Crime, suicide and violence

The rising rate of suicides among college students clearly indicates that many lead troubled lives. Pressure from grade school and high school continues in college.

Last year, a young highly educated couple in Hangzhou nearly ended their lives over a laptop. The woman has a PhD and the man a master's degree.

They forgot a laptop on a bus, realized it when they got off, quarreled and the woman slapped the man. He immediately threw himself into the nearby river. The woman then tried to drown herself. Both were rescued.

The case generated a heated discussion; many say they wasted their family's efforts to educate them and were a social disappointment.

Director Song says overly high expectations from family and society are a major problem contributing to depression and other mental problems, resulting in disturbed behavior. Parental pushing and over-expectation, coupled with smothering and over-protection can lead to personality problems in children.

Psychologists say two kinds of young people are vulnerable to depression: those with high education and those in low-level vocational schools. "The former is overestimated and the latter is underestimated," says Song.

Suggestion:

Reduce the study pressure, ease off, don't evaluate children by their test scores. Encourage them to be responsible, useful and optimistic. Home life should be relaxed and cheerful.

Parents these days fight and quarrel less and there's less physical violence at home. But emotional abuse deeply wounds children and hurts more than a slap in the face.

Ambiguous gender identity

A single mother called to complain her son was "feminized" and psychologists discovered that the woman routinely complained that "men are no good," not considering that her son would be a man.

Counsellors say they receive many such calls from single mothers.

Intact families also have problems. Song says family structure has changed from 2+1 (two parents and one child) to 4+2+1 (four grandparents, two parents and one child). This means a child has six parents in close contact and many have different, conflicting opinions on child rearing.

This makes children irresolute and hesitant to make decisions. They choose the opinions that they like and the easier options. They will come to get used to choosing the lighter jobs in life, the easy way.

Suggestion:

To help little boys develop their masculinity, single mothers should have positive male role models around to interact with their sons, talking with them and playing sport with them.

Big families should get together from time to time and sort out disagreements so children don't get conflicting signals.

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Source: Shanghai Daily