In this study, we analyzed factors affecting children’s academic achievement with the data of PISA2012 and PISA2015. We set up four hypotheses and verified them. Hy- pothesis 1 is “children’s attributes influence their motivation.” Hypothesis 2 is “children’s attributes and their motivation influence their academic achievement.” Hypothesis 3 is “maternal employment has a negative effect on children’s motivation.” Hypothesis 4 is “children’s attributes influence the parent-child relationship, and the parent-child rela- tionship has a positive effect on children’s motivation and their academic achievement.” We clarified hypothesis 1 and hypothesis 2 using graphical modeling. We verified hy- pothesis 3 utilizing a stratified analysis using a propensity score and clarified it in terms of Japanese girls. However, in sub-groups where in mothers tend to work more, mater- nal employment brings about a positive effect on their children’s motivation. Results show that relieving the gap in the children’s academic achievement may be possible by improving parent-child relationships and children’s motivation.

The purpose of this study was to establish a new diagnostic criterion using BMI in place of WC to promote the efficiency of the medical screening and confirm the usefulness of the criterion. Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of obesity-related complications. To find the candidates in such condition, the JASSO criterion using “waist circumference (WC)” have been adopted by Japanese MHLW. According to this criterion, specific health checkup program was begun to delay or prevent these complications in 2008. However, the measurement of WC was obstructive and could not be implemented smoothly for medical screening, since it took extra time and effort. The subjects were 7,492 Japanese subjects (4139 men, 3353 women; age: 34-83 years old), who had been receiving health checkup from 2007 to 2011. With the JASSO criterion regarded as standard, we evaluated the diagnoses obtained by our new criterion using sensitivity and specificity. We finally established BMI at 24 as the cut-off value for both men and women for ease of use. It can be considered that this criterion is better than that the JASSO criterion, since it can increase the efficiency of health checkups by omitting the measurement of WC while keeping the same level of diagnostic performance as the JASSO criterion.

The size of E-commerce market in Japan continues to grow, particularly, for Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG). The aim of this study is to understand online channel use behavior, assuming that the growth of a consumers' online channel use continues. The authors proposed a Latent Growth Model to estimate the online purchase incidences (purchase or non-purchase) in FMCG. As a result, the authors identified consumer characteristics that the consumers who are likely to purchase online have a lot of time, make bulk purchases and the consumers whose online purchasing increase are time-constrained for shopping, make purchases in holidays, have high price sensitivity. It is also suggested that understanding purchase characteristics (not demographics) is important in a longitudinal perspective. Furthermore, online purchasing in FMCG has strongly influenced the experiences of the usage of EC website on PCs compared with mobile. However, the authors also suggested that the influence of mobile is increasing by consumers gaining experience over time.