Abstract

This study examined basic attributes to determine the extent to which age group, gender, and period of stay are significantly related to bonding and bridging social capital among older people living in a typical Tokyo suburb in Saitama. A questionnaire was conducted with residents in the Haraichi-danchi and Oyamadai-danchi housing complexes. The questionnaire contained three parts: basic resident attributes, bonding social capital attributes, and bridging social capital attributes. A three-variable cross-tabulation analysis was conducted with the basic attributes of the age group as the fixed independent variable, gender and period of stay as the independent variables, and the social capital attributes as the dependent variables. Chi-square analyses and further post-hoc analyses were conducted to determine the strongest association. It was found that the period of stay and gender had significant positive associations with bonding and bridging social capital in both housing complexes. Females in their 60s and 70s tended to have stronger bonds, whereas males in the same age groups tended to have stronger bridging social capital. It was also found that the longer the period of stay in both housing complexes, the stronger the social capital. From these results, future research could focus on identifying measures that could strengthen the bonding and bridging social capital for older people in Japanese suburban housing complexes by improving the physical neighborhood environment.