Characterizing Experiences With Hikikomori Syndrome on Twitter Among Japanese-Language Users: Qualitative Infodemiology Content Analysis.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Hikikomori syndrome is a form of severe social withdrawal prevalent in Japan but is also a worldwide psychiatric issue. Twitter (subsequently rebranded X) offers valuable insights into personal experiences with mental health conditions, particularly among isolated individuals or hard-to-reach populations.

Objective

This study aimed to examine trends in firsthand and secondhand experiences reported on Twitter between 2021 and 2023 in the Japanese language.

Methods

Tweets were collected using the Twitter academic research application programming interface filtered for the following keywords: "#きこもり," "#ひきこもり," "#hikikomori," "#ニート," "#ひきこもり," "#," and "#." The Bidirectional Encoder Representations From Transformers language model was used to analyze all Japan

SUBMITTER: Uchiyama MA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11894343 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature