Psychological Thought

1-2

Authors: Paraskevi Theofilou

This article has been retracted due to violating Good Publication Practice and not complying to PSYCT's/PsychOpen's Ethical Guidelines on plagiarism and redundant or concurrent Publication. No abstract available.

27-40

Authors: Ivan Krastev

This paper deals with some social and economic factors influencing on customer’s behaviour – such as social class, social-economic status, occupation, education, income, referent groups, family, gender roles and marketing. Some comparisons are made between some factors influencing on customer’s behaviour in the U.S. and in Bulgaria.

53-61

Authors: Irina Roncaglia

The aim of this paper is to present a theoretical and practical understanding of transitions in young people with an Autistic Spectrum Condition (ASC) and to discuss ways in which support can be provided at different stages of their lives. It aims to propose and highlight some practical initiatives which can be adopted in the preparation of micro and macro transitions thus ensuring an understanding of the criteria behind such practices which can further support practitioners in the long-term aim of positive and empowering outcomes. Ashforth (2001, Role transitions in organizational life: An identity based perspective. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Earlbaum Associate) proposes four motives: identity, meaning, control and belonging, which are discussed in the context of role-transitions. These transitions can often require an adjustment in an individual’s behaviour and relationships with their environment as well as people around them. Transitions occur throughout our lives and these key times can cause high levels of disorientation and anxiety more so in people with ASC. The impact of a range of transitions is also discussed and suggestions of ways in which individuals with ASC can be supported are also presented through examples of key resources which can be tailored to each individual’s needs.

75-89

Authors: Chinedum Amadi

Carl Rogers has become a legendary personage in the mental health field. Rogers (1957) “has been cited in the literature over a thousand times, in professional writings originating in 36 countries” (Goldfried, 2007, p.249). Clinicians in the behavioral health field (psychiatry, social work, counseling and psychology) are exposed to his teachings about human behavior. Of all the ideas propagated by Rogers, the concept of unconditional positive regard (UPR) has been elevated to the level of a doctrine (Schmitt, 1980). What then is unconditional positive regard? How can clinicians be faithful to the demands of unconditional positive regard in the face of other competing realities such as threat of suicide or terrorism? This paper seeks to discuss the impossible nature of Rogers' UPR, highlighting its inherent linguistic contradiction. Since psychotherapy is culturally normative, the doctrine of unconditional positive regard negates this fundamental principle. In this article, the author takes a critical look at the influence of American philosophy of education on Rogers--he was a product of his culture. Furthermore, this paper asserts that clinicians are guided by societal norms or 'conditions' which regulate clinical practice, including unconditional positive regard (Gone, 2011).

97-116

Authors: Zornitza Ganeva

Comparative analysis of the current status, own body perception and positive experience within a period of up to 1 year from diagnosing of women with breast cancer (N = 41; mean age 35.25) in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd stages of the disease progress, of Bulgarian origin, was made. Reliability and validity of the scales were described. They were analysed with respect to: 1) medical characteristics (partial or total surgery, surgical removal of lymph nodes, presence or absence of metastases in them), 2) classical therapies (chemotherapy, radiation therapy and hormonal therapy) administered or not and 3) application or not of alternative therapies (herbal medicine, physical load, administration of massage, lymph drainage, use of nutritional supplements, observance of diet). The results showed that the more therapies the persons surveyed were undergone the more unsatisfactory they assessed their current general status. The bigger the size of the surgery performed to remove the tumour the more positive idea of their own bodies they had. The more time after the surgical treatment passed the more the positive experience accumulated from the oncologic diagnosis grew.

124-139

Authors: Olukayode A. Afolabi

Due to dearth of research on prosocial behavior (PSB) among undergraduates in Nigeria, this study investigated the influence of five –factor personality factors (FFP), emotional intelligence (EI) and gender differences on prosocial behavior (PSB) among undergraduates in Nigeria. Cross-sectional survey design was adopted to tap information from 200 randomly selected undergraduates. They responded to a carefully designed questionnaire with 4 sections. Five hypotheses were tested. The results showed that there were significant relationships between the variables of study. The first step in the hierarchical regression showed that the independent and joint contributions of age, gender, religion and educational level on PSB were not significant. The second step which involved the FFP did not have significant independent and joint contribution on PSB except for conscientiousness [R2 = .34, t = 7.08; p < .01]. In the third step EI also had no significant contribution but the overall joint contribution (with other variables) to PSB increased to 35.3%. However, high EI increased PSB [t(198) = 12.36; p < .01] but gender did not have significant effect on PSB. The findings were discussed based on the existing literature and important recommendations were made.

