Japanese ‘Marrying Without Dating’ Trend Explodes in Popularity

December 8, 2016

A Japanese government survey revealed that 69% and 59% of Japanese men and women, respectively, who are not in a romantic relationship are deciding to skip dating and just marry their friends.

According to Independent U.K., young Japanese men and women are “giving up dating and marrying friends.” Because of the country’s low birth rates, it looks like the young Japanese population has just settled to tie the knot with their lifelong friends.

Japan has one of the lowest birth rates in the world with only 8.4 children born for every 1,000 inhabitants which has lasted for the last five years. In fact, their population problem has become such a serious issue that their 127 million population is predicted to drop to 87 million by the year 2060.

Although faced with the current problem, the National Institute of Population and Social Security in Japan revealed that 80% of unmarried Japanese want to get married. As an alternative solution, people have resulted to doing what they coined “kousai zero nichikon” which is roughly translated to “marrying without dating.”

In recent weeks, people have posted stories like someone marrying a friend of 10 years to website Matome Naver. In 2015, Japanese actress Maki Horikita married her co-star Koji Yamamoto after dating for just a month. So this “kousai zero nichikon” is not a complete stranger to Japanese people.

There is no evidence that shows that this type of trend is popular in some other Asian countries but it seems like it debunks Japan’s arranged marriage tradition where parents suggest who their adult children should marry.

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