Hikikomori

One of the biggest reasons why so many young teens become Hikikomori is that the education system in Japan is incredibly intense.

There are examinations that you have to pass in order to get into school. This applies to every section, primary, secondary, tertiary/college and in many cases even Kindergarden!!

Entry into schools is highly competitive. Failure to get in can bring embarrassment to oneself and one's family. Many teens are sick of how competitive it is to get into school, college just to get employed at a most likely crappy job with no security when they graduate. Many older Japanese employees have a lifetime employment which secures their job for life. This is no longer available to the new employees of Japan.

Soft parenting is also one reason why this happens. Parents fail to recognise that their children have a problem and so do nothing. It may also be the case that parents feel that a problem with their children represents a failure of their own. This may lead to denying or ignoring the problem.

In the documentaries which you'll find below, one of the reasons given is that males in Japanese society are weak. They learn from their fathers, at home, their mothers do all the talking and the father is passive. This makes the female more dominant, so the problem is more common amongst boys.

It is not uncommon for the son and the mother to have a codependent relationship where the son is taken care of till he is in his 30-40s.

New technology, as presented in the documentaries, the new generation of teenagers in Japan are open to more devices, such as internet, games etc. These are things which previous generations did not have. The act of playing would be done outside with one's friends but with the internet and video games, entertaining yourself can be done alone and in your own room.

Bullying amongst other pressures such as school and parents, can result in a teen's withdrawal from society.

These are traits which are common to Hikikomori's but they don't have to have all of them nor is this a complete list of all the traits.

Depression. Many Hikikomori drop out from society because they feel too much pressure and that life in society is not worth while. In the documentaries below, one individual says it pains him to see other people as it reminds him of the fact he has nothing to do with his life. Lack of direction and motivation to do anything.

Fear. Fear of social interactions, the possibility of rejection by people, fear of bullying, fear of communication. As they withdraw from social interactions, they get used to being away from people so when they do meet people, they are met by an increased anxiety. Of course,this is not exclusive to Hikikomori's, I know certainly with me, I can feel more anxious of meeting new people if I've been by myself for long periods of time.

Lack of communication skills. This is apparently one of the stronger traits of the Hikikomori as they do not interact with other people outside of their rooms.
Quiet and passive disposition when communicating with people they don't know. On ocassion, there may be a case of where they are incredibly abusive to parents.

A strong interest in Video Games, Comics, Anime and the Internet. They substitute social interactions with online interactions where they can hide behind a username. So they do socialise in a sense but in a way which doesn't put themselves under much social pressure. Video games such as World of War Craft seem popular among them.

It has also been said that Hikikomori's are mainly middle to high class. This is purely because less well off families can't support them and they are forced to find jobs. However, It has also been said that some Hikikomori's can earn a living playing video games, building up WoW characters and selling them on Ebay.

Welcome to the N.H.K. is a Japanese novel written by Tatsuhiko Takimoto, with a cover illustration by Yoshitoshi ABe, and was published by Kadokawa Shoten in Japan on January 28, 2002. The novel was first published in English by Tokyopop on October 9, 2007. The story centers around a twenty-two-year-old hikikomori who gets aid from a strange girl who seems to know a lot about him, despite never meeting him before. A common theme throughout the story deals with the hardships of life and how people must deal with them in their own way.

Welcome to the N.H.K. was adapted into a manga series, also written by Takimoto, with art by Kendi Oiwa. The manga was serialized between June 2004 and June 2007 in Kadokawa Shoten's manga magazine Sh%u014Dnen Ace. The manga's forty chapters have been collected into eight bound volumes released in Japan and overseas. The English edition of the manga is published by Tokyopop, and the first volume was released in October 2006. The novel was also adapted into a twenty-four-episode anime television series by Gonzo which aired in Japan between July and December 2006. ADV Films announced at Anime Central that they acquired the English rights to the anime, and they released DVD volume one in October 2007 with volume two released in December 2007. In 2008, the anime became one of over thirty ADV titles acquired by Funimation.

