The current preventive trends in clinical examination draw attention to the role of the external factors and stressful circumstances in psychodiagnostic research. Social frustration is an incapacity to fulfill relevant social needs because of a current situation. This term makes it possible to qualify criteria for the potential stress related to social functioning among family members, colleagues, and peers. The authors rationalized and tested a formalized questionnaire of Social Frustration Level developed at Bekhterev National Medical Research Centre for Psychiatry and Neurology in 2004 for patients with social adjustment disorders. The experiment justified the criterion validity of the Social Frustration Level Questionnaire. The article describes the structure of social frustration regarding the key spheres of activity attributed to internal and external frustration. The pilot study involved 45 patients with adjustment disorders, who showed significant frustration related to health problems and socio-economic status accompanied with relative satisfaction with interpersonal relations, i.e., family, friends, colleagues, and strangers. The research relied on the method of clinical psychological interview, as well as the Questionnaire of Social Frustration Level and the Integrative Anxiety Test. Personal anxiety and actual anxiety experiences proved to correlate with social frustration. The internal social frustration prevailed over the external one. The Questionnaire of Social Frustration Level proved to be an efficient practical tool to be used in systematic medical psychodiagnostics research, programs of disorder prevention, and psychotherapy.

Standard tools of attention diagnosis have seen only a few attempts of modernization. A theoretical and methodological analysis revealed data contradictions both in assignment and criteria. Digital versions of cognitive diagnostic material could be more objective due to modern hardware and software methods that register psychophysiological indicators. This research was an attempt to digitalize a standard letter variant of letter cancellation test. It involved a theoretical and methodological analysis of attention studies and diagnostic methods. The authors developed new stimulus material for digital attention tests and studied them using oculography. The research involved 90 people (33 men and 57 women) aged 16–70 y.o. The oculography revealed a set of oculomotor reactions that made it possible to describe the peculiarities of attention process and its stages, as well as to establish such a phenomenon as inattention blindness. The experiment also revealed some stable patterns in search strategies and oculomotor reactions that occurred during the testing. While searching for a target stimulus in a limited time, respondents usually employ two basic strategies: 1) they read elementary units of information to integrate them into a single image; 2) they stick to symbolic content with subsequent selective processing to select the target stimulus from the information flow. In this research, however, the participants also used additional strategies: 3) they completely ignored the target word; 4) they reduced the volume of the target stimulus (incomplete response) with its complete detection by oculomotor reactions; 5) they combined elements mechanically; 6) they turned to confabulation.

Modern psychology focuses on personal resources that help to overcome difficult circumstances accompanied by anxiety and stress. However, psychological diagnosis in this sphere remains understudied. The present research was an attempt to standardize a questionnaire of metacognitive regulation of human behavior in difficult circumstances. The study involved 559 participants from Tomsk (24.8% men, average age – 22.1). The exploratory factor analysis identified four factors (45.6% variance): self-control of behavior (six items, Cronbach’s alpha, α = 0.780; composite reliability = 0.863); anxiety control (four items, α = 0.823; composite reliability = 0.866); memory efficiency (three items, α = 0.817; composite reliability = 0.832); intuitive cognition of people (four items, α = 0.709; composite reliability = 0.757). Confirmation factor analysis showed high values of the model fitness indices: RMSEA = 0.044; SRMR = 0.059; CFI = 0.991; GFI = 0.986. The scales of the new questionnaire demonstrated the required external convergent validity and were found consistent with similar constructs. The study involved the following methods: D. V. Lyusin’s Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire; Subjective Risk Intelligence Scale developed by G. Craparo et al. and adapted by T. V. Kornilova and E. M. Pavlova, E. Yu. Mandrikova’s Activity Self-Organization Questionnaire, C. D. Spielberger’s Anxiety Test adapted by V. N. Karandashev, C. D. Spielberger’s Questionnaire of Personal Anxiety adapted by Yu. L. Khanin, and the Academic Motivation Scale developed by T. O. Gordeeva, O. A. Sychev, and E. N. Osin. The following scales demonstrated a good discriminative ability associated with statistically significant gender differences: self-control of behavior (p = 0.002); anxiety control (p < 0.001), and memory efficiency (p < 0.001). The questionnaire proved to be an efficient tool of studying human resources related to overcoming difficult circumstances.

