Articles

This year Kokurina Irina Georgievna has her 70th anniversary. Our congratulations for the talented scientist and teacher, PhD in psychology, associate Professor of the Department of Social psychology, Faculty of psychology, Lomonosov Moscow State University

Relevance. Both personality and clinical psychology suppose many empirical examples describing the disengagement from activity and shifting to another one as quite effective: e.g., unfulfilled dreams and regret for them, severe illnesses or disabling conditions, etc. These examples demonstrate the importance of study of refusal from the goal and goal change as special self-regulatory processes that are not reducible to other processes of self-regulation (e.g., planning, modeling, achievement) and can be productive. Such studies require a validated measure.

Objective. The aim of this work was to validate the Russian-language version of the Goal Disengagement and Re-Engagement Scale, proposed in the self-regulation theory by C. Carver and M. Scheier.

Methods. 287 students and 4792 employees of a large production organization filled out the Russian-language version of the Goal Disengagement and Re-Engagement Scale (Wrosch et al., 2003a). The students also filled the Inventory of Styles of Behavior Self-regulation, a modification of the J. Kuhl’s Action Control Scale Test, a Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire.

Results. Both internal consistency and factor structure of the scale were demonstrated in both samples. The external validity of the scale is confirmed by the expected pattern of correlations with action / state orientation, behavior self-regulation and strategies of cognitive regulation of emotions. The results of the hierarchical regression analysis show that goal disengagement and reengagement differ from other aspects of  self-regulation of behavior not only structurally (at the level of their correlations with each other) but also functionally: after statistical control of the other aspects of self-regulation, goal disengagement and reengagement still predict a number of cognitive strategies regulation of emotions.

Conclusions. The psychometric properties of the Russian-language version of the Goal Disengagement and Re-Engagement Scale are sufficient for its application for research purposes. Further studies could focus on the differentiation of the process of goal change and other self-regulatory processes, especially their effect on the productivity, health, well-being.

Relevance. The relevance of the study of youth representations of parenting is due to a number of socio-economic and psychological changes taking place in modern society, including the emergence of deviant forms of parenthood, the phenomena of mixing family roles and abandonment of parenthood in general.

Objective. The purpose of this study is to study the content features of representations of motherhood and fatherhood in girls and boys and determine the degree of their harmony as a condition of psychological readiness for parenthood.

Method. Content analysis of the respondents' essays on the topic of future parenthood, aimed at identifying the content of the features of representations of parenthood and the degree of their harmony in girls and boys.

The study involved 231 respondents (190 girls and 42 boys), aged 18 to 25 years.

Results.The main characteristics of parenthood as a special social role and activity: child care; creation of necessary conditions for the development of the child; education of the child; emotional support of the child. It is revealed that in the views of girls the most important function of motherhood is to provide emotional support to the child; in the views of young men about fatherhood - education and training of the child. The majority of respondents demonstrated a high degree of discrepancies of perceptions about parental functions related to the idealization of the images of the child and their own parenting and the lack of representations about the methods of implementing maternal and paternal roles.

Conclusions. The data obtained show that the surveyed young people are not ready to realize a parental role and require corrective work aimed at forming realistic, complete and adequate representations of motherhood and fatherhood before their occurrence.

Abstract

Relevance.Professional sport has become more complex and risky activity in the last decades. Consequently, scientific and applied multi-disciplinary field of sport trauma attract more and more attention. Together with swift development of sport medicine and rehabilitation theoreticians and practitioners pay attention to the differences of physical and psychological readiness to resuming of sport training and competing activities. 

Objective.The article deals with the problem of psychological rehabilitation after sport trauma. Major types of interventions are discussed. Fear of re-injury is considered to be one of the key difficulties after sport trauma. 

Methods.The article presents the case of a gymnast with a strong fear of re-injury. Characteristics of psychological traumatization are depicted. Consulting scheme is based on the theory and practice of trauma in the works of Pierre Janet. 

Results.Three stages of counseling included 1) stabilization of personality and mitigation of acute psychophysiological stress symptoms; creation of a narration about trauma; 2) re-processing of traumatic memories and desensibilization; 3) reintegration and return to sport and competing activity. A number of methods were used to achieve the goal of each stage: cognitive-behavioral interventions, analytic interventions, art techniques, biological feedback, self-determination interventions. The dynamic of 10 sessions is analyzed. 

Conclusions were made on the necessity of psychological guidance, which should start shortly after trauma and be provided during the whole rehabilitation period in a systematic approach, including a sportsman, a coach and parents.

Relevance. The individualization of education, the rapid expansion of the sphere of digital knowledge and the risks associated with cyber-socialization put the problem of a professional psychological organization and pedagogical “accompaniment” of individual trajectories of education for children and adolescents.

Objective. Identification the invariable elements of activity to support individual learning trajectories.

Methods. Analysis of literature; synthesis of theoretical and empirical (case study) methods.

Results. According to the comparative analysis of the approaches to the mentoring organization, the structures of the activities of the tutor, the curator (facilitator), the coach, as well as the essential and formal limitations of the various approaches in solving the problems of accompanying individual learning paths identified and described. It was founds that the compared approaches have fundamentally different attitudes towards the subject of activity. Academic tutoring is more effective in modern educational environments in comparison with curatorship and coaching. The stages of accompanying the individual trajectory of learning, carried out within the framework of psychological counseling for adults, were determined empirically.

Conclusions. The acts of transformations in the structure of the activity of an academic tutor fully correlate with the stages of tutoring humanistic counseling, and can be transfer to work with children, taking into account the specifics of each particular age and personal characteristics of the pupil. A general orientation of the activity on accompanying the individual training trajectory has been develop, which can become the basis for training mentor specialists and be used in the work of tutors.

Relevance. On the course of the history human development is attended by and is determined by development of sing and symbolic systems, cultural codes of different languages. Modern civilization dictates the necessity of active intercultural exchange.

Objective. Analyzing the problem of exploring the development of symbolic function being achieved as unity of affective (emotional, “personally experienced”) and cognitive (intellectual, “subjective and knowledgeable”).

Methods. Theoretical analysis of cultural typology presented by B.S. Bibler; structural and content analysis of the world image as a generalized construction of the social realm representativity in the human mind; objective and analytical approach to studying artifacts as social interaction mediated results.

Results. We substantiated the symbolic function as an individual mechanism implemented in culturally determined representation systems necessary for the emergence of interaction between individuals and for learning social implications. Studying the symbolic function presupposes analyzing those cultures where sign and symbolic means are created. Sign and symbolic means as cultural codes mediate human development and, at the same time, determine it. Signs and their systems being used in practical activity record achievements of human experience and allow creation of “cultural artifacts”.

Conclusions. The image of the world is represented in the culture, and cultural types indicate different images of the world in people belonging to those cultures. The structure of artifacts implements the function of the world image: representation of the structure, its logical links, and a set of tools for mediation in their symbolic role as well as the possible form of experiencing. Symbolic function is actively developed while learning. The content of polycultureeducation is focused learning of sign and symbolic systems’ principles creation and functioning. Instruments of activity themselves are considered as primary artifacts, and secondary artifacts are the rules of primary artifacts use.

Relevance.The growth of mental health disorders, psychological problems in modern society among different categories of the population, including representatives of different cultures and faiths and the lack of cultural development of specific approaches to understanding mental health and psychological well-being raise the problem of cultural conditionality of representations of mental health and psychological well-being in a number of important interdisciplinary problems, of high scientific and practical importance in such multinational and multicultural countries as Russia.

Objective.To examine the relationship between cultural context and mental health and psychological well-being.

Methods.Review and analysis of current research in the field of cultural conditioning of various aspects of mental health and psychological well-being.

18 March 2018. died Yuri M. Zhukov — the doctor of psychological Sciences, Professor of chair of social psychology of faculty of psychology of Moscow state University named after M. V. Lomonosov, honored Professor of Moscow state University, original-minded scientist, a bright and witty lecturer who generously shared their ideas and research Manager, a passionate teacher, creatively experimenting with teaching methods and development of students.

On January 28, 2018 Tatyana Gavrilovna Stefanenko, a sensitive teacher and outstanding researcher, our colleague, friend and mentor, head of the Department of social psychology of the faculty of psychology of Lomonosov Moscow state University (2006-2017), doctor of psychology, Professor, honored Professor of Moscow University (2009), passed away.

