YOUNG people are isolating themselves from the world around them, the Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups has warned, after a survey released yesterday found just two per cent were interested in international events.
The telephone poll, conducted by the Social Sciences Research Centre of the University of Hong Kong, asked 507 respondents aged between 15 and 29 about their news reading habits. It was conducted on June 7 and June 8.
Local social news proved the most popular subject for 30 per cent of respondents, with entertainment news second at 28 per cent and local political news third at 12 per cent. International news rated last, with just 2.4 per cent of respondents calling it the subject that most interested them.
''This is a very worrying development,'' research officer with the Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups, Joice Pang Wai-lan, said.
''Hong Kong is a very international place in many ways. But they are limiting their scope by not developing a truly international perspective by reading about outside news.'' The poll also found that 60 per cent of young people believed the current freedom of the press was satisfactory, but that 77 per cent believed it would be ''worse'' after 1997.
''They know there's a difference between Hong Kong and China concerning freedom of the press,'' Miss Pang said.
