This research aims at revealing how mothers' and fathers' ‘cooking attitude’ influences children's ‘cooking attitude’ and their perception of the atmosphere of ‘eating together with family.’ An inquiry survey of 712 junior high-school students living in the Tokyo metropolitan area shows the following findings. A) The more fathers as well as mothers show their positive attitude toward cooking, the more enjoy their children the atmosphere of eating together with family. Girls' perception of happy family dinner is strongly influenced by their mothers' cooking attitude while boys' perception is equally influenced by both mothers' and fathers' cooking attitude. It should be noted, however, that the frequency of eating together is not directly related to parents' cooking attitude. B) It is apparent that the favorable attitude of children toward cooking is prompted by the positiveness of both mothers' and fathers' attitude toward cooking; it is to be noted that girls are influenced more by mothers while boys are more influenced by fathers. Children tend to show more positive attitude toward cooking where they enjoy the atmosphere of family dinner. C) High frequency of cooking by mothers brings about a negative impact on children's perception of the atmosphere of eating together, and the good atmosphere of a family eating together can be inhibited where mothers are solely responsible for cooking.

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A questionnaire survey was carried out in 1998 to determine the regional characteristics of the main dishes and side dishes eaten on new year's day. The respondents were either university or junior college students from twelve hometown regions, and data were taken from 1,801 valid responses. The average number of meals eaten during the day was 2.92, those eaten out being 0.34. The number of meals eaten out in the Kanto-I area was the highest, while in the Hokkaido and Kyushu areas, was the lowest. The number of main dishes and side dishes was 2.56 dishes a meal per person including 1.97 animal foods. According to the special coefficient analysis, area was the highest for fish and shellfish, and that in the Hokkaido area was the highest for meat. It was proved that there is the regional characteristics of feast day dishes for new year's day.

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Maternity wear should be comfortable for pregnant women from the early stage of pregnancy to the last stage of delivery. We focused on maternity trousers, because our preliminary questionnaire study revealed this kind of maternity wear was the most preferable for pregnant women. Because the lateral part of maternity trousers is made with rib stitches, the abdominal part can be increased in size in the anterior direction. However, the leg part of maternity trousers has a similar shape to that of regular trousers for non-pregnant women. The clothing pressure on the abdomen elevates with the increase of body size due to pregnancy. To design comfortable maternity trousers, we analyzed body form data obtained from 942 pregnant women. Our study showed that not only the abdomen projected in the anterior direction, but also the anterior waist height elevated in the vertical direction during middle and late pregnancy. The total crotch length increased and the body tended to warp backward. To design comfortable maternity trousers for pregnant women, it is necessary to develop new clothing materials which exert less pressure on the abdomen and adjust to the increase in the crotch length.

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This study of female students, who have worn Western clothes since their childhood, attempts to answer two questions: how conscious are female students about their own ethnic costumes, and how do those who often wear ethnic costumes behave? In July and August 2006, a written survey questionnaire as well as a verbal survey of Japanese and Thai female students aged 18 to 24 years old (η=203) were conducted. The students of both countries indicated that their own ethnic costumes are difficult to move in. However, they highly valued them for being “conspicuous,” “pretty,” and “well-matched for themselves.” Japanese female students think that their ethnic costumes have a “peculiar feeling” and cause them to feel “tense when they wear them.” Such feelings are presumably caused by the difficulty of putting them on and the fact that they are mainly worn on occasions of rites of passage. Meanwhile, Thai female students have no special feeling towards their own costumes like in Japanese, though they hold them in high regard. The personal character of Japanese female students who frequently wear ethnic costumes are those who enjoy “going to the sea or mountains,” are “sensitive to fashion,” etc. They have active lifestyles. In Thailand, those who enjoy wearing their national costumes are “fond of reading,” are “leading a well-regulated life,” and are “helping their parents.” The female students of both countries are proud of their own traditional culture and wish for it to be preserved.

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The meal delivery service for elderly people, which has been popularized recently in Japan, is what is termed ‘a community-rooted service.’ In order to help the meal delivery service to grow in Japan, it will be effective to devise plans to develop this type of service into a sound business. This study purposes to deal with two subjects. (1) Advantages of the community-rooted meal delivery service, (2) Problems and other issues in its field of service. Six cases in Tokyo were investigated along the line of five operations of food delivery: (1) First contact with the user, (2) Planning a menu, (3) Cooking, (4) Delivery, and (5) Checking the user's welfare. Apart from these basic operations, studies were made on how to expand the human network, to set up the amount of subsidy as well as the service rate, and to establish a delivery center. The community-rooted delivery service has maintained hearty linkage with the elderly people and with the community network, but there exist a number of difficulties such as the user assessment, adequate menus for a variety of illness, adequate time of delivery as well as the number of meals, and necessary measures in emergency. Also included in this report are the financial difficulty and the difficulty of arranging the necessary delivery centers, which calls for the public support both from the community and the government.

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