The term “lying flat” first emerged online in mainland's microblogging site Weibo, referring to a laid-back attitude to not overstretch at work and to adopt a monastic approach toward life.

In a blog posted online on Sunday, Yeung wrote about the pessimistic mindset.

“The 'lying flat' concept has been worrying as it shall hamper the development of the city in the long term and this wrong conception must be corrected with collaborative effort and value education,” Yeung said.

He also critiqued that other wrongful social ethos, such as online game addiction, as well as the propensity of fake news, misleading and inciting information online, have prevailed in society.

The secretary emphasized that in this technological fast-changing era, it is all the more important for Hong Kong to step up its education about values for students, and to cultivate their sense of patriotism from a young age.

Back in September last year, The Task Force on Review of School Curriculum proposed to prioritize value education in curriculum.

Yeung said its framework will soon be released, aiming to provide all-round guidelines to raise youngsters’ sense of patriotism and law-abiding consciousness, as well as teach them about life, sex and anti-drug antiment. It will also help to correct wrong concepts in society and build good morals.

Although Hong Kong sees a fusion of western and eastern cultures, it stands by Chinese moral value, he said, and that patriotism should no doubt be included in value education in order to raise students’ sense of nationality and responsibility toward mainland China.

The Education Bureau said it has allocated funding from the Quality Education Fund to help schools nurture a sense of gratitude among students, and to encourage them to embrace challenges in life with a positive attitude.

Recently, the bureau has enhanced the funding scheme to subsidize schools' efforts in developing students' sense of nationality, as well as to help teachers and students develop the proper approach to handling the news and information they access.

In the beginning of this year, the guideline and curriculum arrangement for safeguarding national security and national security education was published, and the first “National Security Education Day” was launched on April 15.

Also this year, the Citizenship and Social Development subject replaced the Liberal Studies subject starting from secondary four, switching the curriculum to one that teaches the implementation of the “One Country, Two Systems” principle, national development and lawfulness.