Activity report

Mieko Masaka, Senior Assistant Professor, Department of Information and Electronic Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Teikyo University

1998 Graduated from the Graduate School of Engineering, Nagaoka University of Technology Graduate School From 1998 to 2009, he engaged in various studies in the private sector. In 2009, he became a researcher at the Department of Construction System Engineering at Anan National College of Technology. In 2013, he completed the doctoral program at the University of Tokushima Graduate School. After that, he worked part-time Senior Assistant Professor at Oyama National College of Technology, and in April 2017, he joined Teikyo University Faculty of Science and Engineering Senior Assistant Professor Department of Information and Electronic Engineering Assigned as.

Currently working on mobility management research. This is a field with the theme of distributing from being overly dependent on automobiles as a means of transportation to various means of transportation. There is no doubt that the benefits that cars bring to society are enormous. Although there are major differences in personal use between urban areas and rural areas, society as a whole is indispensable for commuting, logistics, and welfare. However, automobiles emit carbon dioxide in every process from manufacturing to use, and the economic loss due to traffic congestion and traffic accidents cannot be ignored. In today's world, where reducing the environmental burden is indispensable, it is becoming more important to enhance the sustainability of society by utilizing walking, bicycles, next-generation light rail systems (LRT), electric mobility, and so on. There are also cases where vulnerable people are placed in a socially difficult position. A society where no one can miss a society, including those who cannot enjoy the convenience of cars and are placed in a socially vulnerable position, such as being unable to drive due to old age or being unable to drive a car due to minors. It is important to realize it.
To that end, each person is required to change their consciousness and their behavior.

Social dilemmas are particularly important in behavior change related to environmental problems. This is because the environment is a public asset, and even if only you act positively for the environment, it will not have a great effect, and on the contrary, if you act properly, you will not be able to solve the problem. Therefore, we will change our consciousness and behavior so that each person can grasp the issues of the area and society in which he / she lives, accept them as his / her own rather than other people's affairs, and act voluntarily to solve them. You need to.

In fact, various studies have already shown that these approaches change people's behavior. On the other hand, automobiles are also rapidly evolving so that they can become safer with no environmental burden due to technological development. As a result of the efforts of both mobility and users, it is fully possible to build sustainable relationships between people and mobility.

My research theme is traffic behavior analysis for people in areas that are heavily dependent on automobiles. People use various means of transportation such as public transportation, private cars, bicycles, walking, taxis, and commercial vehicles. Steady accumulation is important for the research process. First, we will collect and analyze questionnaire data on daily life to create decision-making patterns in transportation. At first glance, traffic behavior and daily life seem to have nothing to do with each other, but for example, the living environment in which a person is placed plays a major role in deciding where to go and what to do. There is. By analyzing the trends from the data collected in this way, we first understand why people in the target area are moving and why they choose the means of transportation.

Once you understand the decision-making process of the target person, the next step is to build a plan that can cause behavior change. We will provide this planning to people and analyze how behavior change occurs.
Various organizations and companies cooperate in collecting data. Companies, in particular, are very interested in commuting behavior. Congestion during commuting in industrial complexes is also a serious problem for residents in the neighborhood, and there is a desire for companies to somehow refrain from using automobiles. Therefore, there are cases in which we have created an environment where people can commute by bicycle or on foot, and by appealing to employees about their own health, they have found merits in commuting methods other than car commuting and promoted behavior change. In this way, in order to cause behavior change, it is indispensable to take an approach that pierces the individual's heart so that the itchy place can be reached. As a result, it fosters the recognition that it is important to build a mobility environment for the entire region, not just one company's problem. Every day, I realize that personal behavior analysis is deeply connected to society.

Our research is deeply involved in many fields. Take the case of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare as an example. Of course, regarding health, research on behavior change has been conducted for a long time. In modern society, there is data that while average life expectancy is increasing, healthy life expectancy is not increasing. Exercise is important for a healthy and long-lived life, but just telling it does not lead to behavior change. Rather, it may create negative emotions such as "it's annoying" and "because it doesn't last long". Therefore, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare is shifting to health examinations that first grasp the individual's health condition and show the possibility of becoming a long-term care recipient in the future. Then, we judge how much intensity you can exercise and present a plan for training while moving your muscles. By fusing mobility management research here, new knowledge can be obtained.

A person's behavior changes when an accurate analysis of the current situation and concrete action planning are combined. Our field of study has a relatively long history and is located all over the world. For example, you can access the data accumulated by American universities, and research is being conducted every day to put it into practice in Japan and lead to new results. The automobile, which is a useful tool of civilization, is full of modern society and is also the largest industry in modern times. Since a huge amount of user behavior in the real world is accumulated using abundant economic resources, know-how for visualizing universal human behavioral consciousness that can be applied to modern society is accumulated in mobility management. It can be said that it has come to be done. These findings have rapidly been applied to other fields.

Among them, the theme that has a particularly strong effect on human behavior change is "children." Few can be indifferent to what happens to their descendants. At the same time, it is important to update the child's own perceptions and transform future behavior. Therefore, in collaboration with universities and elementary and junior high schools, we are continuing activities to incorporate our research into programs for elementary schools and develop them into education for children. There are also challenges. It can be said that the biggest rival in behavior change is the society itself, which is becoming more convenient. It can be said that it is almost impossible for people who have become accustomed to modern times to dare to shift to an inconvenient society. Therefore, it is important to recognize "people who will live in the future" from an early age, and at the same time, it is required for adults to change their behavior and adapt while learning. In the first place, people are the ones who can bring about strong unity and behavior change in response to a crisis. In fact, even with Korona-ka, such movements have occurred all over the world. I feel that more and more people are thinking about the next generation and do not hesitate to change their behavior. We always have the potential. I feel that what we can see through mobility management is the new future choices that society has.