A study shows that 24 percent of Korean schoolchildren cannot adjust to life in the classroom. According to the study, which was conducted on behalf of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology by Cha Myung-ho, a professor at the Graduate School of Education at Pyeongtaek University, the total number of troublesome students was 1.77 million, 23.9 percent of all students in the country.

Around 330,000 or 4.5 percent were considered "high-risk" and unable to achieve their educational goals without academic or psychological intervention. The study was conducted among 7,262 students at 81 elementary, middle and high schools between October and November last year.

Troublesome students had more experience than ordinary students in 22 out of 39 dangerous types of behavior, including drinking (47.1 percent), gambling (43.6 percent), watching pornography (40.7 percent), Internet addiction (38 percent), stealing money from parents (28.4 percent), smoking (27.2 percent), kissing (22.9 percent), cursing at parents (21.4 percent), depression-related problems (20.2 percent), destruction of public property (20.1 percent), suicide attempts (19.4 percent), and running away from home (18.2 percent).

In elementary schools, 14.3 percent of students were classified as troublesome, while the proportion was 28.5 percent in junior high schools, 31.5 percent at general high schools and 42.1 percent at vocational high schools. Children from broken marriages (40.5 percent) and kids with low academic grades (43.3 percent) were more prone to be trouble, and there were more boys (26.5 percent) than girls (21.6 percent) in the category.