On January 6, 2018 Nina Fyodorovna Talyzina, academician of RAO, Professor of psychology of education and pedagogy Department of psychology of Moscow state University, doctor of psychology, Honored worker of science of the Russian Federation, Honored Professor of Lomonosov Moscow state University, died.

Review of the book S.G. Gellerstein “Methodology of Psychotechnics”

Relevance. The relevance of the work due to the lack of a special method that could to assess the ability of young athletes to represent movements in the Russian psychological tools.

Objective. The aim of the work is to test the method “Movement imagery Questionnaire for Children”, which is developed by Canadian researchers (R. Martini and colleagues), on Russian athletes.

Method. The analysis of studies that demonstrate the importance of using mental images in the training process was described. Empirical study of the mental representation of movements in 112 Russian young athletes from age 7 to 12 years with the help of a pre-adapted technique MIQ-C was conducted.

Results. The main types of mental images that are most often used by young athletes have been revealed: first-person visualization, third-person visualization and visualization of muscle performance. The last one (kinesthetic) is the most difficult for children. The highest rates of use of all three methods were noted in children 9-10 years. In the process of the work it was compared the results obtained for the Russian sample, with the results of Canadian researchers. It was revealed that Russian athletes assess their capabilities for visualization higher than young athletes in Canada.

Conclusions. It is necessary to expand a sample, having picked up athletes of those sports which are not presented at this stage of work, and to carry out check of validity of the Russian version of this method on the expanded sample.

Relevance. The study is devoted to the problem of family relations in adolescence. This problems seems to become very actual in recent times because of significant changes in family relations concerned with adolescents.

Objective. The hypothesis of different levels of awareness (explicit and implicit) representation of family situation in adolescence in connection with the emotional tone of relationships between family members has been tested in this research. We also propose that this fact s related with the follows parameters: adolescent gender and family unity.

Methods. 45 adolescents (22 girls and 23 boys) age of 13-14 took part in the research: 8 of them are from single-parent families (father missing), 37 – from completed families. The following methods were used: Family image test, Color Test of Relations and the questionnaire of parent’s behavior and attitudes of adolescents by E. Shafer).

Results. Results It was demonstrated that in explicit level adolescents evaluate their family situation more positively than in implicit level. Adolescents of different sex differently evaluate the degree of solidarity and emotional relationships in their families: girls consider their families more joined than boys. Both girls and boys perceive their mother and father more positively in explicit level (questionnaire) than in implicit level. Generally, girls and boys realize the estimations of family situation concerned with cohesion and emotional relationships differently. As a hole adolescents implicitly perceive their mother as more positive and important than the father.

The content of the paper refers to the field of interdisciplinary scientific research, lying at the intersection of information theory and cognitive psychology.

Relevance. In conditions of rapid development of communication between people through computers, the transfer and adequate reception of the meaning of an information message are of great importance.

Purpose. Theoretical substantiation and development of the probabilistic approach to the evaluation of the meaning of purposeful human activity on the example of a text.

Methods. Theoretical analysis of probabilistic (V. Nalimov) and activity-related (D. Leontiev) approaches to the problem of meaning in psychology; method of calculating the amount of information developed by K. Shannon; author’s technique for assessing the meaning of a text message, based on a comparative analysis of the source text with its probabilistic representation by random permutation of words.

Results.The justification of the probabilistic nature of sense is given; a psychometric criterion is proposed for quantifying the meaning of purposeful conscious human activity in the form of differential entropy of the exponential distribution of the Shannon entropy difference between two adjacent words in the text; a technique for probabilistic evaluation of the meaning of purposeful conscious human activity taking text as an example is proposed.

The analysis of more than 50 texts - information messages from the Internet, differing in the level of meaningfulness and reflecting various emotional experiences of the authors - showed: a) the greatest meaningfulness is in texts written by authors under the influence of strong emotions; b) texts the style of presentation of which is typical for authors in the state of neutral emotions occupy an intermediate position in terms of meaningfulness; c) the least meaning is in texts written by those who experience some disorder of thinking.

