“Hikikomori.”
That’s Japanese for “extreme social withdrawal” and is the label for those people, many of them in their 20s and 30s, who shut themselves off from society, live with their parents, refuse to work or attend college, and communicate, when they communicate at all, largely through social media. Up to half a million hikikomori live in Japan, which is a major problem in a land with a growing population of the elderly and a shortage of young workers.
