needed to examine the specific mechanisms that link (the perceptions of) the environment to obesity and health.     

Social capital and core network ties: a validation study of individual-level social capital measures and their association with extra- and intra-neighborhood ties, and self-rated health

Research on social capital and health has assumed that measures of trust, participation, and perceived cohesion capture aspects of people's neighborhood social connections. This study uses data on the personal networks of 2707 Montreal adults in 300 different neighborhoods to examine the association of socio-demographic and social capital variables with the likelihood of having core ties, core neighborhood ties, and high self-rated health (SRH). Persons with higher household income were more likely to have core ties, but less likely to have core neighborhood ties. Persons with greater diversity in extra-neighborhood network capital were more likely to have core ties, and persons with greater diversity in intra-neighborhood network capital were more likely to have core neighborhood ties. Generalized trust, perceived neighborhood cohesion, and extra-neighborhood network diversity were shown associated with high SRH. Conventional measures of social capital may not capture network mechanisms. Findings suggest a critical appraisal of the mechanisms linking social capital and health, and the further delineation of network and psychosocial mechanisms in understanding these links.     

Perceived risk of nuclear power and other risks during the last 25 years in Japan

The present study described the results of three "fixed-point" surveys on perceived risk related to a list of social and individual risk events during 25 years in Japan. Female clerical staff and researchers were asked to rank 30 items related to various types of technologies and human activities according to their subjective judgments on the order of perceived magnitude of risk in 1983, 1992, and 2007. A similar survey was undertaken for Japanese citizens using web-based questionnaires in 2007. In general, the risk perceptions of the Japanese people, irrespective of gender, age, and occupation, have been uniform during the last 25 years. The female clerical staffs have consistently judged nuclear power as most risky during the last 25 years, whereas researchers' judgment fluctuated with events such as the Chernobyl accident. The ranking of the risk of motor vehicles fell during the 25-y period, whereas those of health risks with food preservatives, x-rays, and antibiotics rose transiently in the 1992 survey. During the 15 years from 1992 to 2007, people tended to learn how to accommodate themselves to these technologies with low risks in exchange for high benefits, except in the case of nuclear power. Nuclear power was regarded as a high-risk item by the Japanese even before the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident in March 2011. This partly explains that the crisis inevitably provokes further high risk perception in Japan, although the overall health threat to the human population in Japan is estimated to be relatively limited so far.