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Ivy League researchers released a huge report on teen sex. It's a must-read for parents.

The Harvard report has 3 major takeaways.

Photo by Long Truong on Unsplash
woman in white sleeveless dress kissing man in blue dress shirt


"It may be the most important thing we do in life; learn how to love and be loved."

At least, that's according to Harvard psychologist and researcher Rick Weissbourd.

He's been collecting data on the sex and love habits of young people for years through surveys, interviews, and even informal conversation — with teens and the important people in their lives.

Through it all, one thing has been abundantly clear:

"We spend enormous amount of attention helping parents prepare their kids for work and school," Weissbourd says. "We do almost nothing to prepare them for the tender, tough, subtle, generous, focused work of developing mature healthy relationships. I'm troubled by that."

Now he and his team have finally compiled five years of intense research that asks the question, "What do young people really think about sex and love?"

And maybe just as important: "How should we be preparing them?"

Here are three major takeaways from the groundbreaking new report:

1. Hookup culture might just be a big ol' myth.

Everybody's hooking up with everybody these days, right? Not so fast.

The Harvard report presents a startling statistic from a related study in 2008. A group of college students in the U.S. were asked what percentage of guys on campus they thought had sex on any given weekend. They guessed about 80%. The reality? As low as 5%.

Weissbourd notes that because hookups are so culturally visible (especially in college) and gossiped about, it creates a perception that they're a lot more common than they actually are.

The Harvard study itself found, in fact, that most young people are a lot more interested in sex within a committed relationship or, shockingly(!), things that don't involve sex at all.

What it means for parents: We as adults, unfortunately, play a big role in this pervasive and harmful myth. "In every era there've been complaints about how sexually out of control kids are," Weissbourd says. "It's a story adults really love to tell."

When we play up this stereotype, the study finds it can actually make young people less likely to seek advice or to talk about sex and relationships because they may feel inadequate or embarrassed about their lack of experience.

silver tabby cat lying on white textilePhoto by Laura Chouette on Unsplash

2. Sexual harassment and assault, however, remain huge, unaddressed problems.

"There are a significant number of young men out there who think that all they can't do is rape someone," Weissbourd says. "They can't drag someone in an alley to rape them."

What many of them have very little concept of, he says, is how harmful and dangerous behaviors like catcalling, pressuring, and coercion can be.

The study cites endless instances of girls being harassed at school, complaining to administration, staging walkouts; anything to get the problem addressed. But the "boys will be boys" attitude persists, and problems are often swept under the rug rather than tackled head-on.

A culture of sexual violence is harmful for obvious reasons, but the report also found these kinds of attitudes can bleed over into relationships that can "disproportionately involve females servicing males."

What it means for parents: Talk. to. your. kids. about. consent.

"I was really surprised how many parents had not had basic conversations with their kids about things like consent, or how to avoid sexually harassing a person," Weissbourd says.

We have to make it crystal clear to young people what kinds of behavior are and aren't acceptable, and follow up those lines with real consequences. It's the only way things are ever going to change.

3. Teens and young adults want more guidance than we're giving them.

Most parents aren't thrilled about having "the talk," and admittedly, bringing up the topic of sex with a teen is no easy task.

But with all this dread and hand-wringing over how to talk about the birds and the bees, the Harvard report notes that many parents are overlooking a much bigger topic: love and relationships.

Roughly 70% of surveyed young adults reported wishing they had received more or better guidance on the emotional aspects of relationships, both from parents or from health class. But it's not just a hindsight thing.

Many parents are overlooking a much bigger topic: love and relationships.

"The percentage of young people who want guidance on romantic relationships was encouraging," Weissbourd says. "Kids light up when they are talking about love and what love is and what does it mean. That was surprising and really encouraging."

What it means for parents: When you're done teaching your teenager how to put a condom on a banana, make sure to spend some time talking about the day-to-day work that goes into building a healthy relationship.

That means going beyond platitudes. The Harvard team suggests diving into more complex questions like, What's the difference between attraction, infatuation, and love? How can we be more attracted to people the less interested they are in us? Why can we be attracted to people who are unhealthy for us?

