Intercultural communication started to grow with a strong U.S. American influence in Japan in the 1980s, when Japan experienced its economic peak. In the 1990s, with Japan’s domestic cultural diversity and widened world market, the field of intercultural communication flourished. In the 21st century, the field is subject to paradigm shifts and quests for its own identity.

In this entry, culture refers to subjective culture—a set of values, attitudes, and behaviors shared by a group of people—and the entry explicates the development of intercultural communication in Japan, the changes in research themes, and the paradigm shifts within the field.