No 4 (2018)

The paper proves the necessity to draw closer attention to the use of learning information technologies. The authors clear up the model of blended learning that supposes the use of the distributed information educational resources with the application of the elements of distance technologies.

The authors formulated as well the educational conditions for the efficiency improvement of the educational process of the students of technical bachelor’s degree programs within the blended learning based on the combination of the intramural studies and the application of the distance learning technologies: the necessity of continuous renewal of the discipline content and the relevant assessment means; the individualization of the students’ activity in the sphere of selection of learning trajectory, the method and rate of work; the intensification of learning interaction both between a student and a teacher and between the students during the intramural studies and within the e-learning environment, wherein the group communication is implemented through a forum, wiki-page or chat, and the individual communication – through the file exchange. The authors offer a certain sequence of the blended learning phases.

It is determined that blended learning intensifies the learning interaction both between a student and a teacher and between the students; cognitive activity becomes more interesting, emotionally and personally significant what eventually facilitates the formation of a viable specialist.

The authors conclude that the educational process becomes more adapted to the students’ individual characteristics; the time is used in the class more efficiently; the students’ motivation improves; the students have more opportunities to manifest their self-consistency and creativity.

The work experience generalized in the paper is aimed at the development of practical recommendations for further improvement of the technique of training of the students of technical bachelor’s degree programs. 

At the age of formation of the information-driven society, an individual should be educated in the sphere of information. The recent studies define the scientific notions characterizing a person educated in the information sphere: information culture, information literacy, information competency, computer literacy, media literacy, etc. It is obvious, that the notions under consideration are related to each other while often understood in different ways.

The paper analyzes the current publications for the interrelation of the notions in the sphere of information education and identifies similar and different opinions of the modern researchers on this issue.

The theoretical study allowed roughly dividing the publications into two groups. The first group involves the publications studying the interrelation of such concepts as “the information culture”, “the information competence”, and “the information literacy”. There are some publications reflecting the interrelation of two concepts of three. It is identified that the chain of the interrelation for the concept narrowing is formed mostly in the following way: information culture => information competence => information literacy. The paper shows examples of other opinions.     

The second group involves the publications reflecting the interrelation of the information literacy and media literacy. It is shown that the lack of agreement in the definition of the interrelation of these concepts can be observed. The concept of “information literacy” is mostly considered as the wider one than “media literacy”, or these concepts are considered in MIL formulation (media and information literacy).

The lack of agreement in the definition of the interrelation of the concepts is still observed. There are no publications covering the interrelation of four and more concepts.

The paper analyzes the model of a woman’s body image and the results of the empirical study of a body image in the early adulthood period. The proposed model includes the spatial component (body boundaries, unconscious and perceptual body image, body scheme); the information-evaluation component (the individual’s visions of own body, its dimensions, forms, a conscious assessment of the spatial and dynamic characteristics of a body, the appearance, the mismatch of the image with the external and internal standards; the reflected image of a body, the representation of intra- and proprioceptive sensations in the consciousness); the energy component (all emotions caused by a body – joy, pleasure, anxiety, dissatisfaction and fears) and the temporary component (the individual history, the unfolding of changes associated with the process of growing up, maturity and then aging). The empirical study demonstrates that although the image of the young women body is quite positive in comparison with the other age periods but at the same time contains a number of contradictions and is largely based on the conflicting sociocultural standards. Among the identified factors determining the body image of a woman during early adulthood, special attention is paid to the sexual experience and feedback from a loving partner and parents. The study proves the influence of feedback from a father but not from a mother on the concern about the weight and body shapes during the early adulthood. The paper gives the typology of a body image of women during the early adulthood period: women with the ambivalent body image with the high body mass index (BMI), women with the ambivalent body image with the low BMI and woman with the positive body image are identified.

The paper discusses the structure of parental competence. The analysis of the ideas of parental competence in the Russian sources allowed identifying its main components: the emotional acceptance and respect of a child’s individuality; the consistency of specified requirements; the ability of a parent for reflection on a situation and for involvement of a child into this process; the organization of joint activity; the skill of creation of the conditions of confidence and psychological safety. The analysis of foreign sources showed that the parental competence is considered more often from the point of view of bioecological approach and is understood as the style of parenting promoting the best development of a personality in order to occupy the ecological niche in future.

The paper presents the results of the empirical study of parental competence towards the infants and preschool children carried out in the preschool institutions of Pskov and Pskov region. The study used both the famous parental attitude questionnaires and a specially developed questionnaire and the incomplete-sentence method. The authors described the components of parental competence identified during the factor analysis. It is shown that there is the specificity in the structure of parental competence depending on the age of children. The external social (family membership, number of children, age, education, status of parents, etc.), socio-economic and social-psychological factors (the lack of money, housing, the impact of street, Internet, school, broken matrimonial and parental roles) take the important place within the structure of competence of the infants’ parents.

Parental competence towards the preschool children characterizes by better formedness of psychological components. Parental competence supposes the ability to resolve personal conflicts and ability to teach that their child. The authoritarianism is presented as a component of parental competence towards the infants, and the authoritativeness – towards the preschool children.