153-165

Authors: Bolanle Ogungbamila

Studies on occupational burnout among health workers, especially in Nigeria have been at best isolated. No adequate inter-occupational comparative study on burnout among health workers, police personnel, and teachers has been conducted. This study, therefore, investigated the extent to which health workers were different from police personnel, and teachers in the manifestations of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, reduced personal accomplishment, and overall occupational burnout. Participants were 455 employees (203 males; 252 females) sampled from 3 service occupations (police = 139; health = 159; teaching = 157), whose ages averaged 35.94 years (SD = 7.93). Health workers reported higher levels of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and overall occupational burnout than either police personnel or teachers. Although health workers reported a higher level of reduced personal accomplishment than police personnel, results indicated that teachers felt as underachieving as health workers. The findings were discussed in terms of the perceived imbalance in the job demands-rewards ratio in the job situations.

81-82

Authors: Vasil Madolev

Psychological Thought should create conditions for stimulating development of psychological science. Parallel to this organizing role, the journal should co-operate for the propaganda of the achievements of psychology. Psychological Thought should reveal the defensive, integrating and controlling nature of Self; it should point out the process of transformation of human being into a cognitive personality; it should contest the prejudices and it should present the mechanisms for their surmounting; it should support the eclectic approach and every method for finding the truth about human life.

99-105

Authors: John H. Morgan

Geriatric Logotherapy is an analytical approach designed to address issues uniquely confronted in the counseling encounter with the elderly and is an adaptation of the psychotherapeutic school of thought known as Logotherapy. Logotherapy is a type of psychotherapeutic analysis and treatment which focuses on a will to meaning, founded upon the belief that striving to find meaning in one's life is the primary, most powerful motivating and driving force within the human experience. Sometimes called existential analysis, logotherapy grew out of the psychiatric research and personal experience of Viktor Frankl, M.D., based on his internment experience in Germany. Known as the Third Viennese School of Psychotherapy (Freud and Adler being the founders of the First and Second Schools), logotherapy as a school of thought emphasizes existential reflection rather than psychoanalytic repression, focusing upon the concept and centrality of “meaning” in one’s life rather than Freud’s “pleasure principle” and Adler’s “will to power.” This article explores, then, the application of this school of psychotherapeutic theory and practice to the psychological care and treatment of the elderly, emphasizing the “existential efficacy of the good memory” as an analytical tool for emotional nurture with emphasis upon “immediacy” rather than “longevity” of care and treatment.

113-123

Authors: Marius Drugaş

The investigation of the unemployment consequences is a challenging theme in current psychological research. The recent controversy on the nature of general causality orientations (GCO’s) as personality traits stood as a reason for this study. Considering that prolonged unemployment is a significant life event, we investigated the stability in time (as a condition for a personality trait) of GCO’s for a sample of unemployed and we compared the results to those obtained from a sample of employed individuals. The first measure took place in April 2007, the second in September 2007 and the third in November 2011. The results indicated a higher level of control orientation for the unemployed in T3 and a significant positive growth of impersonal orientation for the same sample. Among the research limits were the poor data collection about the reasons of unemployment, family structure, job search behaviors and economic status.

141-149

Authors: Ira Das, Himani Anand

The research was conducted with the purpose to study the effect of prayer and meditation on galvanic skin response (GSR). It was hypothesized that there was a significant positive effect of prayer and meditation (Om chanting) on galvanic skin response (GSR). The sample consisted of 20 normal, healthy female participants through purposive sampling. The age group of the sample was 18 to 24 years (Mean= 18.7, SD= 1.55). Gender was female and minimum education was graduation. The daily practice time of prayer and meditation session was 30 minutes for one month. Pre- Post data were recorded before and after intervention of prayer and meditation session by using single group pre-post research design. Recordings of galvanic skin response (GSR) were made on a computerized polygraph (Model Physiopac, PP 4, Medicaid Systems, Chandigarh, India) test. The results revealed a significant increase in GSR values as an effect of prayer and meditation which suggested the psychophysiological relaxation. Practicing prayer and meditation increases the galvanic skin response and hence decreases the stress level of the individual.

