{"id":379567,"date":"2025-08-28T05:50:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-28T05:50:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/379567\/"},"modified":"2025-08-28T05:50:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T05:50:10","slug":"japanese-town-wants-residents-to-limit-smartphone-use-to-two-hours-a-day-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/379567\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese town wants residents to limit smartphone use to two hours a day | Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"

A town in Japan<\/a> is to urge all residents to restrict their smartphone use to two hours a day in an attempt to tackle online addiction and sleep deprivation.<\/p>\n

Officials in Toyoake, Aichi prefecture, said the measure would target not only children but also adults, amid growing concern about the physical and psychological toll excessive smartphone use<\/a> is taking on people of all ages.<\/p>\n

The move aims \u201cto prevent excessive use of devices causing physical and mental health issues \u2026 including sleep problems,\u201d the mayor, Masafumi Koki said recently.<\/p>\n

The Toyoake municipal assembly began debating the non-binding ordinance this week ahead of a vote scheduled for late next month. If the draft passes it will go into effect in October. The measure will not, however, carry penalties for those who exceed the two-hour daily limit.<\/p>\n

The draft urges primary school students \u2013 those aged six to 12 \u2013 and younger children to avoid using smartphones<\/a> or tablets after 9pm, while teenagers and adults are encouraged to put their devices to one side after 10pm.<\/p>\n

The proposal, the first of its kind to apply to all residents, triggered a backlash on social media. Some users condemned it as an attack on individual freedom, while other said the time limit was simply unworkable.<\/p>\n

\u201cI understand their intention, but the two-hour limit is impossible,\u201d one user wrote on X. Another said: \u201cTwo hours isn\u2019t even enough to read a book or watch a movie (on my smartphone).\u201d<\/p>\n

In response, Koki said the time limit was not mandatory and acknowledged that smartphones were \u201cuseful and indispensable in daily life\u201d. But he added: \u201cI hope it will be an opportunity for families to think about and discuss the time they spend on smartphones as well as the time of day the devices are used.\u201d<\/p>\n

The proposal has not gone down well with many of Toyoake\u2019s 69,000 residents. Officials received 83 phone calls and 44 emails over a four-day period after the announcement, 80% of which were critical of the measure, according to the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper.<\/p>\n

Officials say the proposal was designed to address behavioural problems associated with excessive smartphone use, including truancy among children who can\u2019t bear to leave their phones at home when they go to school.<\/p>\n

Koki said there was also anecdotal evidence that adults in the town were glued to their phones when they should be sleeping or spending time with their families.<\/p>\n

Toyoake\u2019s initiative reflects growing concern about the negative health impact, especially on children<\/a>, of hours spent hunched over smartphones and tablets.<\/p>\n

In 2020, a region in western Japan<\/a> passed an ordinance \u2013 also non-binding \u2013 limiting children to an hour a day of gaming during the week, rising to 90 minutes during the school holidays.<\/p>\n

Young Japanese spend an average of just over five hours a day online on weekdays, according to a survey released this year by the Children and Families Agency.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A town in Japan is to urge all residents to restrict their smartphone use to two hours a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":379568,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3159],"tags":[547,53,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-379567","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mobile","8":"tag-mobile","9":"tag-technology","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115104830086979614","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379567","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379567"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379567\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/379568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}