Those are questions some of us might not even have the answer to, but having the honest conversation with our kids is a major step in helping them learn how to love and be loved.

As Weissbourd says, it's one of the most important things we'll ever do.

The full report tackles even more and is jam-packed with must-know findings and statistics. It's definitely worth a read.


This article originally appeared on 05.18.17

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Mom tidies teen's room each morning as a kind act of service, prompting a fascinating debate

Does her reasoning make sense?

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Mom makes teen son's bed and picks up his clothes after he goes to school.

Parenting is difficult, not only because raising unique human beings through childhood and beyond is complex on every level, but because it's hard to know if you're doing it right. And the internet definitely doesn't help on that front, as everyone has an opinion on what constitutes good parenting.

Case in point: A mom who makes her teen son's bed and picks up his clothes for him after she drops him off at school every morning.

Shannon Tarkey a mother of five (including triplets), shared a video on Instagram and Facebook showing how she makes her son's bed and picks up his clothes, and people had feelings about it. The text overlay on the video as she's tidying up reads:

"I started doing this every morning for my teenager. Not because he won't do it. Not because I do everything for him. But because teenagers are now growing up in a very strange and complicated world and I want him to feel at peace when he comes home.

woman picking up clothes off a bedroom floor

People disagreed on whether tidying up for a teen was kindness or enabling.

Shannon Tarkey/Instagram

People's reactions to the video were sometimes drastically different, with some believing she was setting him up to be an entitled husband.

For instance, one commenter on Instagram wrote, "Ooooh he gonna make his wife so furious one day expecting a clean house but not helping."

Another added, "Although this is very kind and sweet of you, when he gets married he will think this is also what his wife should do for him. I married a man who thought I was supposed to be just like his mom. It took many years for my husband to learn to serve in the home."

However, others shared that they do similar things for their own kids or that their moms did those things for them and are grateful for the loving-kindness being expressed through such acts of service.

"My baby is 15 and after she leaves for school I clean her room," shared one mom. "I plug up her iPad/Mac etc so they are charged and ready for when she comes home. I make breakfast, lunch, iron outfits, comb hair, and anything else I think she needs from me. She has years as an adult but her time as a child is limited."

Another person added, "My Mother used to do that for me and said the same thing. I tried to do the same. There is plenty of time to be an adult..."

The comments go back and forth between people praising Tarkey for showing her son what kindness and caring for others looks like and people saying she was teaching her son that a woman will always clean up after him.

In the caption of the photo, Tarkey explained in more detail why she does this for her son after dropping him off at school:

"He has his own chores and has been taught his entire life to clean up after himself. But when he's getting himself up early in the mornings and rushing off to school this is something I've come to enjoy doing for him. This way when he gets home he can get his homework done in his room and just relax. There's plenty of other things Austin helps with around the house, and I can only imagine what it's like being a teenager in today's world. It is my job to make my children feel at peace so if it's picking up a few pieces of clothes or making his bed then I am more than happy to do it for him."

In the comments she shared that her son also helps with cooking and gardening, cares for the family animals, vacuums and organizes his room and has developed all kinds of life skills—fishing, hunting, car repair—most kids don't have. She clarified that he does make his own bed some days and on weekends. "But when he's rushed out for school I am not going to harp on him when he gets home when he's incredibly responsible as it is," she wrote. "He has plenty of chores and he's also GRATEFUL I do this for him."

The differing opinions in the comments are fascinating in that they offer an insight into how people view the balance between having expectations for our kids and being an example of caring and kindness. Naturally, people brought their own backgrounds and experiences into their opinions, sometimes without having all the information about this particular home and parenting dynamic, so it's not all about this one mom and her son. But what one person sees as kindness, another might see as enabling. And in reality, they might be right or they might be wrong, depending on the circumstances.

Whether this teenage boy grows up to expect his wife to clean up after him or grows up to follow his mother's example of caring for our loved ones depends on lots of factors—how such things are talked about in the home, the values instilled in him, the kid's personality, how other responsibilities are handled and more.

What do you think? Does her reasoning make sense?

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Community

Teens continue on with sweet breakfast tradition for a grandmother who lost her grandson

After Sam's tragic passing, the "breakfast club" was determined to keep his memory alive.

