INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN LANGUAGE TEACHING METHODOLOGY COURSE AT PEDAGOGICAL UNIVERSITY

The introduction of information and communications technology (ICT) in pedagogical universities of Ukraine has considerably optimized the professor’s preparation for different forms of in-class teaching. The aim of this research is to characterize the range of media resources used during the preparation of the teaching foreign languages methodology course at high-specialized school and universities of Ukraine. The predominant method used to check the effectiveness of ICT was content analysis. The method of psychological experiment served to study the link between ICT and the students’ emotional sphere. An anonymous poll has discovered a considerable number of students showing a positive attitude to online instruments and using those resources very frequently or almost every day.

Color’s Indispensable Role in the Rapid Detection of Food

The detection of food is crucial for our survival and health. Earlier experimental psychological studies have demonstrated that participants detect food more rapidly than non-food stimuli. However, it remains unknown whether color, which was shown to have various influences on food processing, can modulate the detection of food. To address this issue, a psychological experiment was conducted using a visual search paradigm in which photographs of food (fast food and Japanese food) and kitchen utensils were presented alongside images of non-food distractors (cars), with both color and gray images used. Participants used a key to indicate whether one item was different from the rest, and their reaction times (RTs) were measured. RTs for the detection of both food types were shorter than for the kitchen utensils when color images were used, but not when gray images were used; moreover, the RTs were slower for gray images than for color images for both food types but not for kitchen utensils. These results indicate that color facilitates rapid detection of food in the environment.

Emotional arousal in 2D versus 3D virtual reality environments

Previous studies have suggested that virtual reality (VR) can elicit emotions in different visual modes using 2D or 3D headsets. However, the effects on emotional arousal by using these two visual modes have not been comprehensively investigated, and the underlying neural mechanisms are not yet clear. This paper presents a cognitive psychological experiment that was conducted to analyze how these two visual modes impact emotional arousal. Forty volunteers were recruited and were randomly assigned to two groups. They were asked to watch a series of positive, neutral and negative short VR videos in 2D and 3D. Multichannel electroencephalograms (EEG) and skin conductance responses (SCR) were recorded simultaneously during their participation. The results indicated that emotional stimulation was more intense in the 3D environment due to the improved perception of the environment; greater emotional arousal was generated; and higher beta (21–30 Hz) EEG power was identified in 3D than in 2D. We also found that both hemispheres were involved in stereo vision processing and that brain lateralization existed in the processing.

Effect of Expressive Writing on the Subjective Well-Being of University Students

The main intent of this research is to test the effectiveness of expressive writing in processing and dealing with inhibited emotions of university students. The use of expressive writing targets the subjective well-being of the subjects, specifically their happiness and life satisfaction. Employing a between-subjects design, a thorough and rigorous psychological experiment was performed on 23 student volunteers where expressive writing was designated as the independent variable and happiness and life satisfaction as dependent variables respectively. Results of the non-parametric analysis showed that after the experimentation, both the happiness and life satisfaction of the subjects improved. Theoretical implications of the study are discussed in this paper.

neatStats: An R Package for a Neat Pipeline From Raw Data to Reportable Statistics in Psychological Science

Performing the entire transition from raw data to reportable statistics can pose difficulties: it takes time, it allows various mistakes (that may or may not go unnoticed), and there are no general guidelines on how to proceed with this task. One particularly useful tool for this transition is the R programming language. However, how to use R for this is not trivial, especially for novices. The present paper serves as a step-by-step yet fast tutorial on how to make all the steps from raw data files to all the statistics normally needed in a conventional psychological experiment (including ANOVA and t-tests). At the same time, it also introduces the R package neatStats, which was created for the very purpose of making these steps as easy and straightforward as possible.

Social Ostracism Paradigms O’Cam, O’Train, Cyberball: the Experience of Pilot Research (Russian Federation)

Objective. Approbation of techniques that allow simulating a situation of social ostracism (ignoring, exclusion, rejection). Background. Social ostracism can be fleeting or manifest itself in a chronic protracted form, leading to depression, causing a sense of loss of meaning in life, and in extreme cases results in an antisocial reaction. The study of this phenomenon in the realities of Russian reality poses a number of theoretical (lack of an established theoretical basis) and, as a consequence, methodological problems for domestic scientists. Study design. Three experiments were conducted with different scenarios and methods of simulating inclusion/exclusion conditions, the technique of psychological debriefing was used. Threatened Needs Scale-Ostracism (Boykina, 2019 adaptation) was used in two experiments in two modifications: for adults and children. The calibration of the “Cyberball” inclusion/exclusion conditions parameters was carried out. Participants. The study included three samples: the «O’Train» approbation: N=66, 61 female, 5 -male, M – 18,3; «Cyberball»: N=96, 57 female, 39 male, M – 12,84; «O’Cam»: N=37, 19 female, 18 male, M – 13,6. Measurements. Experimental method, self-reporting methodology Scale of Threatened Needs- Ostracism, computer program “Cyberball” (Williams, Cheung, Choi, 2000), qualitative data analysis. Results. The tested techniques have confirmed their reliability as a method of simulating the situation of social ostracism. Conclusions. The following admission selection criteria are formulated as recommendations: 1) simulation of conditions of ignoring/exclusion/rejection, 2) the least psychological discomfort of the object, 3) viability of the research organization (including the number of participants in the experiment and the reliability of the legend), 4) avoidance of confrontation of participants. The methods tested by the authors can be used both in research and in applied goals, taking into account compliance with the ethical principles of psychological experiment.

Z.N. Gippius’s Letters to F.A. Chervinsky

The publication introduces 33 letters of the 1890s from Z.N. Gippius to the writer, poet and playwright, St. Petersburg lawyer F.A. Chervinsky. Gippius’s short romance with Chervinsky, as happened with her other heartfelt passions, provoked an intense epistolary dialogue, avoiding, however, direct expression and self-reflection of feelings. Gippius's letters are dominated by playing and light coquetry, full of hints and provocations, and the life romance itself is built by her as a tense psychological experiment. Their relationship in 1892 –1893 found reflection in the works of both participants — in Gippius's fairy tale “Time” and Chervinsky's story “Sylphide”, typical examples of modernist interrelation of literature and life. At the same time, the letters are interesting for the details of literary events reported in them, for the characteristics of a number of contemporary writers — N. Minsky, D. Merezhkovsky, A.P. Chekhov and other common acquaintances.