1 . Have you ever tried to wear a historical object? On 13 September, in a Chinese reality show, an inventive participant chose to connect themes from Sanxingdui, an ancient Bronze Age culture from Sichuan Province, with today’s fashion technology. That included using heat transfer printing techniques and modern materials to create six different pieces.

Historic designs are generating interest in China. Over the past year, more people have visited museums online than in real life. And the number of visits to museum design stores on Tmall alone has lopped 1.6 billion. Of these mils, 100 million users were “post 1990s”.

Museum IP, considered to be an intangible cultural asset, is now attracting great interest from China’s younger generation. In 2013, the Forbidden City Museum in Beijing first requested product design ideas from the public for a cultural and creative design competition. The end results included luggage tags, folding fans, and many other products. Its cooperation with Chinese beauty brand Pechoin followed to launch the first lipstick. Even in 2017 the museum earned more than 1 billion RMB through cultural and creative products.

After witnessing the huge commercial potential of cultural and creative products, many other Chinese museums have followed the Forbidden City Museum’s example. In July, Sanxingdui Museum in Sichuan Province removed the cover on Sanxingdui masks, with toy character designs inspired by Sanxingdui cultural relics. Dunhuang Academy launched a Tianlong Babu blind box (a gift box with a random mixture inside) based on its frescoes. The Henan Museum has launched an archaeological blind box complete with mini play drilling tools that consumers must use to access the toys inside.

2 . Scroll through social media sites such as Instagram, Twitter or Facebook and you’ll be confronted with picture after picture of perfectly presented and delicious-looking meals. While the smell and taste of food can have an undeniably powerful effect on our appetite, are endless posts of steaming snacks more than just a feast for our eyes?

Our eating habits are influenced by what we see. “There is some evidence that, if you see pictures of food, that visual stimulation can prompt you to feel a desire to eat,” says Suzanne Higgs, a professor in the psycho biology of appetite. “If all your friends on social media are posting pictures or live streaming of themselves consuming fast food, it’s going to set a norm that eating fast food is what people do.” says Higgs.

Scientists are becoming increasingly concerned that food-related content on social media is making us think differently about food. Social media algorithms (社交媒体算法) promote content that users engage with more, so viewing more unhealthy food means seeing more of it on our social media feeds.

“It seems that healthier foods are often seen as boring in comparison,” says Tina Tessitore, associate professor of marketing. “In advertising, you see unhealthy food in social settings—people having a barbecue with friends, for example, while healthy food often focuses more on the nutritional value. If you saw friends eating salad together, it wouldn’t seem so credible,” she says.

But while studies have found that social media can make us think differently about food, and that we typically engage more with content featuring unhealthy food, it’s uncertain yet whether this actually translates to our changes in our behavior in daily life. “If I’m scrolling through Instagram, looking at photos of tasty food, whether I seek out the food depends on how hungry I am, and whether it’s appropriate in that moment,” says Higgs. “And when we do eat, we’re influenced by more than what we’ve seen online,” she adds.

3 . By age 12, Gavin Svenson had a strong interest in insects. He couldn’t get enough of digging for them, watching them, and collecting them. He remembers that his parents patiently indulged (纵容) his passion for insects even as he stored them in the fridge of their home.

Around that age, Svenson saw an interview with an insectologist on TV and thought,“Whoa! You can do this as a job?” Clearly, yes, which explains how he ended up as the curator (馆长) at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.

Deep interests that present at an early age often stay with us throughout life, says Susan Newman, a social psychologist.

So how do you help your teenager find their passion? Parents can be patient and supportive without overdoing it. Svenson feels his parents found the night balance. “My parents were super supportive, but it was mostly me driving it,” says Svenson. Though his parents had some worries about his narrow choice of a career path, they never tried to force him to change it.

Teens are likely to try lots of new activities and may drop them almost as quickly as they pick them up. So how can parents know when it’s a true passion and when not? Newman describes a passion as “an interest or activity that you can’t get enough of; it keeps you coming back for more.” Newman says, “As a parent, you’ll notice that you can’t get their attention because they are totally absorbed.”

But what if the passion that’s absorbing your child is not the one you would have picked for them? “Parents have to realize that their children are separate human beings with interests, likes, and dislikes hat can be very different from their own,” says Newman. “You have to let your teen take the lead in what interests them.”

Now a parent himself, Svenson concurs. “Never lower your kids’ interests. Kids are smart, and they have a great ability to form their own opinion.”

5 . Educating children to have good manners maybe a difficult task for all the parents. You may know that children are easier to learn when you make something fun. So you tried to dress up like a clown(小丑) to draw their attention but it didn’t work. Making something fun does not mean that you have to entertain (使某人快乐) your children. What I have found is that tapping into their interests will make anything fun. There are tools and materials from other people on how to develop children’s interests and teach them good manners.

A lot of popular characters such as Madeline, The Winnie Bears and Barbie have DVDs and books about manners. I have used all of these DVDs in my classes, and they not only keep children’s interests, but also the children use the good manners that they learn from their favorite characters.

If your children are interested in sports, princesses, superheroes, or dinosaurs, you can use their favorite heroes (real or imaginary) as good examples to teach them, from meeting and greeting, to how to set a table.

Elise McVeigh is an etiquette (礼节) expert for Barbie Princes Charm School DVD, as well as a contributor to Parents. com. She is the mother of three children whom she raises with her husband in Dallas. Her three polite children are influenced by her great achievements and good manners from a very young age. So, the most important thing is that you should not forget to use your good manners, because you are your children’s biggest hero. Acting and being like you is what they are truly interested in.