The International Journal of Indian Psychology

4

Authors: Aggarwal Sapna

Whenever we think of handwriting assessment all that comes to mind is the non-empirical method of Handwriting Analysis or Graphology. We have never seriously considered handwriting as an independent entity. In this article I have tried presenting few aspects with which we can try and understand handwriting i.e. psychological, biomechanical and growth & developmental. From decades researchers have tried establishing empirical grounds for Graphology. But its time we accept that graphology has no scientific basis and is a pseudoscience which claims to assess things that even the scientific world is hesitant to affirm.

6

Authors: Anusha Ramji

Music has been used therapeutically for centuries, but only recently in treatment of mental health issues. Music therapy is defined by Bruscia as a “systematic process of intervention wherein the therapist helps the client to promote health, using music experiences and relationships that develop through them.” Music Therapy varies cross culturally. In India it is mainly used in connection to religion through chanting and faith healing. It hasn’t yet been considered at a broader scope such as in Neurologic Music Therapy or Psychoanalytic Music Therapy which are used in other countries. In this review, we consider the efficacy of music therapy in the Indian Context in relation to treatment of psychiatric disorders, especially as psychotherapy is still not widely accepted by the Indian Subcontinent. It is also not effective in all cases.

7

Authors: Moghadam, Safoura, Niknejadi, Farzaneh, Irvani, Mohammad-Reza

Overweight and obesity make physical and psychological complications for people. In this regard, Low self-esteem will be the most important psychological condition. This study investigates the effect of diet therapy of women (reduction in body mass) on reducing their overall self-esteem. The population of the study was the women who were referred to diet therapy clinic in Isfahan (2014). The number of 30 subjects among them was selected. In order to measure women's self-esteem, Cooper Smith Self-Esteem Test is used for demographic data, a self-measured questionnaire was used. Analysis of the data in the study was descriptive and inferential statistics. The results show that there is a significant difference between the self-esteem of women in four steps that indicate an effective diet therapy (reduction of body mass) on reducing self-esteem of women between the four stages It means that it leads to low self-esteem in women's diet therapy (0.05> P).

7

Authors: Pallavi Gaur, Dr Aradhana Balodi Bhardwaj

Introduction: Marital adjustment is gaining increasing concern in the modern society. Marital adjustment is a process during which partners in a marriage change and adapt to their new roles accompanying each other acting as a team different to two separate units. Levels of empathy and levels of forgiveness could be factors in determining a relationship with marital adjustment. Marital adjustment is an important predictor and factors like empathy and forgiveness that enhance the marital quality and marital satisfaction in a marriage can be studied as mediators of marital adjustment. High levels of empathy will have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. High levels of forgiveness will have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. Focusing on forgiveness and empathy as having a positive relationship with marital adjustment, it can be said the ability to forgive a partner and the willingness to grant forgiveness is on of the most important contributors to marital adjustment. Empathy between couples means having the ability to feel and understand the thoughts and emotions of the other partner. Having the ability to listen to and relating to the partner’s feelings is very important and this has a great impact on how the relationship works thereby affecting the levels of adjustment. Methods: The current study aimed at studying the relationship between empathy, forgiveness and marital adjustment in couples. The study was conducted on 80 married individuals, i.e, 40 married males and40 married females. It was hypothesized that higher levels of forgiveness would have a positive relationship with marital adjustment; higher levels of empathy would have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. It was also hypothesized that there would be significant gender differences in regard of forgiveness and empathy between couples. Results & Implications: The study reported that higher levels of empathy have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. On the dimensions of forgiveness also the study reported a positive relationship between forgiveness and marital adjustment. There were significant gender differences between males and females on the domains of empathy and forgiveness in a marital relationship. The study provides an opportunity for further research across age and gender to uncover the possible differences or similarities that may be present. Also it adds to the already existing data pool with equivocal studies.

8

Authors: Dr. Neena Sawhney, Dr. Sneh Bansal

Metacognition is an individual’s knowledge of their own cognitive processes and their ability to control these processes by organizing, monitoring and modifying them as a function of learning. Students who succeed academically often rely on being able to think effectively and independently in order to take charge of their learning. These students have mastered fundamental but crucial skills such as keeping their workspace organized, completing tasks on schedule, making a plan for learning, monitoring their learning path, and recognizing when it might be useful to change course. Learning cognitive and metacognitive strategies offers students the tools to "drive their brains." Being metacognitive can be likened to being more conscious, reflective, and aware of one's progress along the learning path. The present study was undertaken to find out the relationship between metacognitive awareness and academic achievement of undergraduate students. The sample of the study comprised of 100 undergraduate students from various colleges of Chandigarh. Metacognitive Awareness Inventory (MAI) by Schraw & Dennison (1994) was used to measure the metacognitive awareness. The findings revealed a significant difference in academic achievement of undergraduate students with high and low scores in metacognitive awareness.

