When he was in his sophomore year, Chen Rui took the " Love Psychology " course at Wuhan University of Science and Technology with aspiration for love.
Chen Rui, 20 years old this year, once had a crush on a boy in high school, but never expressed his thoughts, but just silently expressed his appreciation and love in his heart.
When Chen Rui came to the university, he saw that couples in pairs on campus always travel together. Sometimes many boys in the dormitory downstairs took breakfast to wait for their girlfriends to attend classes. Such a scene would touch her. In her eyes, if a university could have a relationship, it would feel very sweet.
In 2020, Wuhan University of Science and Technology officially offered the "love psychology" course for college students. After a year of course study, Chen Rui realized the possible problems he might have. "I'm too passive. I always believe in destined love and do not actively express my feelings."
Many young people nowadays have similar doubts to Chen Rui when facing intimate relationships: How to start an ideal intimate relationship?
In recent years, intimate relationship and love psychology courses have become popular in colleges and universities. In 2013, East China Normal University opened the course of "Marriage and Love"; Wuhan University of Science and Technology successively opened three marriage and love education courses, including marriage and family law , love psychology, and love marriage economics...
In October this year, the Ministry of Education said in response to the "Suggestions on Opening Compulsory Courses for Family Tutoring and Family Style in Higher Education Institutions" proposed by the representative of National People's Congress that colleges and universities are encouraged to strengthen love psychology education.
When the love course enters colleges and universities, students also start to learn "how to love" with different expectations.
"Love Psychology"
China Youth Daily launched a questionnaire in July 2022, with students from 283 universities participating. Among them, nearly 90% of the college students surveyed supported the school to offer love classes, 36.03% of the college students said they had never had a love experience, and 54.97% said they would go with the flow and consider it if they met the right person. According to reports, professor at China University of Mining and Technology Duan Xinxing believes that "not accommodating, not complying, and not compromising are important characteristics of marriage and love for this generation."
Zhang Yong, associate professor at the School of Marxism, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, is 50 years old. In 2019, he applied to the school to offer a course "Love Psychology". This course is officially launched for sophomore or above in the second year.
Zhang Yong was in class. All pictures in this article are provided by the respondents.
The original idea of offering this course came from a conversation between Zhang Yong and his daughter. He said that when his daughter was in her sophomore year, she met a boy who moved him on campus. In her daughter's description, the boy "looks handsome and handsome, knows me very well, just like another copy of me!"
Zhang Yong believed that his daughter's understanding of love was too idealistic and too ignorant. "This is a bit extreme. Everyone is a very independent individual, and their personality will be somewhat deviated in actual relationships." Zhang Yong said that his daughter's relationship lasted for a year. In the second semester of her junior year, the two eventually broke up because of internship and future development directions.
By observing the daughter's love relationship, Zhang Yong realized that the current view of young people's love needs good guidance, and intimate relationships are a science. In addition to the initial heartbeat and hormone attraction, feelings also need to be treated rationally. "In the process of getting along, how to tolerate, understand and accept each other from the other's perspective, we need to learn."
Zhang Yong wanted to design a course outline based on human psychological development. He observed that the current social opinion field is full of content about "love skills" and "emotional manipulation techniques". He once thought about whether to set the course to " Love Psychology " from an eye-catching perspective, but after careful thinking, he realized that there is an essential difference between the concepts of "love" and "love".
In Zhang Yong's view, "love" emphasizes skill, that is, how to establish a romantic relationship, how two people highlight their respective charms and bring them closer together. And "love" is not like this.
"Love comes with a lifetime, and is looking for a life community that can share honor and disgrace in life and spend a lifetime together." Zhang Yong believes.
Introduction to the love psychology courses taught by Professor Zhang Yong.
"Love Psychology" opened by Zhang Yong has just been launched and has attracted widespread attention from students. The number of people is limited to about 150, and the classes are twice a week, and the people are full every time they attend. "Many people told me that they couldn't get it." Zhang Yong sighed, "It seems that everyone is really confused about feelings."
In 2019, Gong Li offered the "Love Psychology" course at East China Normal University. This was originally an elective course for undergraduates. It was initially estimated that 50 people would choose, but unexpectedly it was very popular for a while. In the end, Gong Li needed to increase the maximum number of students in the course to 200.
The misunderstanding about "get rid of singleness" summarized by Gong Li during class at East China Normal University.
to improve students' " Ai Shang " is one of Gong Li's course goals. "If you don't get out of singleness in college, you will become a senior in senior year." Gong Li told the students bluntly that the four years of college are the best period to improve "love business". After entering society, "your love mind cannot be the same as the senior year, we need to grow."
"The confusion of love"
未分类方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本方日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本日本� Last year, he met a girl whom he was (infatuated with) on campus, and instantly "wishfully poured too many beautiful and positive fantasies into her."
