How can your high school sweetheart impact your love life?

It is often during adolescence that love enters a life and that we form a couple for the first time. At puberty, feelings are much more intense, and the first emotions are sometimes tumultuous. But this first love, often relegated to oblivion over the years, would not be insignificant. According to a new study published in the Journal of Couple and Relationship Therapyour first loves would also be at the origin of healthy or toxic models of our relationships later in life.

The way of being of teenagers in love put under the microscope

The research, conducted in the United States, focused on the relational education, rather than the sexual education, of adolescents. 2,682 students from 19 American high schools were recruited and nearly 23% were in a relationship. Several factors were thus evaluated in these young people, on their way of being in a relationship: the fact of deciding or letting oneself be carried away, the part of romanticism, the fact of knowing how to refuse any unwanted intimacy, the tolerated control, etc.

5 Types of Young Love Discovered

Thanks to this work, the researchers discovered that there are 5 types of relationships in adolescence, from the healthiest to the most problematic.

• Low risk relationships: Low-risk adolescents have healthy romantic role models, make thoughtful decisions, are able to refuse unwanted physical intimacy, and are not deluded, which holds promise for future adult relationships;
• Blindlove: These teens are low risk in all areas except romance and believe that love can conquer all;
• Slider: they simply “slipped” into their relationships without giving them much thought or consideration and are therefore less likely to make thoughtful decisions;
• Blindlove Slider: It is the combination of the previous two, teens find themselves making rash decisions in romantic relationships because they believe that love trumps all. These people are at high risk of succumbing to unwanted physical intimacy.
• Control freak: Very worryingly, control-tolerant adolescents were less likely to reject their partners’ controlling behaviors.

On the importance of also providing relational education

Defining these types of love is important, as it seems that the love that begins in adolescence is the breeding ground for future relationships. By identifying the love landscape of high-risk adolescents, it is therefore possible to review this and provide appropriate education to adolescents. To this end, relationship education would be just as useful as sex education.

They thus emphasize the importance of discussing relationships, love and sexuality without taboos from adolescence onwards, to enable them to aim for healthier relationships.