Teenagers' stress in Hong Kong

Do you know that lots of Hong Kong teenagers have no confidence in themselves and don’t know how to pursue their career goals? This conclusion comes from a survey done in 2015 by City University. Sad, isn’t?

The survey was conducted upon 2000 Form 6 students in Hong Kong. While 4 out of 5 students plan to further their studies and know well that they want jobs that provide good development opportunities, 65% of them simply don’t know how to pick a career. They don’t think they can control their career path.

Another survey done recently also suggests that half of the interviewed secondary school students show symptoms of depression, with about 20% being moderate to severe. What’s astonishing is that, about one fourth of the students considered committing suicide just two weeks before the survey. Together with the news of 22 youngsters killing themselves (one of them was only 11) in the first quarter of this year…

Just what is wrong with this society?

Of course the experts will try to give reasons like “the education system is too stressful”, “students cannot handle stress”, “they lack family support’, and some smart dude from the Education Bureau even said “they lack life planning”.

But you know, they know and I know that the problem is way more complex than that.

“Low self-esteem”, “don’t know what to do with life”, “depression”, “suicide”…these factors seem somewhat inter-related to me, but aren’t these signs of middle-age crisis?

Why would Hongkongers facing these while they are still in their 10s or 20s?

Is it because they are too mature?

Or is it because the society expects too much, yet provides too little?