BEIJING, Nov. 12 (Xinhua) -- Almost 9 out of 10 parents surveyed in seven countries still take malnutrition as a primary threat to the physical health of the underage, according to a report on children's welfare released here Thursday ahead of the Universal Children's Day on Nov. 20.

    The report, issued by Xinhua News Agency and leading global market research company the Nielsen Company, presented the living conditions and development of children, as well as the protection of their rights. It was based on a survey of more than 2,000 people in the United States, the United Kingdom, Nigeria, South Africa, India, Poland and Brazil.

    Target sample included parents of children between three to 14 years old and researchers on children topics including specialists in pediatrics, psychology and sociology, as well as editors of children magazines and charity NGO members.

    Data are collected online in the six countries except Nigeria, where face-to-face interviews were applied. The sample size of targeted parents was 300 per country, with a gender quota of 1:1. The sample size of specialists was 10 per country, covering different professions. The interviews were done via telephone.

    Obesity was regarded as a major threat to children's health by more than half of the respondents, whereas a third of them believed adult diseases, such as high blood pressure and diabetes, were also worrisome, the report says.

    Four out of five respondents regarded "unbalanced diet" as the main contributor to children's physical problems, followed by "lack of physical exercise", "lack of sleep" and "poor hygiene habits".

    Regarding the underage's psychological health, nearly three-fifths of those responded said the "sense of fear" topped the psychological problems that feaze children. "Anxiety" was chosen by nearly half of the respondents and another 47 percent said "selfishness" was also a psychological problem among children that should not be ignored.

    Three-fourths of the interviewed parents attributed children's psychological problems mainly to inadequate companionship of their parents and, a lesser extent, negative influences from the general society and high pressure from homework or competition.

    Pollution was the biggest concern regarding the natural living environment of children, with a concern rate of 3.9 among respondents. One in the rating system stands for "very little influence" and five means the influences are "very serious."

    Meanwhile, about 8 out of 10 respondents blamed family violence as the biggest threat to children's safety, even higher than the percentage of those who chose drugs, contagious diseases, firearms and gangdom.

    The report was released amid media coverage on the upcoming Nov. 20, which marks the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) by the United Nations in 1989.

    Xinhua and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) have launched a global media campaign for children's rights in the run-up to Nov. 20 and a 24-hour global live multimedia coverage on the day, dubbed the "Global News Day for Children". It will be the first time that global media report at the same time on the same topic.

    More than 600 media organizations worldwide have participated in the joint campaign, a move to expand on the impact generated by the World Media Summit held in Beijing early October, which concluded that care for the mankind should first go to children.

    The CRC is the first legally binding international agreement on protection of children's rights, which requires abidance from the legal systems of all countries that have ratified the document, including China.

Special report: Global News Day for Children