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Survey suggests Taipei kids in need of sleep, exercise

Parents in Taipei are more anxious about raising children than their counterparts in Tokyo, Beijing, Shanghai and Seoul, according to a comparative study released yesterday.

The study, conducted by Tsai Chun-mei (蔡春美), a professor at the National Taipei University of Education's Department of Children's Education, suggeted that this may result in pressure on youngsters, particularly in educational terms.

According to the study, conducted between March and June last year on 6,134 mothers with children aged from three to six, 61.6 percent of the parents in Taipei expect their children to hold post-graduate degrees in the future while only 2.2 percent of Tokyo's parents have the same expectation.

The study also suggested that children in Taipei sleep the least -- nine hours 28 minutes on average per night -- compared to children in the other cities.

The data showed that only 26.4 percent of children in the relevant age groups in Taipei go to bed by 9pm, while the percentage in the other four cities is much higher -- 75.8 percent in Tokyo, 65.5 percent in Beijing, 79.5 percent in Shanghai and 36.3 percent in Seoul.

Less sleep

Tsai said that the average amount of sleep Taipei children get decreases as they grow older, partly because of educational pressures.

She also said that comparatively few youngsters in Taipei take part in extracurricular sports activities.

Taipei's parents on average leave their children at kindergartens for more than eight hours a day and at day care centers for more than nine hours per day, according to the study.

Even when their children are at home, about 80 percent of them spend a substantial amount of time either watching TV or playing computer games, Tsai said.

Children in Taipei rank third behind those in Tokyo and Seoul in terms of the amount of time they spend watching television according to the survey.

Tsai urged parents to increase their children's participation in outdoor activities to improve their health and interpersonal relationship skills.

Also, parents can enhance interactions with their children by, for example, chatting with them while bathing them, preparing their breakfasts or helping them to get dressed, she said.
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