This paper examines whether there is any significant difference between sociological traditions of Japan, UK and USA. It hypothesizes that there is a difference in the degree of prevalence of positivism between those countries, and that it makes difference in 1) what kind of research method each country's reseachers use and 2) what kind of literature they cite (academic papers, books, etc.). Quantitative analysis of 219 papers published in 2012 in two major sociology journals from each country reveals that 1) American sociologists are more committed to empirical research than Japanese and British sociologists and are more likely to use statistical method, and that 2) Japanese sociologists are less likely to cite academic papers than American and British sociologists. The three countries are not neatly located on a single scale of positivism since UK is similar to Japan in terms of methods while it's similar to USA in terms of the kind of literature. However, there is a clear difference in the degree of prevalence of positivism between Japan and USA.

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Surveys are conducted using many different modes (e.g. face-to-face, mail, telephone, Internet). Because different modes have different error structures, it is very important to understand the advantages and disadvantages associated with each mode. In recent years there have been major changes in the modes typically utilized in surveys. In particular, there has been increases in the use of computers in data collection, self-administration, and mixed-mode designs. The implications of these and future changes are considered.

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In this paper, we illustrate how CAI surveys in political science have developed in the context of election studies, in particular, how CASI (Computer Assisted Self-administered Interviews) surveys have been applied to election studies in Japan. We then argue that various advantages exist for a survey mode of CASI, ranging from a quick data output, randomization and customization of questions and response choices, recording response time, implementation of survey experiments, mitigating social desirability bias, and to high representativeness. At the same time, we reckon two disadvantages of CASI, which are a lower response rate and a higher cost than other survey modes. To examine if a lower response rate really undermines a representativeness of data collected by CASI, we constructed a database of 79 post-election surveys conducted in Japan. Our analyses demonstrated that a lower response rate does not necessarily increase a turnout bias, i.e. a gap between an estimated turnout in surveys and the actual turnout at an election. Our analyses also con rmed that a lower response rate neither increases a vote percentage bias, i.e. a gap between estimated percentages of votes garnered by political parties and the of cial election results. Among the several survey modes, CASI appears to be closest to the actual electoral records. The concerns over a higher cost of CAI remain but its advantages seem to be not only theoretically assured but also empirically grounded.

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One of advantages of a CASI mode in conducting surveys is that it enables us to record and analyze people's response latency, a new type of dataset for survey researchers. Response latency data, which records seconds which it takes from the timing of interviewers' asking a question to the timing of respondents' answering it, is useful to explore processes to express answers in surveys that we cannot know through analyzing peoples' response only. By analyzing it, this study attempts to show possibilities for survey analysis. To do so, we investigate the relationship between people's ideology and a concept of political sophistication by comparing the survey answering process of perceptions of ideological positions with that of political knowledge. The results show that respondents answer questions of ideology and political knowledge, both of which are considered to be measurements of political sophistication, in very different cognitive processes; it takes longer time to correctly answer parties' ideological con ict, while correct answers for factual questions are expressed instantly.

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I examined the outlook for utilization of CAI (computer assisted interviews) in legal and socio-legal studies. I reviewed the merits and demerits of emerging Internet surveys in addition to those of an electronic survey sheet, the common feature of CAPI, CATI and CASI. Legal and socio-legal researches will bene t from expected reduction of human errors and cost in terms of time and money by adoption of CAI. CAI will also improve accuracy of surveys in several ways, including improved report rate of sensitive issues and computer guidance in self-administered interviews. Actual use of CAI in these area has just begun and existing examples show both its usefulness and gap between PAPI, CAI and Internet survey. It is required for future researches to incorporate a methodological perspective into their schemes and compare results from different modes of research.

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This paper examines the methodological issues of social surveys by investigating the ICT aided survey methodology focusing on the survey modes and showing our experimental survey. First, we show the knowledge obtained through the interviews with the survey experts in Europe and the United States. Then we describe the design of our experimental survey for mode-comparison: randomly assigning a probability sample to CAPI, PAPI, CASI, using almost same questionnaire. The results show that the introduction of ICT seems not to hamper the cooperation of the respondents judging from the response rates of three modes being almost same, the interviewers speak well of CAI, and item non response rates of questions via self-administration might be higher in CAI than paper SAQ. In the end we argue the future issues and possibilities of ICT aided social survey from the experience of our survey and the analysis of paradata, and some problems to be solved in survey mode studies.

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The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the survey mode on survey results. To this end, we used survey data from an experimental design where probability samples were randomly assigned to three modes, PAPI, CAPI and CASI. We used t-tests to compare the means of attitudes and behaviors of PAPI to CAPI and CAPI to CASI. As a result, there was no significant difference in the comparison of PAPI and CAPI. However, there were significant differences in the comparison of CAPI and CASI. Furthermore, when we performed the analysis by removing a non-response error by the propensity score, we found that differences between CAPI and CASI were not confounded by a non-response error but that there were real differences. In the near future, we predict that a transition of the survey mode from the traditional one to one with ICT will occur, switching from PAPI to CAPI, and it can be said that it is possible to make comparisons with previous findings. However, in the same way as with the mode using a paper-based questionnaire, even in a computer-assisted survey, a difference according to the mode between the self-administered and interviewer-administered questionnaire is observed. Therefore, when the purpose is comparisons in time series, changing the survey mode from PAPI to CASI should be done with caution.

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Fukuoka claimed that the Japanese has a shared image of ranking of important factors to be “true Japanese”. The conventional methods of analysis, however, do not enable to examine whether “ranking” of the importance of factors are actually consensual or not. To solve this problem, I introduce Mokken Scale Analysis. Results show that the sequence of the importance of factors are shared by the Japanese as following: feeling of being the Japanese, nationality, place of birth, proficiency of the Japanese, place of living, ancestry, respect to the institution, and religion. The order is consensual even among Japanese with high level of national identification and threat towards foreigners.

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Chinese families are faced with trend of miniaturization. To predict the future changes of Chinese family form, scholars have been focusing on the young's willingness of living with parents upon getting married. Due to lack of nationwide macro-statistics on this topic, this study uses survey data collected in Mainland China and Taiwan in 2013. By observing college students' willingness of living with parents after marriage, this study aims to analyze the potential in uencing factor that may lead to changes of family size in China. It nds that: (1) college students from both regions display low willingness of living with parents after getting married; (2) the traditional moral concept lial piety (Xiao) shows no effects on future living arrangement for students from both regions; (3) in Mainland China, students from rural areas are more willing to live with parents than those from urban areas; (4) in Mainland China, males students shows higher willingness of living with parents than female students, but there is no gender difference for students from Taiwan.

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