Dialogue with Hu Zhen, an expert in adolescent sex education: Carry out comprehensive sex education so that children have the ability to love
Adolescent sex education has always been a topic of concern for educators and parents. A few days ago, a book published by a special teacher in Hubei Province caused controversy because it mentioned that "girls should be the main responsible person for early love", and it also once again triggered a wide discussion of adolescent sex education.
How should we put "early love" in perspective? How can teachers and parents guide children to deal with adolescent emotions? On September 10, Teachers' Day, a reporter from the Beijing News contacted Hu Zhen, a professor at Chengdu University Normal College, chief expert of Sichuan Youth Sex Education Popularization Base, and "the first person to promote sex education in schools in Sichuan Province", to talk about the importance of sex education to adolescent children.
Hu Zhen has been engaged in sex education for more than 30 years, in her opinion, boys' sexual maturity age is indeed later than girls, but it does not mean that boys' sexual curiosity and sexual exploration are also later than girls, in addition, rudely cracking down on "early love" is not scientific, teachers and parents must have the ability to guide children's healthy sexual growth through comprehensive sex education.
Hu Zhen, professor of Chengdu University Normal College, chief expert of Sichuan Youth Sex Education Popularization Base, and "the first person to promote sex education in schools in Sichuan Province". Photo courtesy of interviewee
The following is the conversation between the Beijing News reporter and Hu Zhen:
Early sexual maturity does not equal early exploration of sex
Beijing News: From a professional point of view, how should we understand "early love"?
Hu Zhen: I think the term "early love" itself is unscientific. After children mature sexually, with the germination of sexual awareness, they will be attracted to the opposite sex, and will also attract the opposite sex and develop love emotions, which we usually call "adolescent emotions" or "adolescent emotions". There is no fixed time for the germination of this emotion, just like the flowers of a hundred gardens, some bloom early, some bloom late, and everyone's flowering period is different. Therefore, when this emotion arises, it is impossible to define whether it is early, late or just right, let alone treat it as a problem to "encircle and block".
Beijing News: People are used to calling "adolescent emotions" "early love", what is the reason?
Hu Zhen: When I was training primary and secondary school teachers, I asked them: "When do you think students fall in love early?" They generally believe that it is too early before entering the university, and the subtext behind "early love" is "to affect learning", "the main task now is to enter the university", "should not yet", "can't deal with it yet".
They presuppose that adolescent children are not mature enough, and once teachers or parents recognize the rationality of adolescent emotions, children will be more bold to love, and then it is difficult to control the sexual impulses caused by hormones, and unpredictable consequences occur, that is, "excessive behavior leads to big mistakes". They are also worried that children will not handle adolescent emotions well, affect learning, and will not be able to enter university, which means that there is no future.
But children's emotions are accompanied by sexual maturity, and in the process of dealing with emotions, they are bound to be accompanied by sexual impulses, and we cannot use academic reasons to restrict, control, and avoid their emotions and physical and mental development, which is impossible, unscientific, and inhumane.
In 2020, Hu Zhen gave sex education lectures for parents in a bookstore. Photo courtesy of interviewee
Beijing News: The controversial remarks of the teacher in Hubei mentioned that girls develop earlier than boys, and girls should be the main responsible for early love. Is there any basis for this claim?
Hu Zhen: Parents and teachers are the main responsible for the lack of "love relationship education" in adolescent children.
Menarche in girls and first widows in boys are signs of sexual maturity. Generally speaking, the average age of menarche for girls is indeed one or two years earlier than the average age of boys, but this does not mean that children's curiosity about sex and sexual exploration are also affected by sexual maturity, nor does it mean that boys mature later than girls.
In fact, children's curiosity and exploration of sex predates "early love." When children are 2-3 years old, they will ask "where did I come from", and they will also ask "how did daddy's sperm run into mom's body", and parents' answers to such questions are considered sexual enlightenment. But there are no studies that suggest that boys ask such questions later than girls.
On the contrary, our culture encourages boys to explore sexuality, many boys "understand a lot" through the Internet in primary school, and girls will be stifled once they have a little curiosity about sex, and many parents will say "girls don't ask this", so it cannot be said that boys have sexual enlightenment, sexual curiosity, and sexual exploration later than girls because they are biologically sexually mature later than girls.
Comprehensive sexuality education that empowers children to love
Beijing News: What kind of way should teachers and parents guide children to deal with adolescent emotions?
Hu Zhen: I think the most scientific approach is to let teachers, parents and children discuss it through comprehensive sex education. Teachers and parents should first reach a consensus - the problem we face is not the so-called "early love", but their "lack of early love ability", worry that "early love will affect learning", there will be "excessive behavior" in communication, and even "make big mistakes".
