Health alert! It’s never too late to bridge the knowing-doing gap
Print Edition
AFTER a week of getting up early and/or staying up late, we may want to catch up on the much-cherished slumber on the weekend. But can sleeping in on the weekend make up for our lost sleep on weekdays?
If you say “no,” you’re not alone. A recent survey found the majority of the respondents agreed with you.
The 2025 Chinese Consumers’ Selfcare Awareness & Behavior Report — released by Haleon, a global consumer health company listed on the London and New York stock exchanges — showed that 87.4 percent of the surveyed believed that sleeping in on the weekend won’t compensate for sleep deprivation on weekdays.
The survey covered more than 1,000 people in 284 cities across China who are aged between 25 and 65.
Another question asked in the survey is: Can five to 10 minutes of moderate-vigorous intermittent exercise a day help lower people’s cardiovascular disease risk?
While the correct answer is “yes,” most respondents got it wrong.
On the whole, the survey found that nearly 70 percent of the respondents had a passable or excellent understanding of matters related to health care, but a considerable number of the respondents failed to translate their understanding into action. As a result, only 40 percent of all those surveyed were found to be passably healthy in reality.
The gap is no less a threat to one’s health than exacting work.
Haleon’s mention of such a gap reminds me of an earlier survey of over 1,800 employees across China, released by recruitment platform Zhaopin.com. That survey found that more than 90 percent of the interviewees said they suffered from sub-health one way or another, but only 36 percent persisted in regular exercises although most knew physical activities were good for health.
Worse, 71.4 percent of those surveyed habitually sat for long hours, and 55.3 percent even frequently sat motionlessly before a computer. Moreover, employees who stayed up late because of indulgence in online amusement programs outnumbered those who burned the midnight oil because of working overtime.
Indeed, work pressure can prevent us from exercising regularly, but we should ask ourselves if we can live healthily outside work. Do we often spoil our spare time with endless online games? Do we often eat junk food instead of cooking a fresh dish for ourselves? Do we constantly compromise our sleep time with all sorts of mundane worries?
I also suffer from the knowing-doing gap. For instance, I knew a long time ago that prolonged sitting and eating too much salty stuff would do no good to health, but in reality I often did the opposite.
Last month, I got an urgent phone call from a customer service clerk of a physical exam firm, who alerted me to what she described as “a dangerous sign” of my potential prostate problems. She suggested I go to see a doctor as soon as possible.
I immediately made an appointment with a senior doctor, which was arranged two weeks later. When I visited him, he immediately dispelled my worry, saying my prostate indices were only slightly abnormal and no treatment was needed, but I had to improve my lifestyle right away — more exercise and no more prolonged sitting!
Looking back at how my knowing-doing gap had secretly affected my health in the past, I would not hesitate to share this with the reader: It’s never too early to translate your selfcare awareness into action.
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