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There's a reason why they call it comfort food

One day, a teen boy named Sam Crowe told his grandma Peggy Winckowski that he had been bragging about her cooking to his friends, saying “my grandma makes the best breakfast.”

“Grandma Peggy,” as she’s universally known, invited the group over to try one of her legendary breakfasts, and the following week she was greeted by Sam, his cousin Owen and seven of their school friends—all of whom enjoyed an extraordinary meal, along with a round of hugs.

One morning meetup led to another, and thus their makeshift breakfast club was born. Every Wednesday morning, Grandma Peggy would prepare a lavish meal for a larger and larger group. This tradition lasted throughout the year.

Then, tragedy struck.

In July 2022, Sam was killed in a moped accident, leaving Grandma Peggy devastated. But not alone, because she was still greeted by Sam’s classmates for their breakfast club meetups every single day following the week of the accident, then every Wednesday for the rest of the school year. The breakfast club had not come to a close. In fact, it has grown larger than ever before.

The club would also meet for special holidays, game days and to celebrate Peggy’s birthday.

Grandma Peggy truly had become everyone’s grandma. As one of her regulars told CBS Sunday Morning, “She’s just a built-in grandmother to all of us.”

“Grandma Peggy just brings everyone together. She cares for us a lot. She really cares for us,” another added.

Through compassion, community and delicious comfort food, Grandma Peggy and Sam’s friends have been able to heal together while honoring a tradition he started.

Watch the full story from CBS Sunday Mornings below:

The breakfast club

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Pop Culture

How old is too old to trick-or-treat? Turns out, most people agree on this topic.

This isn't such a debate after all.

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We asked the Upworthy community if trick-or-treating should have an age limit

Should Halloween trick-or-treating have an age limit?

Some seem to think so, arguing that anyone past the age of thirteen has less sincere joy for the holiday, and merely uses trick-or-treating as a candy grabbing “scam”…thus potentially ruining the experience for the littles.

Certain cities have even implemented laws to enforce an age cut-off somewhere between 12-16-years-old, depending on the location. Punishment for breaking these rules vary, but in Chesapeake, Virginia it included up to six months of jail time up until 2019.

And yet, when we asked the Upworthy community this question, there was a very different answer.

Seemingly across the board, after scouring through thousands of comments, the resounding opinion was that Halloween was for all ages.

“I think trick or treating could be a lifelong adventure.”

“There is no age cut off. It’s so wonderful to see community out interacting no matter what your age!”

“Anyone who comes to my door on Halloween saying trick or treat can have a treat. Adults supervising young children, teens who chose to do something wholesome over doing something destructive, special needs adults whose mind is younger than their body, etc. If a Snickers or a pencil decorated with black cats will make someone happy, let’s do it.”

“I think if people are trick or treating and staying out of trouble who cares how old they are.”

“A kid that is older that is trick-or-treating means that they are enjoying their innocence and not off doing something bad, wrong or illegal. Let them enjoy the little things while they can:)”

And it’s not just our readers who feel this way. According to a 2021 YouGov survey, about one in four Americans agree that children can never be too old to go trick-or-treating.

Even experts share the opinion that there is no real harm in letting older children, teens, college kids, etc., participate in going door-to-door, so long as they are respectful.

And to that end, a few suggestions. Lizzie Post, co-president at the etiquette blog Emily Post Institute, recommends that big kids make little kids the “priority,” noting that they might want to steer clear of costumes that would seem too scary or uncomfortable for small kids, saying please and thank you while taking candy (be the example!) and generally leaning into the more friendly side of Halloween, rather than the ghoulish one. (TIME)

via GIPHY

Bottom line: If dressing up and asking for candy helps someone hold onto a bit of that elusive magic for just a little while longer, why not let them, so long as they are being kind?

Childhood goes by too fast—one minute you’re a toddler and the world is big and exciting and the next you’re thrust into the mundane throes of adulthood. But that inner kid never really goes away. And maybe, just maybe, seeing another big kid out and about on All Hallows Eve offers a gentle reminder to let ours free once in a while. Yes, even now.

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