is a Japanese pejorative term which translates literally as "education mother". The kyōiku mama is a stereotyped figure in modern Japanese society portrayed as a mother who relentlessly drives her child to study, to the detriment of the child's social and physical development, and emotional well-being. The kyōiku mama is one of the best-known and least-liked pop-culture figures in contemporary Japan. The kyōiku mama is analogous to American stereotypes such as the stage mother who forces her child to achieve show-business success in Hollywood, the stereotypical Chinese tiger mother who takes an enormous amount of effort to direct much of her maternal influence towards developing their children's educational and intellectual achievement, and the stereotypical Jewish mother's drive for her children to succeed academically and professionally, resulting in a push for perfection and a continual dissatisfaction with anything less or the critical, self-sacrificing mother who coerces her child into medical school or law school. The stereotype is that a kyōiku mama is feared by her children, blamed by the press for school phobias and youth suicides, and envied and resented by the mothers of children who study less and fare less well on exams. Factors influencing development of kyōiku mama In the early 1960s, part-time women's labor began at a few major corporations in Japan and was adopted by other companies within a decade. It became popular among married women in the 1970s and even more so by 1985. Women's return to the workplace is often explained two-fold: by financial demands to complement the family budget, and by psychological demands to relate themselves to society. Child-rearing women in the 1960s inspired the media to produce the idiom kyōiku mama, which referred to "the domestic counterpart of sararii-man" (salaryman). This encompassed a major responsibility to "rear children, especially the males, to successfully pass the competitive tests needed to enter high school and college". No such idiom emerged that deemed men "education papas"; it was "mamas" who became a social phenomenon. The education system The education system and larger political economy it serves influence why mothers become obsessed with children's education. Social prejudices influence media stereotypes of kyōiku mamas that blame women rather than political conditions. Getting a good, steady job in the future very much depends on getting into a good university, which depends on attaining high scores on the national university exams in a student's last year of high school. Ordinary