166-185

Authors: Zornitza Ganeva

Ethnic stereotypes and prejudices as terms were examined and a historical review of their development (Duckitt, 1992) was made. The results from a survey of prejudices of young people of Bulgarian origin (n=942; 347 men and 595 women; average age 21.3 years) towards the in-group and the representatives of the main ethnic minorities: Turks, Roma and Jews, carried out in 5 time intervals: 2004, 2006, 2008, 2010 and 2012, were presented. Through free associations, the relation between stereotypes and attitudes was studied in two social contexts: personal and community. The results showed that the assessment of the minority groups was more positive in the former than in the latter context. The persons studied perceived most negatively the representatives of the Romani ethnos, more weakly negatively the Turks, and the attitudes towards the Jews were positive.

195-212

Authors: Nikolay Ivantchev, Kremena Markova

An experiment on conformity was carried out. The participants were 95 youths. The scale “Conformity – Autonomy” from I. Karagiozov’s questionnaire for locus of control (1998) was also used. The results indicated the prevalence of youth conformity regarding institutions and media. The different types of conformity were related to each other. The subjects’ gender and the experimentators’ gender mediated the connections between the both types of conformity. The female youths conformed more with institutions than the male youths, but there were not any significant gender differences in their conform behavior regarding media (magazines). More male youths conformed for the magazines when the experimentator was a woman. More female youths conformed for the magazines when the experimentator was a man.

1

Authors: Stanislava Stoyanova

The history and the mission of Psychological Thought are presented. The scientific journal “Psychological Thought” started its existence as an idea of the colleagues at the Department of Psychology at South-West University “Neofit Rilski” in 2006. Seven print issues were published from 2006 to 2009 (2 issues per year). Each issue included average ten articles published in Bulgarian or in English.

22-32

Authors: Desislava Ivanova

This paper presents the specificity of the codependent behaviour, some models of therapeutical effect, their scientific validity and practical effectiveness. The focus is on the possibilities of motivational interviewing - one comparatively new therapy in the area of dependent behaviours with specific techniques, which are directed towards the act and the mobilization of the inner values and goals of the codependents, their resources for stimulating changes in behaviour and forming more effective coping strategies.

47-59

Authors: Gergana Stanoeva, Stanislava Stoyanova

This paper deal with an important issue related to the human attitudes and needs in interpersonal and professional aspects. The theoretical part deals with several psychological components of the self-esteem and esteem of the others – acceptance of the others, feeling of being accepted, need for approval. Some gender differences in manifestations of acceptance and feeling of being accepted at the workplace are discussed. This article presents some empirical data for the degree of acceptance of others, feeling of being accepted, and the strive for being accepted among the representatives of helping, pedagogical, administrative and economic occupations, as well as non-qualified workers. The goals of the study were to reveal the interdependency between these constructs and to be found some significant differences between the representatives of the four groups of occupations. The methods of the first study were W. Fey’s scales “Acceptance of others”, and “How do I feel accepted by others”. The method of the second study was Crown and Marlowe Scale for Social Desirability. The results indicated some significant differences in acceptance of others and feeling of being accepted between the non-qualified workers and the representatives of helping, administrative and economic occupations. There were not any significant difference in strive for being accepted between the four occupational groups.

69-74

Authors: Teodor Gergov, Ivanka Asenova

Ageism is one of the global problems of contemporary world. This article is an attempt to look at it from a point of view of mentality. A few of the main manifestations of ageism including prejudice and openly demonstrated discrimination against seniors are discussed. On the basis of a survey, some conclusions are made about the negative consequences from ageism for the mentality of older people. The survey was conducted among 27 people between the ages of 20 - 35 and 36 people between the ages of 65 - 80 (mean age of 73.5 years).

78-80

Authors: Stanislava Stoyanova

The books by M. Alvesson and J. Salmons deal with some different kinds of methodologies: qualitative (case study, grounded theory, phenomenology, and multiple qualitative methodologies), quantitative (experimental and quasi-experimental), and mixed methods. The trends in and the future of interview research, qualitative and mixed research methods are discussed.