Teachers and parents themselves must have the ability to "talk about sex and love" with children, and give children the ability to benefit from lifelong love through comprehensive sex education, rather than evasion, or simply label "early love", blindly obstruct, intimidate, which may push children's "early love" from "open" to "underground", without adult guidance, let the instigation of good and bad network information, the risk is even more uncontrollable.
In 2023, Hu Zhen conducted sex education training for class teachers of primary and secondary schools in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, explaining how to design sex education themed activity classes. Photo courtesy of interviewee
Beijing News: How exactly should teachers and parents discuss with children?
Hu Zhen: If we simply put on the hat that "children who fall in love early have no good results", children will definitely resist and rebel: why do we affect learning? What is "excessiveness"? What kind of "big mistake" will it make? Not only are they not convinced, they even insist on going their own way.
In fact, teachers and parents do not need to answer shyly, half-cover, and implicitly, but should say all the problems that "early love" needs to face bluntly: what conditions do you need to have to deal with the relationship between emotions and academics? If a different decision is made, what are the good or bad outcomes? Guide children to explore together and seek solutions to problems that may arise.
The purpose of the discussion is to give children the ability to deal with emotions - let children understand the true meaning of love, let two people develop more upward and better, and know that life has other topics besides love. If "early love" makes the two plummet in their studies, the woman becomes pregnant unexpectedly, and the growth and development of the two are frustrated, it is not love but "harm", which means that it does not yet have the ability to deal with feelings and control sexual impulses, and it still needs to grow and learn, and it needs to wait.
For example, we can ask the child, if your confession is rejected, are you capable of facing it? If not, then you'd better wait until you have the ability to accept rejection. If the confession is accepted by the other party, how should two people treat intimate behavior in dating? Can you pull hands? Can I hug? Can you kiss? Is there a capacity to withstand the sexual urges that these behaviors may bring? What are the possible consequences of sexual impulses? When children face these problems under the guidance of parents and teachers, understand that loving behaviors need respect, what are the consequences of these behaviors, and when they can rationally analyze and make responsible sexual behavior decisions at critical moments, the purpose of sex education is achieved.
In our sex education practice, when parents and teachers teach these life topics to children, they often find that children are actually very rational, they are very good at analysis, and even give answers that are better than we educators think.
In June 2023, Chongqing Nanyu Middle School opened a sex education classroom for junior high school students. Photo courtesy of interviewee
Sexuality education should be institutional
Beijing News: What responsibilities do you think families and schools have in sex education?
Hu Zhen: Some parents will be very resistant to this issue, and others are aware of the importance of sex education, but they have not received systematic training and do not know how to conduct family sex education based on life scenarios. After all, sex education is not like mathematics, physics, chemistry and other natural subjects with standard answers, and will be very different in the understanding of different people.
However, sexual development follows a certain law, whether you admit it or not, sex education, children's sexual development is quietly progressing. They will explore the truth of sex under the release of hormones, the communication of peers, and the availability of online sexual information, to face the sexual curiosity, the germination of sexual emotions, and the restlessness of sexual desire brought about by sexual maturity. Therefore, whether it is the family, the school or the whole society, we must make great efforts to popularize sex education. Fortunately, we are also pleased that more and more teachers are now engaged in sex education.
In April 2023, Hu Zhen gave a lecture on adolescent sex education at Chengdu 49 Middle School. Photo courtesy of interviewee
Beijing News: What else can be improved in sex education in the mainland?
Hu Zhen: At present, whether in towns or villages, many teachers are unable to provide comprehensive, scientific and systematic sex education to students.
At present, the content of sex education in primary and secondary schools is scattered in team activity classes, mental health classes, science classes, ethics and law, biology classes, physical education and health classes, etc., these teachers have not received sex education training, dare not talk about it, afraid to talk too much, so they can only skip it, or let students learn by themselves. Other teachers turn sex education into a form of preaching or even misconceptions.
More than a decade ago, when I was promoting sex education in Chengdu, I used a rural middle school as a pilot. The principal at the time was very open-minded and he discovered early on the importance of sex education for adolescent children. Therefore, he will let the school's teachers of related subjects receive training, class teachers, physical education teachers, ideological and moral teachers, psychology teachers are involved, different teachers perform their own duties, integrate sex education into different subjects, parents or children, very like these courses, but unfortunately the principal transferred away, the courses also stopped.
In fact, children are easy to contact with wrong information from the Internet and traditional concepts, resulting in a lot of confusion, we should pass on more scientific values and attitudes to them. Therefore, I believe that sex education should be institutional, incorporated into the training of teachers of various related disciplines, with teaching objectives, knowledge points, skills training, and value transmission, while ensuring that sex education is systematic and continuous, in line with the physical, mental and cognitive development of students of different ages.
Beijing News reporter Zuo Lin Peng Jingtao
Edited by Peng Chong Proofread by Wu Xingfa