China's highly competitive education system puts intense pressure on young people - and the one-child policy means a family's hopes are riding on just one child. This stress can lead to violence, suicide and even matricide

Xu Li's parents had ambitious plans for their son. The middle-class Chinese couple dreamt that one day their "little emperor" would be accepted into a prestigious college, such as Peking University, to study medicine or engineering. From the age of four, it was drilled into Li that he had to study hard in order to achieve this ambitious goal. The precious only child was never allowed to watch TV or have friends over to play. All his young life was devoted to schoolwork.

Xu, a student at the No 4 Senior Middle School in Jinhua city in Zhejiang province, was not very academic and, despite all his study, did not excel in class. His parents' marriage was bad and his mother pinned all her hopes on her shy and introverted boy.

One day two years ago, when he was 17, Xu dropped home at lunchtime. He was anxious as important exams were coming up. He got into a row with his mother who threatened to break his legs if he failed the tests.

Something snapped in the normally gentle, quiet teenager. Years of resentment at being pushed around welled up inside him. Xu picked up an iron bar and beat his mother to death. He was arrested and sentenced to 15 years in prison for the murder.

Ironically, he is now taking a university correspondence course in jail and is making good progress.

Xu Li is not alone. He is one of 222 million Chinese students, from primary school to university level, who are sucked into China's pressure-packed education system.

From the earliest of school years, it is drummed into Chinese children that they must perform well in school. As a result, the country is churning out a nation of highly stressed students. There are almost daily reports in Chinese media of psychologically disturbed students committing serious crimes, including murder and suicide.

One of the reasons Chinese students have to work so hard is that there is huge competition for school places, especially at senior school and university level. From primary school onwards, students have to pass highly competitive exams in order to progress through the system.

There are 140 million primary-school students in China but only 54.5 million junior high school places. That means that two-thirds of primary-school students will not make the grade to go on to higher education.

Of those who do get to junior high school, which caters for students from 11 to 15, fewer than half will get a place in senior high school (the equivalent of the Irish Leaving Cert cycle). And only one in seven students who finishes senior high school will get a third-level place.

But there is another factor that is adding to the pressure of a lack of places in schools, and that is China's controversial one-child policy.

As Prof Tang Deng Hua, a psychiatrist with the Institute of Mental Health in Beijing University, points out, an only son or daughter is the focus of six people in China - the parents and both sets of grandparents.

"Traditionally, Chinese people have always put their hopes on their children and the aim is to make the family glorious and famous," he says. "But because most families now have only one child, there is just one person for parents and grandparents to dote upon. This has resulted in young people in China being over protected and not as independent as children in the West.

"When it comes to study, there are six adults pushing a child to excel, while other aspects of a child's development are neglected. Parents are willing to do everything for their one child so they can concentrate on their schoolwork.

In some cases, parents go too far. "They even prepare the toothbrush for their child in the mornings. They are not allowed do anything at home."

Last month, a 21-year-old college student made headlines after being arrested for pouring acid over a rare species of bear in Beijing Zoo. The student, Liu Haiyang, was studying electromechanics and was top of his class.

According to Prof Tang, who has followed the case, the boys' parents divorced when he was three months old and his mother put all her hopes in her son. While he wanted to study biology in university, his mother opposed it. This was his way of reacting to the pressure.

"We are in a crisis situation and unless action is taken, we will see an increase in the problems students face," says Prof Tang.

According to educationalist and senior publishing editor with the National Children's Publishing House in Beijing, Lu Qin, various surveys show that between 80 and 90 per cent of Chinese students are under stress.

"While people's living space and standard of living have improved in China in the last 20 years, the psychological growing space for children is getting smaller," she says.

"From a young age, all children hear from parents is the importance of study and college. And if they fail to get a university place they are deemed to have let the whole family down."

Lu Qin has visited Xu Li in prison three times. "This boy is basically a good person but no attention was ever paid to his psychological health. No one listened to him. While murdering a parent is extreme, reports of students physically attacking their mother or father and committing other serious crimes are common. It is their way of rebelling and dealing with the pressure."

Lu Qin is involved in a new national schools campaign geared towards students and parents. A hotline has been established for students who are feeling pressure, and her company has been commissioned to publish a school magazine aimed at encouraging better communication between parents and their children. "We are trying to shift the emphasis from the books to children's all-round education," she says.

Suicide among students is on the increase. On January 16th, a third-year biology student at Guangzhou's Jinan University killed himself by jumping off the eighth floor of his apartment building. The son of a university professor, he left a suicide note in which he said he could not bear the heavy studies and wanted relief from the pressure.

In a survey last year of almost 1,500 students aged between six and 14 in Tianjin city, in north China, 90 per cent reported feeling under pressure. Some said they had lost confidence in their studies because of stress while 80 per cent said that parents paid too much attention to grades and not enough to their mental well-being. Ninety-nine per cent of parents surveyed said they wanted their children to go to university after graduating from high school.

Last September, 32 students from a high school in Yunnan province were found to be suffering from frequent fainting fits. Two psychologists assessed the students and diagnosed stress.

Chen Tiantian (14) attends the Chenjinglun Middle School in Beijing. Her father is a manger for a western company and her mother, Huang Xiao Wei, works for an airline. The family is well-off and lives in a new apartment north-east of the city.

"I do feel pressure from my parents," says Chen. "But if I don't study I won't get to university, and then I won't get a good job." Already Chen is worried about doing well in her junior school exams, which she must pass with honours if she is to get a place in a good senior school.

In Beijing, only 50,000 children out of 118,000 who sit exams will get a senior school place.

Huang admits she worries about the effect the intensive study will have on her daughter, but she says there is no choice except to push her to achieve top grades. The only "free time" Chen has is on Sunday afternoons, when she meets friends or goes bowling. But she must study for the rest of the week: "Unless the system changes, the situation where parents will put pressure on their children will not change. That is the reality".