Children listen to a reading lesson in a nursery classroom at an elementary school in Seoul, South Korea (Image courtesy of Yonhap)
SEOUL, July 29 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean elementary school students are spending more time studying than ever, while their sleep and playtime continue to shrink, reflecting the intensifying pressure of early academic competition, according to new government data released Monday.
The 2024 Time Use Survey by Statistics Korea found that elementary students now study an average of 5 hours and 5 minutes per day — up 19 minutes from five years ago — bucking the downward trend in study time observed across all other student groups. High schoolers still study the most (6 hours 37 minutes), followed by middle schoolers (5 hours 45 minutes), while college students and older spend just over 3 hours.
Nine out of ten elementary school students — 94.8% — engage in after-school education such as private tutoring or self-study, with 2 hours and 38 minutes devoted to non-school learning on weekdays. That marks a 22-minute increase since 2019.
Despite their age, 7.1% of elementary students are still studying during the hours typically reserved for sleep, and their sleep time dropped by 5 minutes over the past five years, echoing similar reductions among all age groups. Their play and game time, though still the highest at 1 hour 32 minutes per day, also declined slightly — the only group to see such a drop.
Across the board, 61.4% of students said they feel they don’t have enough time in their day. More than half (57%) wished to reduce time spent on self-directed study, and 73.2% reported feeling fatigued after daily routines — with self-study cited as the main cause.
Satisfaction levels among students were middling: 55.7% said they were satisfied with their lives overall, and just 50.8% expressed satisfaction with their leisure time.
Over 60 percent of South Korean couples in their 30s and 40s now belong to dual-income households, highlighting changing family dynamics as economic demands and evolving gender roles redefine the balance between work and home life. (Image supported by ChatGPT)
Gender Roles Shifting, Slowly, in Dual-Income Households
The survey also highlighted modest but meaningful shifts in household labor dynamics. In dual-income families with children under 18, husbands spent 1 hour and 24 minutes per day on housework — a 13-minute increase from five years ago. Wives, meanwhile, saw their domestic labor time fall by 17 minutes to 3 hours and 32 minutes — though still nearly double that of their spouses.
Men spent 1 hour and 23 minutes more per day on work than women, and expressed greater satisfaction with household labor distribution (45.3% vs. 33.9%).
Both genders reported similar levels of time scarcity, with around 78% saying they lacked time. While both men and women cited work as the top activity they’d like to reduce, 31.3% of women also wanted to cut back on childcare and housework — compared to just 9.1% of men.
Interestingly, wives in “living apart” couples reported the highest life satisfaction (46.9%), while husbands in the same arrangement had the lowest (39.8%).
With Aging Population, Korea’s Hotels Shift Focus to Active Seniors (Image supported by ChatGPT)
Seniors More Active, Media-Driven in Retirement
Among seniors aged 65 and older, time spent on work and job searching rose to 1 hour and 33 minutes per day, up 5 minutes. Time devoted to personal care, such as health and grooming, also increased by 5 minutes to 1 hour and 47 minutes.
Leisure time expanded by 12 minutes to 7 hours and 3 minutes — with media consumption dominating at 4 hours and 6 minutes per day, a 16-minute increase from 2019.
Conducted every five years, the Time Use Survey tracks how South Koreans spend their 24 hours and serves as a key barometer of societal shifts. The latest study surveyed 25,000 individuals aged 10 and older from 12,750 households nationwide.
Lina Jang (linajang@koreabizwire.com)
