'Shying away from study in America" screamed the front-page headline of the Dec. 11 evening edition of the Asahi Shimbun. The article beneath presented facts and analysis of an unmistakable phenomenon: Japanese students are not being drawn to the United States to pursue their studies as they once were.
Let's look at the figures first.
The peak was reached in 1997, when a total of 47,000 Japanese were studying in the U.S. By 2007, their numbers had fallen to 34,000.