In Yi Hao's fantasy, this girl is "very well-behaved and doesn't like the noisy scenes of social interaction." Before taking the love psychology course, Yi Hao's understanding of love came more from social media, and he saw that love in the movie was a love affair in the first sight, and then he lived forever. He looks forward to having a romantic relationship with his crush partner.
However, all Yi Hao's beautiful expectations were soon disillusioned. Yi Hao's friend told him that he saw the girl he liked in a bar, "In an instant, I felt that my perfect image collapsed and my imagination was disillusioned."
Due to the lack of real offline interaction and more contact, Yi Hao's crush relationship ended hastily before it even started.
In class, Yi Hao was ashamed to express his emotional experience that ended in vain. He asked the teacher privately how to fall in love? Do you want to have beautiful imaginations at the beginning? If there are no such beautiful imagination, how can love happen?
teacher did not give her a unique answer, but inspired him to take the step of active contact and understand what he really wants in his heart. In addition, do not try to change or control the other person, and do not shape the other person into what he imagines.
After communicating with the crush object, Yi Hao realized that maybe she is not suitable for him. Now he hopes to find a partner who can empathize with each other with .
In the love psychology course, you often meet classmates like Yi Hao who have never been in love but have romantic fantasies about feelings.
In order to crack the myth of students' overly romanticizing love, Zhang Yong named the first chapter of the course "The Essence of Love", and he hopes to teach students to correctly understand love.
"The Essence of Love" in Zhang Yong's courseware.
Zhang Yong mentioned Stenberg's love triangle theory in class: perfect love is composed of intimacy, passion and commitment. If there is no promise, only passionate love is just a temporary obsession. Zhang Yong believes that many students now know what it feels like to like others, but they are not very good at maintaining love.
"Falling in love is not some fictional fairy tales, it is a persistent effort. It is mutual acceptance and is about each other's loyalty." Zhang Yong wrote in the courseware.
In addition to "maternal singleness", there are also couples who are in close relationships who come to listen to Zhang Yong's class.
An Lan and her boyfriend have a stable relationship. They basically don’t quarrel when they get along, but because they are approaching graduation, they are about to face separation from another place. "I can't bear to let the other party feel wronged, and I'm unwilling to let myself compromise." Faced with the reality after graduation, she and her boyfriend felt very powerless and didn't know how to solve it.
In intimate relationships, An Lan is good at thinking. She has been thinking about what the essence of intimate relationships is. With these doubts, she walked into Zhang Yong's course.
What impressed An Lan was that in class, Zhang Yong quoted Fromm in "The Art of Love": "Love is not just narrow love between men and women, nor is it obtained by training and improving skills. Love is the overall display of personality. To develop the ability of love, you need to work hard to develop your personality and move towards beneficial goals."
Fromm's view inspired An Lan. She believed that no matter what the final relationship between her and her boyfriend was, the most important thing was that they slowly discovered themselves, knew themselves, and understood themselves better in the process of getting along.
"Breaking the Shame of Love"
Not long after it opened the course "Love Psychology", Zhang Yong found that many students were ashamed to express their emotions.
He saw a twisted mentality in some students. "They actually desire and like others very much in their hearts, but at the same time they are not confident and feel that they are not worthy of others. They are very conflicted and painful," said Zhang Yong.
A student once stopped Zhang Yong after class and asked anxiously why he could never chase the person he liked? Why are they always rejected by the other party on the grounds of "inconsistent personality".
Zhang Yong understands students' behavior. In his eyes, the students are worried that if they publicly express their frustration in their relationship in class, they will be "understood" by others, or they will be considered to be some moral problems.
In order to protect students' privacy and to break the students' sense of shame in their relationship, Zhang Yong thought of asking students to write their confusion on the notes in an unknown form, and he came to reply in a concentrated manner.
Anonymous note records the undercurrents of young men and women. Some people lament that it is too difficult to express their feelings actively, some people wonder that the person they are always hot and cold, and they can’t figure out whether the other party is serious or just playing. Some people have a pessimistic attitude towards love in the note: “Why do you have to fall in love?”
Zhang Yong realized that these views are often related to the deep-rooted sense of shame in traditional culture. He remembered that when he was young, he felt uncomfortable when he mentioned that he wanted to fall in love. Seeing others in love would cause a feeling of disgust. Later, Zhang Yong began to learn development psychology and perverted psychology by himself. He realized that this was because his emotions were suppressed for too long.
He tried to tell students that on the basis of passion, intimacy and commitment, the high spiritual and spiritual fusion of the two is indispensable, and this process needs to be achieved through continuous communication and running-in.
In the process of exploring intimate relationships, Zhang Yong naturally transitioned from the difference in thinking between the two genders to the discussion of sex and love.