The article introduces a new method for diagnosing the preferable cognitive resource strategy in university students. One’s personal experience of using cognitive resources defines the dominant strategies for solving sensorimotor tasks. Cognitive resource patterns can be described by using particular psychological indicators in order to select the optimal analysis method. The new method made it possible to model the situation of solving sensorimotor tasks and develop criteria for determining the strategies employed by university students to solve cognitive tasks in experimental conditions. The research involved 127 first-year students (18 y.o.) of Psychology, Tomsk State University. The strategies used by the students to solve sensorimotor tasks ranged from scarcity and heterogeneity to positive experience in cognitive resource application. Sensorimotor tasks proved to be an effective diagnostic marker of the cognitive development level during university education. The method also proved applicable as a cognitive simulator to develop optimal strategies in solving sensorimotor tasks of various levels of difficulty, as well as to reduce the existing deficiency in cognitive experience.

Metacognitive involvement in activities and critical thinking are the soft skills students require as a basic adaptation resource in information environment at university, in life, and at work. This research explored the correlation between metacognitive involvement and critical thinking which university students of technical specialties used to navigate information environment. The study involved 58 male and 12 female fourth-year students (21.26 ± 0.47 y.o.) of the Penza State University, Penza, Russia. The list of methods employed included scientific review, survey, testing, and Spearman’s correlation analysis. The survey involved the following questionnaires: Metacognitive Involvement in Activity (G. Schraw, R. Dennison, 1994; eight-factor version by E. I. Perikova, V. M. Byzova, 2022); Critical Thinking Test (J. Kincher, 1990); author’s own questionnaire of Students and Information Environment (N. N. Krylova, 2024). The correlation analysis revealed strong relationships between nine indicators of metacognitive involvement in activities and critical thinking (p ≤ 0.001 and p ≤ 0.01). The Structure of Error Correction factor of metacognitive involvement depended on such a parameter of information environment as the input intensity. The metacognitive involvement in activities correlated with the students’ assessment of mental and information load in the curriculum, e.g., the Metacognitive Knowledge factor correlated with the mental and information load in Physics and Mathematics while the Error Correction Structure factor was associated with the load assessment in technical disciplines. In addition, some individual parameters of information environment correlated with the students’ assessment of mental and information load. In this study, metacognitive involvement in activities correlated with critical thinking in university students as they interacted with information environment because these phenomena are not isolated psychologically from each other.

The article describes such systemic anthropological characteristics of thinking as multidimensionality, projectivity, inclusion in life relationships, transtemporality, and nonlinearity. On the one hand, these characteristics are inconvenient phenomenological "anomalies" for the classical psychology of thinking. On the other hand, in the context of progressive anthropologization of psychological cognition and interdisciplinary discourse, they make it possible to study thinking in a more holistic and human context, as well as to establish new conceptual links between the psychology of thinking and the psychology of human existence. Thinking is a multidimensional and nonlinear act that simultaneously unfolds in several registers of one’s mentality, capturing a variety of temporal, active, and noetic aspects of one’s being. The projective function of thinking consists in overcoming event uncertainty, building a semantic markup of living space, and producing semantic orientations in the activity and existential dimensions of the living environment. The fact that thinking is part of one’s life relationships ensures the integrity and transtemporal continuity of one’s life world. According to the polyphonic principle of mental dynamics, the dialectic unity of its spatial-temporal and modal correlations unfolds at each moment of thinking.

Language disorders are criteria of psychopathology diagnostics listed both in the 10th revision of International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD-10) and the Diagnostic and Statistic Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). However, structure and grammar remain understudied in this aspect, which makes structural analysis a relevant research topic. A structural analysis of written narrative may objectivize particular language disorders, thus facilitating psychodiagnostics of different mental disorders. The research objective was to describe the structural features of written narratives obtained from 127 patients with schizophrenic, bipolar, and personality disorders. The narratives were subjected to structural and statistical analyses. Schizophrenic narratives demonstrated a poor vocabulary, a low volume, and a high degree of formality with a passive narrator. Bipolar texts tended to be long, detailed, egocentric, and active, with multiple participles. Patients with personality disorders emotionally relived their memories, producing reflective written narratives with a lot of actors. The final list of written speech indicators to be used to distinguish between schizophrenic, bipolar, and personality disorders included such variables as text volume, verb tense, non-finite verb forms, first-person singular pronoun, number of actors, passive / active narrator, and laconic / detailed narration.

