Schools in Japan’s Noto Region Assign Hugs for Homework; Children Still Suffering Trauma from Earthquake

By Kaho Urakami and Mari Matsumoto / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writers

17:43 JST, July 23, 2024

Some children are still complaining of stress-related physical and mental disorders more than six months after the Noto Peninsula Earthquake. That has some elementary schools in disaster-hit areas assigning children a special kind of homework: hugging family members to help their mental health.

“After the earthquake, she became sensitive to noise and scared even of small tremors,” a woman in her 40s in Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, said of her daughter, who is in sixth grade at an elementary school. Their house was destroyed in the earthquake and they had to break a window to get out. She said her daughter is still afraid of dark places and cannot go to the bathroom alone at night, probably because of her memories of the disaster.

The Ishikawa prefectural board of education opened a telephone consultation service to provide emotional care for children in mid-January, just after the quake hit the prefecture. By the end of March, the service had received 109 calls. At present, counselors are assigned mainly to elementary and junior high schools in the northern part of the peninsula, and by the end of June a total of 907 counseling sessions were provided to children.

At the municipal Sanno Elementary School in Nanao, Ishikawa Prefecture, students have been encouraged to make physical contact with their family members as part of their homework since February. The school asks students to talk with their parents and choose from four types of physical contact: hugging, sitting on a parent’s knee, holding hands for more than one minute or shaking hands.

The idea for the assignment came from Kimiko Koura, a nurse at the elementary school. A survey conducted soon after the school reopened at the end of January showed that many children were experiencing trauma. Symptoms included being unable to leave their parents’ side or throwing up if they saw collapsed houses. Given the survey results, Koura thought that close physical contact might help children feel safer.

While many children still complain about mental and physical problems due to the lack of progress on rebuilding, more than 100 children and parents have given feedback such as “The hugs made me feel much better” and “My daughter looked embarrassed but I felt very happy.”

The initiative has drawn interest from other disaster-hit areas, and elementary schools in Suzu in the same prefecture has followed suit.

“I hope the homework gives children time to be comforted and to charge up with the energy needed to move ahead,” said Koura.

Psychological trauma from earthquakes affects children over a long span of time.

According to an annual survey conducted by the Iwate prefectural board of education since the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake,15.8% of children needed support due to stress and other reasons in severely affected coastal areas in fiscal 2011, which was higher than the 14.3% in inland areas. Since then, the figure has remained higher in coastal areas than in inland areas.

“Since children have difficulty expressing their feelings in words, many suffer from headaches or insomnia and begin complaining about such symptoms about six months after something has happened,” said Norihiko Kuwayama, a psychiatrist who cared for children in Miyagi and other prefectures after the 2011 disaster. “It’s good for children to have physical contact when they start to feel insecure. Even though children may not like it, I want parents to hug their children and tell them they are on their side.”