BEIJING -- More of China's emerging middle-income consumers say their lives have improved in material terms in recent years than do their counterparts in Japan or the U.S., a survey shows.

Some 80% of China's new middle class, defined by an annual household income of at least 100,000 yuan ($15,200), feel better off materially and culturally than they were four to five years ago, according to an October survey by Hakuhodo Institute of Life and Living Shanghai, a group member of Japanese advertising group Hakuhodo DY Holdings.

In Japan and the U.S., just 40-50% of respondents answered the same way.

Moreover, 96% of Chinese respondents cited interest in the cultural aspects of clothing, an attitude shared by only about half of those polled in Japan and the U.S. Curiosity about food culture was reported by 98% of Chinese consumers, compared with some 70% of Japanese and American respondents.

The institute sees the strong interest shown by the Chinese middle class in where products come from and what they are made of as a sign that they are enjoying a higher quality of life.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has pledged to make the world's second-largest economy a "moderately prosperous society in all respects" by 2020.

The survey, conducted in partnership with the Communication University of China's School of Advertising, covered a total of 900 people in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, along with 600 in Tokyo and Osaka as well as 600 in New York and Los Angeles.