EXCERPT For the past quarter century or so, some people in Japan, mostly young men, have been confining themselves to their rooms and withdrawing from society. Avoiding work and social situations of any kind while depending upon their families to support them, extreme cases have seen this tendency last for decades. This small, bedroom-sized space is the world of hikikomori, and while the term was coined and the trend first identified in Japan, its emergence probably facilitated by the nation’s rigid culture of high expectations and strong family bonds, it’s a phenomenon with ever-increasing international relevance…