Dancing in the Modus of Self-Identification

The main idea of the article is to address the phenomenon of dancing as a type of creative activity in the modus of self-identification. Sociocultural (self-)identification within the framework of art is taken as the process and space of forming an outline — personal and collective — in relation to certain groups of values, norms and traditions, as a way to discover the boundaries of reflexivity and the possibility of their representation in an artistic act. Basing on the interpretation of reflection as self-directed thinking, this article solves the problem of showing the potential of art in general, and dancing in particular, in the aspect of formation and preservation of identity parameters. The identity is considered as the result of constructing metaphysical supports and methods of self-representation in the widest range: national, religious, ideological, gender, but above all — the actual artistic-stylistic one. In addition to the obvious value of beauty and harmony, the article highlights expressiveness and authenticity as the main axiological guidelines for the art of choreography. The author analyzes the high communicative potential of dancing as a type of artistic activity both at the professional and amateur levels. The article focuses on the specifics of self-identification procedures in the space of modern dance, interpreted in this context in a wide chronological field — from the emergence of “free dance” by Isadora Duncan to current trends in postmodern dance, “contemporary dance” and performative practices. The study concludes that dancing has a high axiological potential as an artistic activity that combines physical and metaphysical practices.

Future-Directed Thinking and Its Relationship to Subjective Well-Being in Older Adults

Age-related changes in future-directed thinking may be important for well-being. Older and younger adults generated idiographic anticipated experiences for the next week, the next year, and the next 5–10 years, using an adapted fluency measure. Relative to younger adults, older adults maintained a focus on the immediate future but frequency of anticipated events declined for the medium and longer term. The presence of negative thoughts for those two more distant time periods was related to lower life satisfaction in older adults. Content differences in thoughts illustrated the differing concerns of the two groups. The results align broadly with previous findings in the literature on socioemotional selectivity theory.

An Exploration/Exploitation Trade-off Between Mind-Wandering and Goal-Directed Thinking

Agents invariably face trade-offs between exploration, which increases informational stores and potentially opens up new opportunities, and exploitation, which utilizes existing informational stores to take advantage of known opportunities. This exploration/exploitation trade-off has been extensively studied in computer science and has been productively applied to multiple cognitive domains. In this chapter, this framework is extended to the ubiquitous alternation between two modes of serial thought: mind-wandering and goal-directed thought. The exploration/exploitation framework provides a new perspective on the functionality of mind-wandering and its pattern of regular switching with goal-directed thought. It also raises new hypotheses about the regulation of mind-wandering across time and differences in the propensity to mind-wander across individuals.

Goal-Directed, Spontaneous, and Stimulus-Independent Thoughts and Mindwandering in a Competitive Context

The aim of this study was to analyze the functions of goal-directed thoughts and the content of spontaneous and stimulus-independent thoughts and mindwandering in a competitive setting and to explore links between different types of thoughts. Therefore, 17 young sport science students competed in a card-sorting task, while their recorded thoughts were collected between trials. Afterwards, the participants classified their own transcripts into different types of thoughts. The results indicated that goal-directed thinking serves a variety of functions, that spontaneous thought content might reflect a series of psychological states and processes relevant for performance, and that the content of mindwandering was idiosyncratic. Moreover, goal-directed thinking increased during competition, whereas mindwandering diminished. Lastly, mindwandering was rarely connected to other types of thinking, whereas the most recurrent connection between thoughts was found between goal-directed and spontaneous thinking.

THE FORMATION OF THE ENVIRONMENTALLY DIRECTED THINKING AS THE NECESSARY QUALITY OF PERSONALITY IN MODERN CONDITIONS

It has been developed a conceptual model of environmentally directed thinking and its relationship with environmental protection on the basis of competence approach. It have been developed the principles of formation of the environmentally directed thinking in the structure of environmental competence. There were proposed stages of teacher’s activity by the gradual transition from mental activity of students with a reproductive level to the level of creative environmental activities. The technology of problem-based learning based on interdisciplinary links was highlighted. A new look was justified at the environmentally directed thinking as an essential quality of the personality of modern man and the backbone factor of education of intelligence and civilization, ecological attitude to nature. Keywords: ecologically oriented thinking, environmental competence, problem-based learning.

Session 7: Imaginal Exposure Continued and Managing High-Risk Thoughts

Chapter 9 outlines session seven of the COPE treatment program, which involves an imaginal exposure exercise, and discusses strategies for managing high-risk thoughts (such as developing alternative ways of thinking, goal-directed thinking, and the use of perspective).