Things to keep in mind about the list are:
Since they are things that Japanese girls want their boyfriends to STOP doing, it means that they are things a lot of Japanese guys with girlfriends do… I’m just sayin’. If you live in Japan, you probably see this kind of thing all the time. It also doesn’t look like these things are deal-breakers for the girls because these don’t seem to be reasons to break-up.
To the list (with my comments or clarifications in parentheses):
1. Not listening to what she has to say
2. Going out to eat alone with another woman
(not implying cheating per say, just being alone or going out to eat with another girl or female friend)
3. Going to the “Gokon” match-making parties
(if you are unfamiliar, these are the 4-girls-sitting-across-from-4-boys-hoping-to-hook-up-or-break-into-couples parties to which some guys “innocently” attend “just to keep the numbers even”)
4. Bad table manners
5. (tied) Constantly checking their cell phones during a date
5. (tied)
7. Smoking
8. Dressing badly when they go on dates
9. Locking their cell phones
(OK, this is just because they want to check the guy’s phone when he’s in the bathroom, taking a shower, or asleep… a side note here that Japanese cell phones have the most amazing stealth features you can imagine, including password protection of only certain data in the address book, and things like that)
10. Getting caught up in video games
I don’t know how scientific this Livedoor news poll was. They say they had 192 responses from women aged from their teens to their 30s. They were allowed to choose multiple answers. I imagine an open poll, or one in which they were asked to choose only one answer might have come out a bit differently. (If “he doesn’t listen to me” is on the list of possible answers, almost everyone will choose it. If the creators of the questionnaire missed something that may have been chosen such as “verbal or physical abuse”, that one is obviously not going to make the list.
Surely “Looking more feminine than they do” has to be on the list, no?
Isn’t that a big plus in Japan these days?… I also remember my first month in Japan when we saw a bunch of those biker-type kids (I won’t go so far as to call them Bosozoku, though that’s probably what they thought they were), and telling my friend that I thought it was great they were able to be so openly effeminate. Long, bleached hair, sitting on each other’s laps at the station… Then, I kind of got lectured about how they were bad boys and I should be afraid of them. I tried my best, but just couldn’t feel the fear I was supposed to.