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Survey Findings on Attitudes towards Physical Exercises in Hong KongReleased by Hong Kong Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies at CUHK
A telephone survey was conducted from 28 to 30 December 2015 by Hong Kong Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong to gauge public attitudes towards physical exercises in Hong Kong. 723 respondents aged 18 or above were successfully interviewed, with a response rate of 42.7%. The sampling error is + or –3.64% at a confidence level of 95%.
Major findings are summarized as follows:
In the current survey, the respondents were asked about their habits and attitudes towards physical exercises. When asked about the frequency of exercising in the past six months, about one-third of respondents answered rarely or no exercises (34.0%), while 32.1% of respondents said often and 33.9% said sometimes.
Out of those who responded not doing any exercises, more than half (52.4%) said that “they are too busy and have no time for exercises”. 17.5% said that “they have health problems and are unable to do exercises”. Another 13.6% said “exercising is too hard”, and another 10.7% said “they do not like doing exercises”.
For the respondents who do exercises, the average exercising time reported is 3.9 hours per week. About three-fifth (59.2%) of them exercise for less than four hours a week. While 32.9% said they exercise for more than four hours, 7.9% of respondents did not give a clear answer. The most popular exercise is running, where 43.9% of respondents said this to be the most frequently done exercise. Other popular exercises include hiking (10.6%), ballgames (9.7%), taichi or qigong (9.5%) and fitness training (8.1%).
Among those who exercise, more than two-third (70.0%) said that the main reason for doing exercise is to train the body and keep healthy. Another 14.0% of the respondents said that they do exercises for losing weight or getting the body in shape. Other reasons include relaxing from pressure (8.7%), exercising for fun (8.5%), meeting up with friends and relatives (6.9%) and killing time (4.5%).
The respondents hold diverse views about whether there are sufficient public sports facilities. About one-third (34.9%) said they are not sufficient, while another one-third (32.0%) said the opposite. Another 27.8% said “in-between”. When asked which kind of facilities they most wanted the government to build in their local community, the demand of respondents is also diverse. About one-fifth (21.7%) responded that they want to have extra fitness training facilities. Another 18.8% want to have more cycling tracks. Other popular suggestions include water sports facilities (15.6%), courts for ballgames (11.9%) and track and field facilities (9.7%).
