bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

articlePageQuery

filter

article

articleBaseAdvertisingInfoArticle

articleListArticle

articleSeoArticle

hooksArticleAcknowledgementGateOverlayArticle

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

hooksContentInterestArticle

articleLinkingDataContent

hooksAmpRedirectArticle

articleSchemaContent

liveArticle

advertZone

sentiment

contentLock

topics

types

sections

paywallTypes

createdDate

publishedDate

sponsorType

urlAlias

moreOnThisArticles

commentCount

authorLocations

authors

corrections

displaySlideShow

multimediaEmbed

printHeadline

seriesContainer

articleSpeeches

socialHeadline

headline

images

flag

firstTopic

glossary

flattenTypeIds

image

relatedLinks

relatedNewsletters

__typename

sponsor

pdfFiles

seriesReverseOrder

series

disableOffPlatformContent

published

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

body

keywords

readingTime

customTimezone

liveContents

Stella Lee

ONE in five girls in Hong Kong wishes she was a boy, and an increasing number of young people are feeling unhappy and bored, a survey has found.

  The findings released yesterday prompted calls for more funding and a comprehensive policy for youth services, and the elimination of gender bias and sex-role stereotyping in education.

  The Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups polled 2,087 people aged between 12 and 17, with about equal numbers of boys and girls.

    About 16 per cent said they were unhappy, bored, losing self-confidence or facing psychological stress. This was 2.5 percentage points higher than a similar survey found in 1989.

    A federation research officer, Charles Chan Kin-hung, said young people's sexual identity affected their psychological health.

  Just over 19 per cent of the girls said they wanted to be boys because ''girls have more restrictions than boys'' and ''boys can protect girls''.

  Forty-nine per cent of girls felt that the status of the genders was not equal, compared with 35.7 per cent of boys who felt that way.

  Only 3.8 per cent of boys were unhappy with their sex, giving such reasons as ''girls could have protection from others''.

    Mr Chan said adolescents' identification with and enjoyment of their own sex should be enhanced by eliminating gender bias and sex-role stereotyping in textbooks, which usually depicted the mother as housewife and father as breadwinner.

  The deputy executive director of the federation, Paul Chan Kam-cheung, called for more school social workers. He said the Government target ratio of one worker for every two schools could not meet the demands.



One in five girls wants to be male