The study of the area of community welfare after the municipal merger in the depopulated area.

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25380740
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Social welfare and social work studies
• Research Institution: Kyushu University
• Principal Investigator: Takano Kazuyoshi 九州大学, 人間・環境学研究科(研究院), 教授 (20275431)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): YAMAMOTO Tsutomu 熊本大学, 文学部, 教授 (60174801) ; KAKU Kazunori 下関市立大学, 経済学部, 准教授 (80214261) ; YAMASHITA Akiko 九州大学, 大学院人間環境学研究院, 准教授 (40442438) ; YOSHITAKE Yui 下関市立大学, 経済学部, 特任教員 (70758276)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 過疎地域 / 市町村合併 / 地域福祉 / 社会参加活動 / 高齢化

Outline of Final Research Achievements

After the municipal merger the depopulated area has changed largely. First of all, the function of the community groups has weakened. Though the change in the villages(集落) has been relatively small, the area of Ooaza(大字) which independently had many regional organizations has lost their centripetal force.
Facing these changes, in order to confirm the conditions to set the area of community welfare, we made a social survey in Hita, Oita Prefecture (Random sampling from the list of voters, Number of targets: 1000, Ratio of responses: 46.0%).
The result of the survey showed that it is necessary to confirm the activity of community groups in order to set the area of community welfare. In addition, it pointed out that it is effective to classify the community by the intensity of influence of the community groups.

Free Research Field

地域福祉社会学