The image of the social world is a predictor of social behavior and its development during stable social transitivity, i.e., COVID-19 pandemic, economic crises, local military conflicts, etc. It can also be interpreted as a variable linguistic phenomenon. However, very little empirical research has featured its integral structural and content characteristics through the prism of narratives, metaphors, and social representations. The author used the methods of thematic narrative analysis and content analysis of metaphors to identify the narrative constructions used by adult subjects to describe their image of the social world. The data obtained were subjected to frequency analysis and hierarchical cluster analysis. The experiment involved 193 respondents aged 35–49 years old, employed in the city of Rostov-on-Don, Russia. In their metaphors and narratives, they described the social world as balancing between stability and dynamism, predictability and stochasticity, as well as endowed it with differentiation in the absence of universal laws. The rationality of the metaphors reflected the age identity while the subject of biographical narratives reflected the subjective adaptation to current social processes.

Preschool children conceived through In-Vitro Fertilization (IVF) tend to demonstrate particular behavioral, social, and emotional patterns that correlate with their physical development. The authors used a number of techniques to assess the behavior and social and emotional development of five-year-old IVF children. Such questionnaires as Your Child’s Behavior and Child’s Relationship with Friends and Family cast light on the behavioral, social, and emotional status. To define the physical development, the authors used such questionnaires as Child Feeding Issues, Three-Month History of Infectious Diseases, History of Injuries and Accidents, and Chronic Disease History. The sample consisted of 81 IVF children and 153 naturally-conceived children (aged 5); it included subgroups of children with perinatal developmental risks. Most parents of the IVF children reported neither behavioral nor social issues. However, the IVF children demonstrated more severe emotional issues. The IVF children with perinatal developmental risks had more pronounced emotional and anxiety issues, which was not typical of naturally-conceived children with perinatal risks. Both groups included children with difficulties in social and emotional development. The study revealed four significant factors that defined the difficulties of the socio-emotional development in the IVF children: behavioral disorders, aggression, social issues, and emotional issues. The significant correlations of behavioral, social, and emotional development in the IVF group indicated some specificity against the control. The correlating indicators of mental and physical development proved that physical development might affect behavioral, social, and emotional development in IVF children.

Type 1 diabetes mellitus is a complex disease, with self-control playing a key role in its effective treatment. Routine self-control requires high-order cognitive skills, e.g., planning, self-direction, compliance with medical recommendations, etc. All these pose a challenge for teenagers. The model of Responsible Self-Care developed by the World Health Organization takes into account not only health maintenance in diabetic patients, but also their cognitive ability to control their own attitude to treatment in order to achieve glycemic control. This study focused on the correlation between health self-control and neuropsychological profile in teenagers with diabetes. The sample included 38 diabetic patients represented by 13 boys and 25 girls aged 12–17. The study relied on the method of medical documentation analysis and the psychodiagnostic method, including the neuropsychological assessment battery by A. R. Luria and such questionnaires as Multidimensional-Functional Diagnostics of Responsibility, Self-Control Style, Locus of Disease Control, and Self-Efficiency in Disease. The correlation analysis confirmed a direct connection between the cognitive status and responsible behavior in teenagers with diabetes. Poor glycemic control and chronic hyperglycemia were associated with low test results in cognitive abilities, speech fluency, and memory capacity. Cognitive deficiency correlated with insufficient self-control, poor responsibility, and low self-efficiency, as well as with preference for external forms of control locus.

As mobile messengers gain popularity, visual images affect digital communication, leading to new interaction patterns. This review sums up scientific experience in describing digital communication facilitated by emoji and memes. The review covered scientific articles that reported empirical research on visual communication in digital environment in such open research databases as CyberLeninka, PubMed, Google Scholar, eLibrary, and ResearchGate in 2019–2024. The current rise in visual communication tools seems to reflect the general visual shift in modern culture, associated with the changes in human psychology brought about by total digitalization. Visual communication tools have a high information capacity, which hinders their interpretation, thus modifying the complex of individual and socio-psychological characteristics of interlocutors in an attempt to ensure mutual understanding. The review can be used to improve digital communication that employs alternative communication tools.

Patient-centered medicine is a relatively new model for planning, implementing, and evaluating healthcare services. It is based on mutually beneficial partnerships between healthcare providers, patients, and their families. However, the existing models of patient-centered healthcare have a number of disadvantages. The article introduces patient-centered healthcare as part of corporate culture adopted by various medical organizations. The authors developed a component model for the empirical study of patient-centered healthcare in terms of corporate culture. It involved five components, i.e., corporate culture, attitude to patient, attitude to work / professional image, adherence to ethical principles, and motivation. The model was tested using assessment methods developed by the authors, as well as using the Questionnaire of Professional Motivation by K. Zamfir as modified by A. A. Rean and the Mouton-Blake Corporate Culture Test. The sample involved 267 medical employees of urban medical organizations, Primorye Region. The respondents demonstrated a general understanding of patient-centered approach, which they interpreted as communication skills with patients. The dominant culture was that of task, which allowed medical staff to achieve their goals through collective decisions and mutual assistance. However, this mutual assistance was mandated to them due to the lack of personnel. The model demonstrated a good potential for yielding psychological and organizational technologies for training, support, and correction of patient-centered issues in medical organizations.