9

Authors: Gautami Kapila, Dr Arun Kumar

Aim: The purpose of the study was to identify the level of Life Satisfaction and Resilience among the divorced women in India. Method: This study aims to identify the relationship between Life satisfaction and resilience. Standardized questionnaires (LIFE SATISFACTION SCALE & CONNOR DAVIDSON RESILIENCE SCALE) were employed to measure Life satisfaction and Resilience, among 60 divorced women (Group1: women divorced for less than 5 years & Group 2: women divorced for more than 5 years), all aged between 30-50 years. The results were analysed using T-test and Pearson r. The score were tabulated. Results: The statistical analysis suggested a positive correlation between Life satisfaction and Resilience. The results also indicated that there is no significant difference between the level of life satisfaction and resilience among the Group 1 and Group 2.

9

Authors: T. Shantha Kumar

The present study is an attempt to find out whether Yoga Intervention has any effect on State and Trait Anxiety and also on the Subjective well-being. What we have tried to express in this paper includes the nature of anxiety, depression and perception separately and through that we have explained that anxiety can be considered an important component in perceptual process, though it has always been believed as a psychological and neurological problem.

11

Authors: Chanderkant Gorsy, Ritu Goyat, Madhu Anand

Emotions play an important role in the life of an individual and one requires a higher emotional intelligence to lead an effective life. We need to study the emotional aspects of school lecturer as they go on with their normal lives. The current study was planned to analyze the relationship between emotional intelligence and occupational stress. The sample consists of 102 school lecturer taken from government school. Further, the association of emotional intelligence with occupational stress of these school lecturers was analyzed. ‘Emotional intelligence scale’ was administered on the selected sample to assess emotional intelligence and occupational stress index’, was used for measuring various components of occupational stress of these school lecturers. . The results showed that (i) occupational stress has a significant negative correlation with emotional intelligence (ii) Political pressure and Role overload have significant negative correlation with emotional intelligence, (iii) Role ambiguity, role conflict, responsibility for person and under- participation doesn’t show any significant relation with emotional intelligence and (iv) Stepwise regression analysis revealed two predictors of emotional intelligence i.e. political pressure and role overload, jointly account for .115% of variance in emotional intelligence.

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Authors: Mounica. Bollu, Shaik Faizan Ali, Dr. Desu Brahma Srinivasa Rao, Nallani Venkataramarao, Dr. Nalluri. Murali Krishna M.D

Context: Medication non-compliance is an important area of concern in schizophrenia as it contributes to relapse and re-hospitalization of the patients. Constant advancement and study of therapeutic interventions designed to improve medication adherence and the outcome of dose titrations are required to reap the most valuable benefits from the pharmacologic treatment of schizophrenia. Aim & Objective: The aim of the present study is to find out the reasons for drug non-compliance and the effectiveness of treatment outcomes after dose titrations in schizophrenic patients and the main objective is to educate the patient by counseling about the disease, drugs and the importance of medication adherence. Materials and Methods: This study was conducted over a period of six months. All male and female subjects of age group 30-40 receiving anti-psychotic medications for a minimum of 1 year before the study starts and who were noncompliant to the prescribed medications were included. Results: Females were prominent in the non-adherent group and males were found to be higher in Group-B. Most of the schizophrenic patients were suffering with paranoid schizophrenia, living in the urban environment and running their nuclear families. Majority of the Subjects in the non-adherent group were illiterates and unemployed, where as in the dose titration group many have completed their primary education and were employed. Compared to first generation antipsychotics, second generation antipsychotic drugs were most commonly prescribed. Almost 56.07% do not have the support from their families. The main reasons stated by the patients to be noncompliant were difficulty in access to treatment, financial obstacles, forgetfulness. Dose titrations were made at an interval of 1 month for four antipsychotics (haloperidol, chlorpromazine, olanzapine and risperidone) and patients were benefited by the titration which was observed through the PANSS scores at each visit. Conclusion: Findings suggest that there is a need for identification and reduction of factors responsible for noncompliance. Strategies to improve adherence have the potential to reduce these costs. Dose titration shows beneficial effect to improve patient quality of life. Hence they should be implemented in clinical practice depending upon the individual patient.