China’s private lives are not slipping neatly into silence. The latest survey points to a more awkward picture. Younger adults are having less sex in some settings, but that does not mean they are simply less open. Middle-aged couples, meanwhile, are carrying a heavier load than the headlines suggest.
中国人的私生活并没有整齐地滑向沉寂。最新调查呈现出的图景更复杂，也更别扭。某些情况下，年轻人的性生活确实减少了，但这并不等于他们变得更保守。与此同时，中年夫妻承受的压力，比很多标题写得更重。
A few reader comments helped sharpen that picture. “The essence is a redistribution of attention,” one wrote. Another was blunter and funnier, asking simply, “Where is there any energy left?” Those lines land because they sound lived-in. They do not explain everything; they do explain why so many people recognise the pattern.
几条网友评论把这个图景勾得更清楚了。有人说，“本质是注意力的重新分配”；还有人更直接，也更好笑，只问了一句：“哪儿还有力气？”这些话之所以有分量，是因为它们很像真实生活里说出来的。它们未必解释全部，但足以说明为什么很多人一看就懂。
The findings come from the second China Private Life Survey, or CPLS, carried out in 2025 by Peking University and Fudan University. It is the only continuing national survey still tracking sexual attitudes and sexual behaviour, which gives it unusual weight. Its numbers are not a mood; they are a map.
这些发现来自2025年北京大学和复旦大学联合开展的第二次“中国私生活质量调查”（CPLS）。这也是目前全国唯一仍在持续追踪性观念与性行为的延续性调查，因此分量不轻。它给出的不是情绪，而是一张坐标图。
Among partnered people aged 25 and under, a notable share are not sexually active at all. The figures are about 13 percent for men and 17 percent for women, which is higher than among older cohorts. That has fed the idea of a “sexual recession”, but the researchers argue the reality is less dramatic and more uneven.
在有伴侣的25岁及以下人群中，相当一部分并没有性生活。男性约13 percent，女性约17 percent，这一比例高于年纪更大的群体。这也让“性萧条”的说法更常见，但研究者认为，现实没有那么戏剧化，也没有那么整齐。
Attention Reallocated, Not Desire Lost
注意力被重新分配，而不是欲望消失
The survey team’s reading is that desire has not vanished; attention has shifted. Short videos, gaming and other easy pleasures now compete with intimacy. They are immediate, repeatable and low effort. Sex, by contrast, still asks for time, space and coordination. One commenter put it neatly as “too many temptations”; another said the younger generation simply has too many other things to do.
调查团队的判断是，欲望并没有消失，只是注意力转移了。短视频、游戏和其他容易得到的快乐，正在和亲密关系竞争。它们来得快，可重复，成本低。相比之下，性仍然需要时间、空间和配合。有人把这概括成“诱惑太多了”；也有人说，年轻人只是有太多别的事可做。
That does not make the situation bleak. In 2020, 92 percent of people aged 20 to 25 said they were satisfied with sex in both body and mind; by 2025 that figure rose again. The survey’s point is not that sex has failed, but that it no longer occupies the whole stage.
这并不意味着局面悲观。2020年，20到25岁年轻人中有92 percent表示性生活在生理和心理上都满意；到2025年，这个比例还在上升。调查要表达的并不是性“失败了”，而是它不再占满整个舞台。
One reader said it should be lighter, and love should be taken more seriously. Another argued that women’s awakening is a good thing, because being able to say no is part of being equal. The comments around the piece were full of that tension: less pressure, more choice.
有人说，应该把性看轻一点，把爱看重一点。也有人认为，女性的觉醒终归是好事，因为能拒绝，本身就是平等的一部分。这篇文章下面的评论，处处都是这种张力：少一点压力，多一点选择。
Marriage Turns Into Logistics
婚姻慢慢变成了后勤
The harder story is middle age. Among people with stable partners, sex is falling fastest in educated urban households, where work, parenting and fatigue crowd out almost everything else. For women over 45, about half have sex less than once a month or not at all; for men the figure is close to 40 percent.
更难看的故事发生在中年。对于有稳定伴侣的人来说，性生活下降最快的，是受过高等教育的城市家庭。工作、育儿和疲惫几乎挤掉了所有私人时间。45岁以上女性中，大约一半性生活少于每月一次，甚至完全没有；男性这一比例也接近40 percent。
Readers recognised that immediately. “Two people keep working overtime, come home exhausted and just want to lie down,” one wrote. Another said families with children turn into a team, with intimacy pushed further and further back. That is harsh, but it is also plain.
网友几乎是一眼就认出来了。有人写道：“两个人经常加班，回来已经很累了，就只想躺到。”还有人说，有了孩子之后，夫妻关系就像成了一个团队，亲密关系被一拖再拖。话说得狠，但也说得直。
The survey also shows a big gap between what people say and what they do. Most remain cautious in principle, yet more than 90 percent of those who married in the past decade had premarital sex. Chinese people are often more conservative in opinion than in practice; that contrast is one of the clearest threads in the research.
调查还显示，观念和行为之间有明显落差。大多数人在原则上仍然偏保守，但最近十年进入婚姻的人中，超过90 percent有过婚前性行为。中国人常常是嘴上更保守，做法更开放；这种反差正是这项研究最清楚的一条线索。
Hook-up experience among 18- to 25-year-olds has also fallen sharply since 2020, while trust in meeting people online appears lower than the technology around them. China may be highly connected, but confidence in digital intimacy is not keeping pace.
18到25岁人群的“约炮”经历自2020年以来也明显下降，而对线上认识对象的信任，似乎没有跟上技术的发展。中国的互联网很强，但数字亲密关系的信心并没有同步增长。
What the survey captures, then, is not a nation losing desire but a nation reordering time, trust and expectations. That is a messier story than “sexual recession”; it is also a more honest one.
因此，这项调查捕捉到的，不是一个失去欲望的社会，而是一个正在重新安排时间、信任和期待的社会。这个故事比“性萧条”更乱，也更诚实。