Conclusions. The results confirm the main hypothesis of the study that the meaning is encoded in a chain of semantic connections of purposeful conscious human activity and has a probabilistic nature. The materials of the paper can be of practical and theoretical interest for psychologists dealing with issues of meaning, linguists and developers of artificial intelligence.

Relevance. The study of adaptive brain reorganizations during normal human aging is relevant both in the social aspect and in the scientific aspect. It contributes to the development of theoretical ideas about brain providing cognitive processes.

Objective. The aim of the work is to study the mechanisms of changing the volume of visual attention during normal aging using the technology of eye-tracking.

Methods. 30 healthy subjects aged 19-30 years (11 people, younger group) and 50-81 years (19 people, older group) performed an original technique assumed the memorization of triplets of images, their recall and recognition in a series of similar, identical and new images. The memorization was accompanied by the recording of subjects’ eye movements.

Results.In the older group the narrowing of volume of visual attention was obtained. For a 10-second exposure of stimuli in the older group, only the visual information associated with central stimulus was accurately remembered. Results of the older group showed a significant predominance of recall and recognition errors of stimuli over the number of those in the younger group. The differences between the two groups were not found only for the situation of recognition of the central stimulus. In the young group there was a tendency to an asymmetric appearance of errors in relation to the left and the right triplet stimuli. The right stimuli were worse reproduced verbally, and the left ones were less well recognized. In the older group the asymmetry in the recognition and reproduction of stimuli was not detected.

Conclusions. An eye tracking data objectified the distribution of visual attention and allowed to explain the results of the subsequent reproduction and recognition of images.

Relevance. P300-based brain-computer interface (P300 BCI) enables a user to choose commands by consciously attending to certain visual stimulus. However, P300 BCI-based systems for detection of covert focuses of human interest, including emotional stimuli, can be built and applied in systems for monitoring human’s normal and pathological state.

Objective. The objective was to investigate the properties of perception of stimuli with different subjective emotional significance for the person and to evaluate the possibility of P300 BCI-based detection of covert emotional focuses of attention.

Methods. 14 healthy subjects participated in the EEG-study with consequent presenting of visual stimuli with emotional or neutral human faces photos. In the first block the participants’ task was just to look at the screen with appearing stimuli (passive attention) while one of six stimuli in each trial was emotional. In the other two blocks the task was to silently count the number of the target stimulus presentations among non-target stimuli (active attention) with emotional or neutral target stimulus depending on the block. We analyzed the event-related potentials (ERP) for stimuli of different classes and the classifica-tion accuracy for target (or emotional) stimulus in P300 BCI-similar fashion.

Results. In this study we showed that the accuracy of presented in passive viewing paradigm emotional stimuli recognition exceeded the random level more than twice. Also we found characteristic features of the potentials in response to stimuli with various significance.

Conclusions. The obtained results create opportunities for developing the clinically applicable P300 BCI-based systems for detection of covert attentional focuses.

Full list of the articles, published in Moscow University Psychology Bulletin. Series 14.Psychology, 2017

The article analyzes various factors of life satisfaction of people of elderly and senile age. At the theoretical level, the assumption is that the integrating condition of satisfaction with life at this age is the central life idea (purpose, meaning). A generalized model of life satisfaction, based on the coordinates determining the common life idea (altruistic or egoistic) and the position of personality activity (creative or passive) is proposed. In the psychological space formed by these coordinates, one can identify the aspirations of the person himself (his “I want”), his real capabilities (“I can”), as well as expectations on the part of people relevant to him both in relation to “I want” and in relation to “I can”. The model allows reflecting the contradictions between the “I want” and “I can” of this person, as well as the contradictions between his intentions, self-esteem and expectations on the part of people relevant to him. When different elements of satisfaction do not coincide, problems arise and crises in the development of the elderly and old man. More concrete models of self-determination at the considered age in relation to their past, to the real present and prospective future are presented. The models of life satisfaction are proposed for further analysis: a creative model (search for new goals and opportunities for development), a model of “right” life (passive realization of the stereotypes of a pensioner's life), a “paternalistic” model (caring for others), a model of “ignoring” old age, the model of protection of their rights (in the conditions of imperfection of pension systems), the models of struggle for survival (in the conditions of sharp deterioration of health), the model of preparation for death, the model of self-assertion and the model of comprehension of the lived. Promising hypotheses of further research are formulated, reflecting possible options for complementarity and conflict of different models.

