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Korean High school students sleep less than 6 hours per day

February 17, 2014
Korean students go to another school, to do better in their regular school. (Newsis)

Korean students go to another school, to do better in their regular school. (Newsis)

By Kim Se-jeong

South Korean High school students slept five hours and 27 minutes per night on average last year, compared with six hours and 30 minutes in 2009, a survey showed.

Primary school students slept eight hours 19 minutes on average, while middle school students seven hours and 12 minutes, the National Youth Policy Institute said after surveying 9,521 primary and secondary school students.

Nearly 70 percent of high school students replied that they don’t get adequate sleep.

More than 50 percent of high school respondents cited after-school classes as the main reason behind their limited sleep, followed by watching movies and TV dramas.

More than 60 percent of the respondents said that their free time never exceeds two hours.

For high school students, it was worse, as more than 80 percent said their free time is less than two hours on a daily basis.

Nearly 37 percent of middle and high school students said that they “thought about suicide” over the past year. Asked why they thought about suicide, 40.4 percent cited poor academic performance, and 27.6 percent answered conflict among family members.

An official at the Korea Health Promotion Foundation noted that sleeping habits developed while young can later adversely affect their adulthood lifestyle, becoming the source of yet another social problem.