Perfectionism, as one of the characteristics of an individual, expressed in the pursuit of perfection, is an additional risk factor in the development of emotional burnout of the higher school teachers. According to the survey, the majority of university teachers have a neutral or positive attitude to perfectionism, despite the ambiguous nature of this psychological phenomenon, while perfectionism is a characteristic of 30.61 % of respondents. Among the types of perfectionism of the higher school teachers, self-oriented perfectionism, other-oriented perfectionism, and socially prescribed perfectionism are noted. The paper analyzes the characteristics of emotional burnout of the university teachers according to the scales of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduction of professional achievements; identifies the current phases of anxiety, resistance, and exhaustion. To identify the relationships of perfectionism with the emotional burnout, the method of mathematical statistics – Spearman rank correlation coefficient r_s was used, which allowed establishing the significant correlations between the self-oriented perfectionism and the symptom of the anxiety stress phase – the experience of psycho-traumatic circumstances; between the other-oriented perfectionism and the symptoms of the resistance phase – inadequate selective emotional response, the expansion of the emotional thriftiness sphere; between the self-oriented perfectionism and the reduction of professional duties; between the socially prescribed perfectionism and the symptoms of the exhaustion phase – the emotional deficiency, emotional detachment; between the self-oriented perfectionism and the symptom of the exhaustion phase – personal detachment. The results show that perfectionism is one of the factors of the emotional burnout development among the higher school teachers and requires further study.

Despite the fact that the psychology of religion develops rapidly in Russia as well as abroad, there is no uniform psychological definition of a religiousness phenomenon. It is hindered as well due to the fact that the psychology of religion as a sphere of scientific knowledge is determined ambiguously. There are three main approaches influencing the creation of theoretical apparatus of the scientific study. The first approach considers the psychology of religion as a part of philosophy or religious studies, the second – as a theology sphere, and the third one, we follow in this paper, as one of the psychology branches.

To the authors’ opinion, the study of religiousness not as the characteristics of the individual psyche but as a social-psychological phenomenon is the most specific and complex. It is the social-psychological approach that provides insight into the formation of a religious person and his/her behavior in the context of social interaction, understanding of the religious circulation processes within a small religious group.

To conceptualize the religiousness as a social-psychological phenomenon, the authors carried out the theoretical analysis of the scientific theories of the religiousness. Both the psychological theories and the psychological aspects of this phenomenon description in the framework of philosophy and sociology were considered.

The results of the analysis showed that in the context of the social-psychological approach, the religiousness is the system of interrelations of a man with God and the society. The authors highlighted such social functions of the religiousness as the person’s socialization, person’s introduction to the social customs, attitudes, and traditions; the satisfaction of social needs of a person in play, communication and interaction; moral and hygienic functions providing the efficiency of survival of a person in the society; consolidation and regulation of a social group through the creation of the hierarchy. The religious circulation in such context can be considered as the socialization forming both the social identity of a believer and his or her self-consciousness in general.

Based on the obtained conclusions, the authors determined the religiousness as a social-psychological property of a person related to the construction of social interrelations mediated by the relations with the God or the higher force and being a result of the interiorization or acquiring of the social experience.

The paper presents the empirical study of the stereotypes’ content in the manager’s assessment of the success of the professional activity of the staff. The purpose of the study is to determine the peculiarities of the stereotypes’ content in the assessment of the professional activity of the staff by the manager of the service sphere. Using the “Semantic differential” method, the authors studied the peculiarities of stereotypes of the assessment of personnel activity by the manager. The paper describes the stereotypes, determined during the study, in the case of assessing personnel with the successful professional activity by modern managers. The peculiarities are observed in the following patterns: successful – it means “without the external distinctive features (piercing, tattoos, etc.)”, “taking care of one’s own health”, “open” and “with high experience”, “collectivist”.

The paper presents the results of the study on stereotypes in the managers’ assessments of personnel with the unsuccessful professional activity. The peculiarities of manager stereotypes when evaluating a staff member with the unsuccessful professional activity are the following: “with no work experience”, “unwilling to communicate”, “frequently ill”, as well as the employee’s “apathy”, “the presence of the external distinguishing features (piercing, tattoos, etc.)”. The employees with the varying degrees of the predominance of these features are often stereotypically considered by managers as the unsuccessful in their professional activity.

The paper presents the results of comparing the prevailing characteristics of stereotypes when evaluating the professional activity of personnel in the sphere of service. Their concordance in the most significant values in dichotomies: “The external distinctive features” – “Without external distinctive features”; “Apathetic” – “Active”; “Healthy” – “Sickly”; “Open” – “Unsocial”, “High experience” – “With no work experience” allows determining the main criteria that create the objective assessment of professional activity of the staff.

On the results of the study, the authors made the following conclusion: the assessment of professional activity of the staff in the sphere of service in terms of successfulness/success-failure is possible according to the following criteria: the external features, the activeness/apathy at the workplace, the employee’s health status, openness, and work experience.