This paper proposes a scheme for study of migration which contains three factors, i.e. migrants, areas of origin and destination, and migration flows. Then it discusses characteristics of out-migration from an underdeveloped mountain village.
Many mountain villages in Japan have experienced drastic depopulation by out-migration flows after W. W. II, especially since 1955. The starting point of this migration corresponds with that of high economic growth in postwar Japan. As a matter of course, social and economic characteristics of the mountainous areas have undergone rapid changes. The out-migration flows from the areas have been, therefore, one of the main causes of regional transformation by depopulation. But these out-migration flows themselves have hardly been treated in the studies on depopulation or underpopulation by researchers.
In this study, the author adopts two points of view: that of 1) social geography, and of 2) population geography. The first one stresses characteristics of migrants, especially age, sex, and so on. And the second one overviews the whole character of out-migration flows from an area. These viewpoints are finally integrated to investigate spatial and temporal patterns of movements by many migrants.
The study area, Kamitsue-mura, is a mountain village which is located in Oita Prefecture, and has experienced drastic depopulation in the past 25 years.
In this study, data of individual out-migrants, whose names were struck off a resident registration list, were analyzed and then a further tracing survey was carrsed out.
The following results were obtained:
1. According to the data, the number of out-migrants from the village reached a peak between 1965 and 1970. Increase and decrease of the number was fairly correlated with the trend of the rates of Japan's economic growth.
2. Analysis on the age and the sex of the out-migrants made it clear that mobility among young people, especially those between 15 and 18 years, was remarkable. Generally, the age of a migrant is strongly connected with his life cycle, and family cycle. The life cycle is reflected in the migrant's opportunities to move, and the family cycle is represented in the alternative forms of migration, i. e. whether single movement or not.
Surveying other characteristics of out-migrants, e. g. family membership, the author found that the order of children by age in a family was related to their mobility. And an out-migrant's distance of movement was governed by his place of legal residence.
3. The out-migrant's distance of movement was generally short. But young people tended to migrate farther away from the village. On the other hand, in the case of collective family out-migration, the distance was greatly shortened.
Spatial distribution patterns of out-migrants' new addresses were thought to offer some tendency. Here, new addresses of out-migrants were grouped into six types for the purpose of analyzing the characteristics of destination and their changes. As a result, it was clear that many people who migrated from this village tended to move into the regions where the number of laborers occupied in tertiary industry was lorge. But besides this, the more important thing was the fact that migration flows of many out-migrants were destined for agricultural regions. The directions of out-migrants movements have, however, gradually tended to concentrate in those regions where tertiary industry was prominent.
4. Out-migration from the village indicated some characteristics peculiar to mountainous areas. For example, numbers of out-migrants holding the object of entering into a higher level school, changing occupation, or obtaining a license were notable in this village. In addition to this, it became clear that many out-migrants selected the secondary industry for their occupations.
Leaving this village, some people traced “chains” of former migrants.

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With their remarkable growth in Japan, big stores started to expand into small local cities in 1970's, a trend that continves. The influence of big stores on the central shopping districts in small local cities is huge, and it also involves social problems. Two aspects can be noticed in the effects of their expansion into small cities. One is the influence on the retail function of the cities, and the other is on the central shopping districts. These two do not always coincide. Many studies have been published mainly on the change of the retail function of cities from the view point of central place theory. However, the influence of big stores in the small cities upon the central shopping districts has only partially been considered.
The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence both on the retail function of cities and on their central shopping districts. The author divided the small cities in Japan with less than 100, 000 population into five groups according to the presence of a big store with the selling pace of more than 3, 000m², and also to the time a big store appeared for the first time in the city. Two out of these five groups are focused on in this paper:
One is the group of cities where big stores were built from July, 1976∼June, 1979, and the other where big stores were built from July, 1979∼June, 1982. These two groups are analysed respectively, and their differences are considered. The results are summarized as follows:
1. The retailing function of cities can be considered from two points of view, sphere of traing and market share. Putting these two viewpoints together, the author makes hypotheses about the increase rate of the retail sales in a city. As a result of multiple regression analysis of the increase rate of the retail sales in cities, we can see that the increase rate of the retail sales in a city is most closely related to the increase rate of population. Moreover, from July, 1976∼June, 1979, the appearance of big stores contributed to the increase of the retail sales in cities, but from July, 1979∼June, 1982, little contribution can be seen. From 1979 to 1982 it can also be recognized that the commercial centrality of cities has a negative correlation with the increase rate of retail sales. Taking these facts into consideration, from 1979 to 1982 it can be inferred that there was a division and decrease of the trade area these of small cities.
2. In analyzing the influence of the appearance of big stores upon the shopping districts, the author substituted clothing shops' retail sales data for the retail sales data of central shopping districts, since the latter were not available. As a result of this analysis, we can see that from July, 1976∼June, 1979, the opening of big stores had a stimulus effect on central shopping districts, but not from July, 1979∼June, 1982. This change can be explained as follows: Major clothing shops became tenants of big stores, which weakened sales for central shopping districts, especially in 1979-1982. As a result, the sales of clothing stores lost its value as an index for estimating the sales of central shopping districts.
3. The effect of the opening of big stores on the central shopping districts differ from city to city, depending on the location of big stores. Generally speaking, stimulus effects to shopping districts can be seen when a big store is located inside the shopping district, but not when it is located in the suburbs of the city. In the case of small cities, however, big stores usually have bad effects on the shopping districts even if they are located inside those districts, which was the case especially in 1979-1982. In addition, this paper clarified the main factors of the influence of big stores on shopping districts, such as the character of the city's trade area, cooperation between big stores and local shopping districts, leadership of the local chambers of commerce and industry, etc.

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