American highschool students make health and wellness their biggest priority for 2021, according to a recent survey.
The online learning community Brainly surveyed 1,000 US high school students about their New Year’s resolutions. (Little did anyone know what a challenging and unprecedented year 2020 would end up to be at the time.) This year only 57% of high schoolers said they were making New Year resolutions. This is a roughly a 20% decrease compared to last year.
“While we faced many unique challenges in 2020 with the pandemic, students should see this moment in time as a chance for a clean slate and start anew,” say Patrick Quinn, parenting expert at Brainly, former educator and father of three.
“ For teenagers especially, learning healthy habits and sticking to them—New Year’s or not—can be the key to a long, happy life. The lifestyle choices they make now will lay the foundation for what’s ahead: the real world.”
Here are a few more highlights from the survey:
More Than 1/3 of Students Say They Want to Exercise More
At least 39% of students say they want to exercise more in 2021. This is no surprise considering the lack of regular gym classes or sports leagues.
Last year getting better sleep was the biggest health-related resolution with more than half of students pinpointing it as their top priority.
Healthier Lifetyle Habits Is the #1 Subjects of 2021 Resolutions
This year’s survey revealed that the majority of students (72%) are most concerned with making healthier decisions when it comes to their daily routines.
This includes drinking more water, taking walks more often, exercising on a regular basis, eating healthier, and maintaining a consistent sleep schedule, to name a few.
The second most popular resolution was spending less time procrastinating (7%). Last year, improving grades snagged the #1 spot on students’ resolution list with a whopping 55%.
Overcoming Social Anxiety Tops List of ‘Real World’ Resolutions
Students want to cultivate skills for success after graduating high school. Of those sureyed, 33% say they want to resolve their social anxieties in 2021. Public speaking (22%) was the runner-up skill while financial literacy and budgeting (13%) was the third most popular skills-based resolution for post-grad success.
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