In Japan, "NHK" refers to the public broadcaster Nippon Hoso Kyokai, but within the series, the main character believes it stands for Nihon Hikikomori Kyokai ("The Japanese Hikikomori Association"), which is a reference to the protagonist's claim of a subversive conspiracy led by NHK (the real-life broadcaster) to create hikikomori. While it mainly deals with the reclusive phenomenon of hikikomori, the plot also explores many other Japanese subcultures-for example: otaku, lolicon, and internet suicide. Despite the show's name, Welcome to the N.H.K. was not broadcast on the NHK television channels, but it was syndicated throughout Japan, from July 9, 2006 to December 23, 2006, with Chiba TV (July 9 - December 17, 2006, every Sunday) as a flagship station. It aired mostly on JAITS stations, and Hiroshima Home TV (July 16 - December 23, 2006, every Saturday), a local ANN station in HIroshima.

In the visual novel (and anime adaptation) Chaos;Head, the male protagonist, Takumi Nishij%u014D, is described as a hikikomori.

The novel (and manga/anime adaptation) Welcome to the N.H.K by Tatsuhiko Takimoto is a first person account of the hikikomori lifestyle.

In the manga/anime Rozen Maiden, the male lead, Jun Sakurada, is a hikikomori.
In the anime, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei, a recurring character, Kiri Komori, is a hikikomori.

In the manga/anime series Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge, Sunako Nakahara, the main character, lives a hikikomori lifestyle.

Hideo Aiba, protagonist of Sundome, pretends to be a hikikomori in front of his gym coach to avoid being caught ditching class.

World War Z contains a story about a hikikomori survivor, although the word itself is not used, favoring the word "otaku" to describe the lifestyle.

In the anime Hayate the Combat Butler, the female lead Sanzenin Nagi is a hikikomori.

In the 2002 film Moon Overflowing the character (Koboreru Tsuki) is a hikikomori.
In the drama Ikebukuro West Gate Park, the minor character Kazunori gradually loses his hikikomori status.

In the dorama Seito Shokun!, one of the students in class 2-3, Shirai Naoki, became a hikikomori after a mountain climbing accident.

Ultraklystron's 2007 CD, Opensource Lyricist, features a track entitled "Hikokomori," revolving around the lives of hikikomori.

In the video game .hack, the character Endrance is a hikikomori.
In the drama Dicey Business, Bosco Wong plays a hikikomori in modern day Hong Kong.

The 2008 South Korean horror film Loner is about a girl who is a hikikomori

In the 2008 three-part film Tokyo!, Teruyuki Kagawa plays a hikikomori, in the third part of the film entitled Shaking Tokyo.

In Cat Street, a girl becomes a hikikomori after a traumatic incident.
In the 2007 New Yorker short story "Sweetheart Sorrow" by David Hoon Kim, the main character has a Japanese girlfriend who is a hikikomori.

The American Philidelphia based band Conservative Man released an album entitled Mirabel and the Hikikomori in 2006.

In the anime/manga series Gin Tama, the character Tsu Terakado writes a pop single entitled "Your Brother is a Hikikomori".

In the Nintento DS game "Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side Second Season", Komori Taku is a Hikikomori who refuses to go to school and stays in his house. As the heroine, he is a dateable choice in the game. You can help him get back to school after long periods of going to his house.

Madotsuki, the female protagonist of the computer game Yume Nikki, is a hikikomori who spends all possible time sleeping and roaming through her dream world.

There is a freeware video game entitled "Hikikomori Quest" (a near-farcical parody of the Pokemon Game Boy games) in which the protagonist is flamed on the Internet then goes to the shop to prove to himself that he can go outside and come back home in one piece.

In the webcomic Hetalia Axis Powers, the nation of Japan is portrayed as a hikikomori for approximately two hundred years, leading up to the arrival of the Black Ships.