Positive interaction between the doctor and the patient affects the treatment outcome, as well as the level of satisfaction with healthcare services. Many young doctors experience communicative issues that can lead to negative consequences for all stakeholders. The research featured various problems in shaping communicative skills in medical students. It involved a review of scientific publications, a survey of first-year medical students (n = 20), and an analysis of 40 negative feedbacks from patients. The communicative issues included: lack of eye contact / active listening, misleading mimics, inappropriate intonation / voice volume, violation of private space, insufficient or excessive amount of information, lack of bedside manners / respect for patients. The list of communication skills to be mastered by medical students in order to improve the quality of medical care included: eye contact, self-presentation, active listening, conflict management, strategies of delivering bad news, and conclusion phrases. The data obtained make it possible to identify key aspects that affect the formation of communicative skills in future doctors, as well as to propose methods for its improvement at university level. The authors emphasize the importance of developing communicative skills in future doctors to provide high-quality medical care and prevent emotional burnout in young professionals.

Psychological well-being is a system of optimal psychological qualities and states manifested as life strategy and a system of personal attitude to the world and oneself. Self-attitude is an intrapersonal phenomenon of individual projections in the field of self-awareness. In assessing psychological well-being, it acts as a guiding vector for self-development and self-actualization. In case of people with disabilities, psychological well-being largely depends on self-attitude as a predictor. This study featured the effect of self-attitude on psychological well-being in university students with limited health capacities. The study involved 60 students aged 18–25. The list of methodological tools involved Sentence Completion (J. M. Sacks, S. Levy), Subjective Well-Being Scale (adapted by M. V. Sokolova), and Personal Self-Attitude (V. V. Stolin, S. R. Pantileev). The study established differences in the assessment of psychological well-being by students with and without disabilities. Physically challenged students tended to demonstrate low self-esteem, associated with negative emotional and health experience. They also had specific parameters of self-attitude with a vector of positivity and trends towards personal growth. These parameters are a motivating component of social behavior that determines the general perception of psychological well-being by students with disabilities.

Teachers as victims of aggression seldom become focus of psychological research. However, teacher-directed violence has become a socially relevant phenomenon. Revealing the causes of teacher-directed aggression should at the core of antibullying programs. To identify these causes, psychologists need to study teachers’ experience and insights. The authors compared causes of teacher-directed aggression as perceived by teachers with their accounts of students’ aggression experience. The research relied on the methods of principal component analysis and Pearson’s correlation analysis. The sample consisted of 5,350 teachers from nine regions of the Russian Federation. Most respondents believed teacher-directed aggression to be caused by the dysfunctional family or parents’ disrespect of the teaching staff. The causes were divided into teacher-related, environmental, and intrapersonal. These variables correlated with teachers’ experience of student aggression. The phenomenon of teacher-directed aggression should be taken into account in violence prevention programs aimed at ensuring safety and well-being of both teachers and students.

Gamification is a powerful tool of modern education, but its successful implementation requires careful planning that takes into account the academic context and the individual needs of students. The authors tested a new narrative model of gamification, which integrated game elements and storylines to create a more interactive and motivating learning environment. The model involved stories and scenarios that linked various tasks and activities to immerse students in professionally relevant situations. The model was based on gamification principles, game mechanics, interactive tasks, social interaction, and adaptive feedback. The narrative contextualized learning, thus enhancing students’ engagement, motivation, and professional identity. The experiment (September-December 2023) gamified a course of Professional Ethics and involved first-year students of Clinical Psychology (n = 31), Voino-Yasenetsky Krasnoyarsk State Medical University. The narrative model of gamification fostered a more positive attitude towards the future profession, increased students’ engagement, and enhanced their interest in the academic process. Storylines, roles, personages, problematic situations, and unpredictability ensured students’ deep immersion in professional situations and contributed to the development of important ethical and professional qualities. Gamification has a great potential for improving the quality of higher education, making the learning routine more exciting and effective.