CONNECT AND FORGET IT? Or is it plug and play? The Chicago Sun-Times has put together a series of articles about sex on campus titled Hooking Up and Hanging Out. The adults who have taken the time to think about these phenomena seem to be coming to the conclusion that yes, the pshrinks will not lack for work. Here's the abstract for the series.

On college campuses the pressure is intense for one-night hookups, without emotion or commitment -- but some psychologists warn that these young adults are setting themselves up for future relationship troubles.

Now consider these paragraphs from the article that provided the title for this post.

In interviews with college students across the state, some say hookups are preferable to relationships.

"You have a whole life to be with [one] girl,'' said a 22-year-old U. of I. frat member from Chicago. "This is your one shot to have a good time." Added a 21-year-old U. of I. sorority girl from Springfield: "A lot of people feel like college is the only time when you can do what you want, and it doesn't matter.''

"A lot of college is about having a story the next day, 'Oh God, I was so wasted. You won't believe what happened,' '' said a 22-year-old coed from Park Ridge.

Some psychologists, though, say these young adults are setting themselves up for future relationship troubles at a key moment in their emotional development. Chicago's Columbia College junior Kelly Stinson, 21, can see that. Stinson has "friends who are so used to just connecting with strangers that, when they are ready to have a real relationship, they're screwed because they don't know how to open up to someone.''

Even those who are trying to avoid casual sex or are monogamous with a steady partner are feeling the echoing undertow.

"There's so much temptation,'' said Mike Rodriguez, 20, a U. of I. junior from Elk Grove Village. He had a girlfriend for two years but broke up, in part, because of the swirl of permissiveness. He didn't trust her -- or himself. "It's hard to have a girlfriend when you see all that,'' he said.

"Good sex is sex that isn't emotional -- that's the cultural message,'' said [Elizabeth] Paul, the College of New Jersey psychologist, who has interviewed hundreds of undergrads for her research. Students "buy in to the media images we bombard them with that says sex can be something quick and easy and sort of free from yourself. But, most of the time, they get into these quick interactions and realize it's a little more complicated."

Lovely. Read on.

Post-hookup feelings ran the gamut: Almost half of the students surveyed said they were happy or satisfied. Thirty-five percent reported feeling regret or disappointment, more so for women. Eleven percent said they were confused and 7 percent uncomfortable. Some described "an awkward moment" when the two partners "put their clothes back on and realize they have nothing to talk about.''

The disappointed wonder, "Did I really want to do that? Why did I do that? Why was it not a good experience? Did I fail at it? It must be my fault,'' said Paul.

For some women, according to one study of 1,000 college females, hookups are a way "to avoid the pain of breaking up by avoiding commitment in the first place."

What often disturbs them is an unexpected emotional connection.

"This generation is leery of relationships with emotional intimacy,'' Paul said. "One of the phrases you hear is 'you catch feelings' to describe when a hookup goes bad. You get an emotional feeling you weren't expecting." A male student told Paul, "I felt confused after because I liked her.''

Even ongoing though casual relationships can be killed by "catching feelings.''

Columbia's Kelly Stinson has felt the pain. "You start to long for them,'' she said.

Her roommate, Becki Mielcarski, 22, of Westmont, was on the receiving end once. "I made out with a friend of mine, and he told me he was in love with me. I told him, 'You're a dear friend of mine, but I don't feel that way about you.' I felt like a guy. We switched roles.''

J.P. Allen, 20, a Southern Illinois University sophomore from Park Ridge, caught feelings and tried to follow up. "I call them, but it's such a shock," Allen said. "When it moves so fast, it's hard to go backwards."

I suppose that's why friendship with benefits is for friends that aren't really friends. The longer term consequences don't look that good either.

Geraldine K. Piorkowski, a psychologist and former director of the Counseling Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said college students are risking not only their emotional health today, but also in the future. The author of Too Close For Comfort: Exploring the Risks of Intimacy, Piorkowski said trying to have sex without feelings is "psychologically damaging.'' In the short run, she said, "When you're not comfortable with your feelings or you try to put them aside, they overwhelm you, you're very anxious. You get depressed.''

Long-term, Piorkowski said, students involved in the hookup culture are "not learning how to be emotionally close to someone in a relationship, which means learning how to talk about yourself, talk about what's important to you, how to listen to somebody and be supportive of them in difficult times. They're not learning to resolve conflicts or compromise."

Paul allows that, "in some ways, providing some way to sexually experiment and sexually explore is good for people.'' But only, she said, "if it's done in the context of physical safety, as well as self-awareness in an emotionally reflective way: You learn about yourself and how sex can help achieve a connection with another person.''

The problem, said Paul, is that sex "is happening in this non-contemplative way. Kids are just blindly running into it. [They haven't] thought through 'What am I comfortable with? How far do I want to go?'"

Amy Alkon, a syndicated sex columnist out of Santa Monica, Calif., scoffs at the hand-wringing over hookups. "Sociologist after sociologist squawk that the hookup girls will be irreparably emotionally damaged -- conveniently forgetting all the sexual frolickers who made it out of the roaring '20s and free-love '60s without their heads imploding,'' Alkon said. Students "will have casual sex, and sooner or later they'll want to connect and they'll stop. When it's not working, they'll change.''

Made it out of the free-love '60s? You mean the mid-life crisis, and the approximately 30% failure rate of the marriages of that era, and the full calendars at family court are ... my imagination? And when they want to change, will they be viewed by the responsible partners they're seeking as damaged goods?

Another article in the series suggests that some women are recognizing that risk.

Many college women today say they don't expect or want to find a spouse at college. Only 19 percent polled in the dating report "strongly agreed" that they'd like to meet their future husband at college.

"I don't plan on getting married until I'm 26 or so," said Johanna Borgsmiller, a 20-year-old junior at U. of I. "I still have time to get serious."

She does, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The age people get married has gone up considerably in the last quarter century. In 1970, the median age of women walking down the aisle for the first time was 20.8 years. In 2003, it was 25.3.

"You have this elongated period of adolescence and young adulthood that gives [students] a lot more time to experiment," said Patricia Koch, an associate professor at Penn State who has studied sexuality for more than 20 years.

Some women say that, if marriage looms on the distant horizon, there's no sense getting bogged down in serious relationships during college. Instead, they get their sexual needs met through a series of casual hookups, which can elicit a range of conflicting emotions. Sixty-one percent of women who said a hookup made them feel desirable also said it made them feel awkward, according to the college dating report.

"If it's a hookup where [I] actually stayed there ... I just want to get out of there as fast as possible the next day," said a University of Chicago woman cited in the report. "It's that 'walk of shame' thing. You've got front desk people you have to get by. You hope you don't see anybody else in the dorm. And you look like you had a rough night. It's just, like, awkward."

Of course I'll respect you in the morning. Not. Plus ca change.

University of Washington sociologist and sex educator Pepper Schwartz said she has noticed more bravado lately among college women boasting about their sexual conquests. She suspects a lot of it is just talk.

"Are they really happy? Sometimes, I think not," Schwartz said. "In the end, they're still looking for a boyfriend. They're still looking for respect. They ultimately want to pair up, not just hook up."

What role, then, for the university? Are the rabbits being given enough course work to do?