The Paper's reporter Jiang Xiner, Wei Yao, Wang Yasai, and intern Zheng Shujing
What would have been the result if Chinese boys born in different eras were allowed to run the same 1,000 meters on the same field?
The answer over the past 30 years has been: run slower and slower.
When boys reached the end of the kilometer in 1985, in 2014, boys could only run 900 meters, and it was likely that they would rush the line in a daze. Mao Zhenming, a professor at the School of Physical Education and Sports of Beijing Normal University, once recalled to the media the scene of the first physical education examination in Beijing: students ran 1500 meters and threw up, "because they did not take physical education classes, nor physical exercise, they were pressed there every day to do questions."
The data in the figure comes from the student physique and health survey conducted in China every five years. In fact, it is not just long-distance running, this report on the future depicts a number of physical indicators such as flexibility, strength, speed, and endurance of Chinese children.
Not only long-distance running, many physical indicators are red lights
A study published in The Lancet disclosed physical measurement data from nearly 1.5 million Chinese adolescents in the survey, including lung capacity, standing long jump, sitting body forward flexion, 50m run, oblique pull-ups, pull-ups, 1 minute sit-ups, 8*50m round-trip running, 1000m and 800m.
Based on the physical measurement data, the study weighted the students' physical fitness index values. Based on the results of the 1985 survey, the study set the physical fitness index value of Chinese children and adolescents to 0 that year, and the peak of the student physical fitness index value appeared in 1995, reaching 1.2.
It is worth mentioning that the recently released new round of national student physical fitness and health survey (2019) has brought good news, compared with previous years, Chinese students' lung capacity, flexibility, strength, speed, endurance and other physical fitness indicators have improved.
The results of the survey showed:
Compared with 2014, in 2019, the lung capacity of boys aged 7-9 years, 10-12 years old, 13-15 years old, 16-18 years old, and 19-22 years old increased by 82.5 ml, 153.6 ml, 209.7 ml, 161.2 ml and 92.3 ml, respectively, and the lung capacity of girls of all ages increased by 105.3 ml, 166.0 ml, 187.2 ml, 147.0 ml and 102.2 ml, respectively.
Compared with 2014, the 1-minute sit-up performance of girls of all ages increased by 1.9, 1.9, 1.8, 1.6 and 1.0 respectively in 2019; the oblique pull-ups of boys aged 7-12 increased by 0.7. Compared with 2014, the 50-second running performance of male and female middle school students aged 13-15 and 16-18 years old in 2019 increased by 0.09 seconds and 0.01 seconds respectively; the 800-meter running performance of girls aged 13-15 increased by 4.49 seconds, and the 1000-meter running performance of boys aged 13-15 increased by 6.50 seconds.
Bean sprouts have entered history, and small fat mounds have become a new topic
Both contradictory and related to the physical decline may be the change in the shape of Chinese children in the past 30 years.
Paradoxically, height, a physical indicator, has indeed improved over the course of more than 30 years.
Another study published in The Lancet pointed out that between 1985 and 2019, the average height of 19-year-old boys in China increased from 167.6cm to 175.7cm, an increase of 8cm; the average height of 19-year-old girls increased from 157.4cm to 163.5cm, an increase of 6cm.
Relatedly, overweight, obesity replaced wasting, and growth retardation became new problems plaguing Chinese children.
Over the past 30 years, the proportion of emaciated children has gone down from 7.5% to 2014, when only 4.1% of Chinese children had wasting problems; the proportion of overweight and obese children climbed from 5.3% in 1995 to 20.5% in 2014. In other words, in 2014, one in every 5 children was either overweight or obese.
It is understood that the results of the new round of national student physical fitness and health survey (2019) show that the old problem of "primary and secondary school students being overweight and rising obesity rates" still needs to be solved urgently, but Liu Peijun, deputy director of the Department of Physical Health and Art Education of the Ministry of Education and a first-level inspector, pointed out that the overall growth trend has slowed down, and the slowdown in obesity in young-age students is the most obvious.
In the next step, the Ministry of Education will comprehensively strengthen and improve school sports work. Strengthen physical education classes and extracurricular exercises, strengthen the management of physical health of primary and secondary school students, implement the system of large inter-class sports activities, and promote family physical exercise activities. Supervise and guide primary and secondary schools to arrange students to go out of the classroom for appropriate activities and relaxation during each class. Promote the reform of sports evaluation in colleges and universities, take sports work and its effects as an important indicator of the evaluation of colleges and universities, and include it in the evaluation index system of undergraduate teaching work in colleges and universities and the evaluation of the effectiveness of "double first-class" construction.
There are more "small glasses", and adolescents are myopic and younger
Another issue worth paying attention to is myopia.
More and more Chinese children are short-sighted and wear glasses at an earlier time.
According to the 2014 Chinese Student Physical Fitness and Health Research Report, in 2014, there were 4 myopia in every 10 primary school students; 7 in every 10 junior high school students; and 8 myopia in every 10 high school students or college students.
The above report also pointed out that from 2005 to 2014, the myopia rate of children aged 7 to 12 years old (primary school stage) in China increased by about 10 percentage points, and the myopia rate of adolescents aged 13 to 15 years old (junior high school stage) increased by about 13 percentage points. The report reminds that insufficient sleep time, lack of physical exercise, and excessive homework time may be the main reasons for recent videos of Chinese teenagers.
In addition, in the same province, the myopia rate of urban students is usually higher than in rural areas. The myopia rate of students in the economically developed eastern provinces and some western provinces, including Gansu, Yunnan and Inner Mongolia, is also relatively high.
Pulling the time to the latest round of national student physical fitness and health survey (2019), according to the relevant press conference of the Ministry of Education, the high myopia rate of Chinese students still needs to be solved. The Ministry of Education is carrying out eight special actions to reduce students' academic burden, strengthen outdoor activities and physical exercise, and scientifically regulate the use of electronic products, and continue to reduce the myopia rate of children and adolescents.
At the meeting, Liu Peijun also gave a positive signal to the existing problem of "large base and proportion of myopia in adolescents". Liu Peijun pointed out that the effect of myopia prevention and control in adolescents has begun to appear, and the prevention and control goal of 0.5 percentage points per year has been basically achieved.
Intern Li Ka-ho also contributed to this article.
Editor-in-Charge: Lu Yan
Proofreader: Yan Zhang