Study objectives: to examine the severity of the personal social psychological attitudes of an individual in the need-motivational sphere, the Dark Triad traits, and the components of burnout, as well as the interrelationships between these features among physicians with different lengths of professional experience. 

Participants: 124 people between the ages of 20 and 62; 4 groups of respondents, differing in the length of their professional experience (student, less than 10 years, 11-20 years and over 20 years of work experience).

Materials: O.F. Potemkina’s “Social psychological attitudes in the need-motivational sphere of the person diagnostics test”, “The Dark Triad inventory” adapted by M.S. Egorova and M.A. Sitnikova and the “Maslach Burnout Inventory” adapted by N.E. Vodopyanova. 

Methods of data analysis: Cronbach’s alpha, descriptive statistics, crosstabulation (chi-squared test), one-way analysis of variance (with Tukey post-hoc test), one-sample Student t-test, Spearman’s correlation, comparison of correlations using Fisher’s z-transformation. 

Results: The altruistic attitude of practicing doctors is higher than that of students, but does not depend on the length of experience. A greater intention towards work is observed for participants with the medical work experience over 10 years. There is no established connection between work experience and the intensity of burnout in the respondents. Physicians with the average experience expressed weaker non-clinical narcissism and a psychopathy than students. The structure of the interrelationships between social psychological attitudes, the Dark Triad traits, and the components of burnout has specificity on the samples with various lengths of professional experience. We suggest interpretations for differences found in the severity and patterns of the connections between the indicators; they are summarized in the psychological portrait of a physician with a certain amount of experience.

A multicomponent model of multiculturalism by the Canadian cross-cultural psychologist John W. Berry is one of the most famous approaches designed to ensure the harmonization of intercultural relations in a plural society. Today including in Russia an applicability of this model has been widely investigating. However, in the light of social cognition, the model does not clearly define relations between the multicultural ideology and various principles of intergroup categorization; the existing empirical findings within the framework of the Berry’s model and within social cognition still to some extent consider intergroup relations somewhat isolated from each other. In this present exploratory study was examined the relationships between interethnic categorization (assimilation, colorblind, multicultural, polycultural) and multicultural ideology by Berry. A survey of ethnic Russians from the Central Federal District of Russia was conducted. The results showed that the multicultural ideology was positively associated with the colorblind, multicultural, and polycultural categorization and also negatively with the assimilation one. Although the colorblind categorization that purportedly rejects cultural diversity was positively associated with the multicultural ideology, this relation had small effect size. The findings of the study suggested that an acceptance and endorsement of cultural diversity and egalitarianism in Russia that according to Berry is a content core of the concept multiculturalism can be realized through polycultural, multicultural, and to a lesser extent through colorblind categorization.

Ideas of the school students having experience of participation in the educational project and research activity (PRA) about educational researches and projects are considered that is relevant due to the need of formation, since high school, experts of research type. 

Objective: to reveal the attitude of school students towards various aspects of project and research activity. 

Methods: “Unfinished sentences”; questioning on the questions connected with participation in PRA; nonverbal method “Emoticons”. Sample included 84 school students of the fifth, sixth, eighth and ninth grades. 

Results: The unfinished sentences method identified seven categories of definitions that school students give to educational researches and projects. Questioning has shown that school students prefer voluntary participation in educational project and research activity; concerning preference of educational researches or projects there are differences in verbal and nonverbal answers, however in ninth grade both methods found that students preferred educational researches to projects; the readiness for implementation of educational projects on all studied subjects from a third to a half of school students has been estimated by low points; the desire in future professional activity to carry out projects and researches has been estimated, mainly, by average points. 

Conclusions: The revealed general tendency reflects the positive attitude towards the above-named educational technology; however, there are both significant individual differences, and the differences between grades in ideas of school students of project and research activity and the attitude towards it demanding profound studying for the purpose of further improvement of this educational technology.