Anchor: A new survey has found that seven out of eight children and teenagers in South Korea are not happy due to lack of sleep and excessive studying hours. The survey also found that the number of teens who feel depressed or have thought about suicide is steadily increasing. Bae Joo-yon has more. 

Report: ChildFund Korea released the worrying results of its survey on children’s happiness on Wednesday. 

The nongovernmental organization specializing in children's welfare found that nearly 87 percent of respondents ranked “low” in an index gauging happiness. That’s up two-point-five percentage points from a year earlier.  It also found that one in ten had experienced thoughts about taking their own lives. 

The survey was conducted on two-thousand-231 students aged between eleven and 17, between November 22 and December 29 of last year. 

The so-called “children’s happiness index” is measured by analyzing the day of a child in four areas, including sleep, studying, media and exercise. 

The index stood at one-point-66 points out of a perfect score of four this year, similar to results posted in 2021 and 2022. 

However, the survey found that the percentage of children and teens who saw a decline in sleeping hours and a rise in hours spent on studying saw growth for the past three years. 

Compared to 2021, the percentage of children and teens who lacked sleep surged ten-point-four percentage points while the percentage of students who studied longer than the optimum standard jumped 14-point-five percentage points. 

Also according to the survey, ten-point-two percent of respondents said they had thoughts about taking their own lives on impulse. That’s up from the four-point-four percent posted in 2021 and seven-point-seven percent recorded in 2022. 

The foundation said children tend to feel miserable if they don’t spend an optimum amount of time in terms of sleep, studying, media and exercise. 

The organization noted that children and teens who ranked low in the happiness index tended to go to bed late, stay most days at home, eat dinner alone and spend most of their leisure time online. 

The foundation stressed the need to guarantee children their right to sleep and rest and make efforts for them to not study until late hours, as well as encourage them to have dinner with their family. 
Bae Joo-yon, KBS World Radio News.