When the atmosphere loosened up at her office, Japanese hospital clerk Makiko Ishikawa knew it was because there was new blood around -- literally.
Fellow workers with Type-O blood had joined the team, she explained, replacing the Type-A types who strictly follow the rules.
"When I meet someone for the first time, like newcomers at work, I usually ask them their blood types. It tells me something about their personality," said 30-year-old Ishikawa.
"You would be amazed to find out how much you can tell about a person by knowing her or his blood type," she said.
Such belief in a link between blood types and human personalities is common currency in Japan and South Korea.
Television networks and magazines are rife with programs on the supposed connection, and many Japanese and Koreans casually ask others about their blood types to predict their inclinations.
While in Western countries many people are completely unaware of their blood types unless they need to provide it to health workers for medical reasons, Japanese are acutely aware what type they are.
But the practice also has a dark side -- discrimination against people, particularly children, based purely on their blood.
The issue has become such a cause of concern that a Japanese industry group has asked major broadcasters to stop presenting blood type shows as science.
To Toshitaka Nomi, a leading researcher of blood-type characterization who has studied the link for three decades, people are undeniably predisposed to certain characteristics due to their blood.
He believes Japan should recognize the fact and make use of it.
"If studies in this area become more advanced, we can apply this to improve product marketing, human resource management, education," said Nomi, a former journalist who heads the non-profit Human Science ABO Center.
In Japan, the four blood types are more evenly distributed than in many countries, although Type-A and Type-O still account for nearly 70 percent of the population.
According to popular belief, Type-A people are organized perfectionists, while Type-Os are strong leaders.
The more rare Type-AB indicates a person is rational and standoffish in public, but in private is creative and full of emotion, typically becoming decorators or gourmands.
Type-B means a person puts personal freedom above community order, a taboo in East Asian culture, leading to the bullying of Type-B children at school.
Only 20 percent of people in highly organized Japan are Type-B, compared with about 40 percent in India, Nomi said.
According to Nomi's research, during the era of Japan's rapid economic growth after World War II, 36 percent of publicly traded firms had Type-O, or strong leaders, as presidents, more than the 31 percent of the general population.
After the 1970s, the percentage of Type-O presidents fell to 29 percent. They were replaced by Type-As, the organized ones whose management skills kept up Japan's stable growth, Nomi said.
Former US president Ronald Reagan was Type O, while the slain John F. Kennedy was AB, said Nomi, who has published some 100 books in Japan, some of which have been translated into other languages.
"These findings are all statistically significant, not a result of a one-off survey," said Nomi, himself a Type-A.
But Daisuke Nakanishi, a social psychologist at Hiroshima Shudo University, warned of danger if people believed such ideas were science rather than just entertainment.
"It is an immensely interesting field of study for us scholars, that many people actually believe in blood type characterization even after many scientists have dismissed it," he said.
Human genes have been linked with human characters, but it is too "radical" to say blood types affect character, said Nakanishi, who is among many scholars who keep Internet sites against the concept.
"Those who believe in blood type characterization think they know about people just by learning their blood types. It is dangerous to casually believe that," he said.
BOMBARDMENT: Moscow sent more than 440 drones and 32 missiles, Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, in ‘one of the most terrifying strikes’ on the capital in recent months A nighttime Russian missile and drone bombardment of Ukraine killed at least 15 people and injured 116 while they slept in their homes, local officials said yesterday, with the main barrage centering on the capital, Kyiv. Kyiv City Military Administration head Tymur Tkachenko said 14 people were killed and 99 were injured as explosions echoed across the city for hours during the night. The bombardment demolished a nine-story residential building, destroying dozens of apartments. Emergency workers were at the scene to rescue people from under the rubble. Russia flung more than 440 drones and 32 missiles at Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy
COMPETITION: The US and Russia make up about 90 percent of the world stockpile and are adding new versions, while China’s nuclear force is steadily rising, SIPRI said Most of the world’s nuclear-armed states continued to modernize their arsenals last year, setting the stage for a new nuclear arms race, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said yesterday. Nuclear powers including the US and Russia — which account for about 90 percent of the world’s stockpile — had spent time last year “upgrading existing weapons and adding newer versions,” researchers said. Since the end of the Cold War, old warheads have generally been dismantled quicker than new ones have been deployed, resulting in a decrease in the overall number of warheads. However, SIPRI said that the trend was likely
‘SHORTSIGHTED’: Using aid as leverage is punitive, would not be regarded well among Pacific Island nations and would further open the door for China, an academic said New Zealand has suspended millions of dollars in budget funding to the Cook Islands, it said yesterday, as the relationship between the two constitutionally linked countries continues to deteriorate amid the island group’s deepening ties with China. A spokesperson for New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters said in a statement that New Zealand early this month decided to suspend payment of NZ$18.2 million (US$11 million) in core sector support funding for this year and next year as it “relies on a high trust bilateral relationship.” New Zealand and Australia have become increasingly cautious about China’s growing presence in the Pacific
Indonesia’s Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki yesterday erupted again with giant ash and smoke plumes after forcing evacuations of villages and flight cancelations, including to and from the resort island of Bali. Several eruptions sent ash up to 5km into the sky on Tuesday evening to yesterday afternoon. An eruption on Tuesday afternoon sent thick, gray clouds 10km into the sky that expanded into a mushroom-shaped ash cloud visible as much as 150km kilometers away. The eruption alert was raised on Tuesday to the highest level and the danger zone where people are recommended to leave was expanded to 8km from the crater. Officers also