Some 77.6 percent of people in Japan aged 17 to 19 feel "anxious" about natural hazards and major disasters, according to findings in a recent online survey of 800 young people.
In February, Tokyo-based think tank The Nippon Foundation asked teenagers across the nation how they feel about natural disasters, ahead of the eighth anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis that killed at least 15,897 and left more than 2,500 unaccounted for in March 2011.
"Now that Japan is preparing to lower the (legal) age of adulthood from 20 to 18 in 2022, 18-year-olds will be expected to play more active roles in society, and we wanted to find out whether they're aware of various issues, including disaster preparedness," Orie Sakamoto, a researcher at the think tank, said in a phone interview.