Zhang Yong observed that when it comes to sex, male and female classmates will have completely different attitudes. Will women consider whether men only want sex or really like her? If a sexual relationship occurs, can the relationship last long? In the course, Zhang Yong clearly told the students, "Sex does not equal love."
After listening to this chapter, a boy Yu Han began to reflect on his past problems when facing intimate relationships. He believes that having desires is not something to be ashamed of, but he should have more understanding and respect for his girlfriend. He realized that he was not in a hurry to fall in love now, and if he didn't meet the opposite sex who had feelings, he could wait.
In Yu Han's growth experience, no one has ever talked about "love" publicly with him, and no one has told him how to get along with the opposite sex. His education before college only talks about how to study hard. He was once worried, why did his parents think that falling in love is a delay in studying, but when he was in college, people around him began to eagerly hope that he would fall in love?
He hopes to find an answer in Zhang Yong's love psychology course. His understanding of love was very simple in the past, just as two people were together, but in Zhang Yong's class, Yu Han had a new understanding of love. He believes that love is the ability of two people to support each other and be willing to understand each other, and to become a better self together.
"Love is not a math problem"
After teaching love class, Zhang Yong felt the changes in the current emotional outlook of young people.
The current social platforms and marriage market advocate utilitarian emotional values such as precise matching and efficiency priority. For example, the social platform soul once claimed that by completing 30-second soul tests, you can find friends with your heart; the dating software tinder claimed that about 1.6 billion slides occur every day, and 55 billion pairings have been reached; the social software "She said" claimed that it can recommend 21 suitable new friends to users through AI algorithms every day.
This new type of dating and interaction model has had a widespread impact on young people. In Zhang Yong's view, this interactive model disintegrates the process of men and women in the past when long-term interaction and communication are needed to build a sense of trust. "(driven by technology) they ignore a lot of desires and pursuits for the truth, goodness and beauty of human nature."
Zhang Yong said that he still has old-fashioned persistence and pursuit for feelings. In class, he tried to tell students that although they may be chatting enthusiastically on the Internet, there is a wonderful energy field between people. Online chat cannot capture the other person's true emotions. No matter what, it still requires two people to communicate face to face.
Gong Li also realized that the current love values constructed by the Internet and social media have made young people's view of love "in a flowing process." He encouraged students that love is a process of constant trial and error. Only by constantly trial and error can you know what kind of relationship that is ultimately suitable for you.
Yi Hao was also thinking about whether love can be obtained through education. He began to reexamine his view of love: "Love is not a math problem after all, intimate relationships come from interaction with specific people."
"It is not enough to just talk about life experience"
As love classes gradually became popular in colleges and universities, controversy followed.
Cui Le, a doctoral student in gender and education studies in Auckland, New Zealand, told Pengpai News . Looking at the current videos of some love courses and media interviews received by teachers, it is not difficult to find that these courses have many gender stereotypes.
For example, when someone taught gender differences, "The biggest difference between men and women is that women are emotional and men are rational." "Girls often speak quarrels and their words are opposite to their behavior. Their thinking characteristics of angry words are reverse thinking and anti-logical" and so on.
Cui Le believes that in these teachings about gender psychology, the psychology of men and women is exaggerated as opposite poles, and there is no internal difference between the same gender, nor can there be multiple gender identities. Furthermore, when “get out of singleness” is seen as a sign of ability or “success” and the only way to get happiness, those students who enjoy being single or unintentionally enter into intimate relationships will be stigmatized.
How to offer reasonable love courses?
Cui Le believes that "just talking about life experience is not enough, because what may be conveying is a wrong concept."
Zhang Yong believes that teachers who offer love courses in colleges and universities should have a correct view of love. Secondly, the teacher must have knowledge of philosophy, psychology, sociology and other subjects related to marriage and love. If the teacher himself does not have the ability to objectively view and analyze love psychological problems from multiple disciplines and perspectives, it will lead to theoretical and cognitive deviations in guiding students to establish a scientific view of love.
"Of course, if the teacher's personal emotional problems are not able to handle well, or the relationship between husband and wife is not harmonious, then how can we teach others to learn to love?" Zhang Yong said.
Researcher of the Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences Chu Zhaohui once said in an interview with Beijing Daily that for those students whose emotions have not developed normally, it is far from enough to just offer love classes in one or two schools. Instead, all universities need to see the universality and complexity of this problem and pay attention to the solution of such problems.
Chu Zhaohui believes that colleges and universities cannot guide the "enlightenment and cultivation of love" for adolescent students by relying only on one course. Young people need to gradually understand self-discipline, self-care, distinguish right from wrong, protect themselves, respect others, and understand the methods, principles and art of love.
