Lada Kaliská (ed.): Selected aspects of the psychology of morality. Banská Bystrica: Faculty of Education, Matej Bel University in Banská Bystrica, 187p. ISBN 978-80-557-0514-9
The collective scientific monograph entitled Selected Aspects of the Psychology of Morality is not only proof of the topicality of the moral phenomenon at the present time, but also proof of the slowly growing interest of the psychological professional community in the given topic.
The reviewed work consists of a set of eight compact chapters that combine selected aspects of morality from a psychological point of view into a systematic whole. The first chapter presented by Vladimír Poliach provides a clear orientation in the various specifics and interrelationships of individual factors that create the image of a situated moral subject. The transparency of the theoretical analytical reasoning is also enhanced by diagrams that aptly complement the presented ideas of the author.
In the second chapter, Katarína Čižmáriková makes a comprehensive statement about the theories of children's socio-moral development. It begins with Freud's psychoanalytic theory, continues with social teretic concepts of moral development, also deals with well-known cognitive theories and does not leave out socio-cognitive theories of moral development. The chapter is completed by Peck's contribution to moral development and Pupal's concept of moral education.
The author of the monograph, Lada Kaliská, completes the series of theoretical chapters with her own part, which theoretically defines moral intelligence - a concept attracting more and more attention from experts. It presents the philosophical starting points for the understanding of moral intelligence, it also deals with the pragmatic-social platform of the studied concept, which is followed by the pedagogical-advisory base of the ability to think morally, make decisions and behave morally.
The fourth chapter focuses on the lesser-known phenomenon of integrity, which the authors Mária Kahancová and Eva Nábělková successfully clarify in an overview of individual concepts of integrity in various psychological contexts. Special attention is paid to integrity as a key concept of positive psychology.
Lenka Ďuricová deals with the moral aspects of the non-directive approach to upbringing and education in the following fifth chapter. The aim of the chapter is to present and provide application possibilities of the principles of person-centered therapy in a complex educational system in which the given approach is only minimally established.
The sixth chapter of the scientific monograph entitled Prosociality in the context of self-evaluation of a high school student presents the practical side of the discussed moral issue. Marta Valihorová and Janka Lajčiaková investigated the relationship between high school students' prosocial tendencies in connection with their personality and their global self-evaluation. The assumption of a positive correlation between prosocial tendencies and global self-evaluation was not confirmed, in contrast to several empirical studies.
Lucie Pašková's research chapter on the influence of the perception of social support on the life satisfaction of adolescents presents interesting findings about the relationships of overall perceived social support both with overall life satisfaction and with its partial areas.
The monograph is concluded by the last eighth chapter by Alexandrovna Soloshich, which discusses environmental ethics in the context of students' professional activities. The monograph deals with a socially topical issue, which its individual authors discuss from several points of view, which makes the work even more attractive to the reader. It opens up a wide problem area, which allows to continue with many solutions both in the theoretical and empirical fields.
The editor of the monograph, as well as the authors of the individual studies, gave relatively comprehensive answers to the researched questions related to the psychology of morality, and at the same time raised a whole range of new questions that need to be further discussed and further investigated. With its information, findings, observations, recommendations, the publication can inspire not only academics, but also students of psychology, pedagogy, social work, ethics, or philosophy.
PaedDr. Petra Lajčiaková, PhD.
CONTENT
INTRODUCTION
SITUATED MORAL SUBJECT - CATEGORIES OF VARIABLES Vladimir Poliach
THEORIES OF CHILDREN'S SOCIO-MORAL DEVELOPMENT Katarína Čižmáriková
THEORETICAL DEFINITION OF THE CONCEPT OF MORAL INTELLIGENCE Lada Kaliská
INTEGRITY AS A VIRTUE FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF PSYCHOLOGY Mária Kahancová, Eva Nábělková
MORAL ASPECTS OF A NON-DIRECTIVE APPROACH TO EDUCATION AND EDUCATION Lenka Ďuricová
PROSOCIALITY IN THE CONTEXT OF SELF-ASSESSMENT OF SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS Marta Valihorová, Janka Lajčiaková
THE INFLUENCE OF PERCEIVED SOCIAL SUPPORT ON THE LIFE SATISFACTION OF ADOLESCENTS Lucia Pašková
FORMATION OF ECOLOGICAL ETHICS IN STUDENTS IN THE PROCESS OF SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY Irina Alexandrovna Soloshich
Morality starts from small things and from each of us. It is just the sum of millions of life attitudes. Jan Procházka
INTRODUCTION
Psychological research on morality began to establish itself in the 30s of the 20th century, when psychologists also began to intensively study the motives of human action and the study of the moral development of a person. Since then, the interest in the moral development of a person has not lost its relevance in the psychological community. Guiding people's behavior in such a way as to prevent negative phenomena that would disrupt life in society and enable evil is a primary task even today. Respect for moral rules, principles, principles and standards enables people to co-exist, and it is here that psychologists play an important role, who try to postulate or establish new forms of optimization and humanization of personality formation. In view of the globalization processes bringing multiculturalism, in view of the increasing scientific and technical power of individuals and various institutions, in view of the increasing number of interpersonal contacts and interests, in view of the increasing freedom of the individual, the ability to distinguish between good and evil and (in general) the issue of human responsibility becomes crucial, and consequently so does the need for the psychological study of morality in the 21st century. Contemporary Swiss ethicists H. Ruh and T. Gröbly expressed it with the words: "Either the future will be ethical or there will be none! We will only enable the future if we orient our actions in all areas to ethical standards."
The presented collective scientific monograph Selected aspects of the psychology of morality responds to this situation, the aim of which is the analysis and evaluation of selected phenomena of the psychology of morality (social-moral development of an individual's personality, situated moral subject, morally sensitive situation, personal-semantic meanings, dispositional and status modulators, the concept of moral intelligence, integrity, non-directive approach in the formation of moral personality, social support and prosociality) with the help of recent professional literature and current research.
V. Fields in the first chapter Situated moral subject – categories of variables, describes the main categories of variables of the 'situated moral subject' system. These are the following categories: (1) morally sensitive situation, (2) situational macro-context, (3) experiencing the situation, (4) sources of personal-semantic contents, (5) state modulators of experiencing and (6) dispositional modulators of experiencing. The identification of these categories is the first step towards the creation of an empirically verifiable theoretical model.
The second chapter of K. Čižmáriková's Theories of socio-moral development of children provides an overview of theories of moral development that deal with the problem of similarities and differences in human behavior, analyze the causes and consequences of human behavior from different points of view. The psychoanalytical point of view is represented by S. Freud, the social point of view is brought by A. Bandura, the cognitive theory was elaborated by the authors J. Piaget and L. Kohlberg, the sociocognitive point of view is represented by R. L. Selman. The author explains the basic concepts of moral psychology in an analytical way, but also offers critical responses to selected theories.
In the third chapter entitled Theoretical definition of the concept of moral intelligence, L. Kaliská offers a theoretical-historical, philosophical-social-psychological view of the newly established concept of moral intelligence. Based on a comparative, analytical-deductive approach, the author presents the variability of opinions on this concept within the psychology of morality and tries to characterize it more closely. It also points to theoretical, empirical or practical verifications of the concept of moral intelligence.
M. Kahancová and E. Nábělková in the fourth chapter (Integrity as a virtue from the point of view of psychology) theoretically analyze the concept of integrity from the point of view of five psychological perspectives: management psychology, theory of psychosocial development, salutogenesis, personality psychology and positive psychology. It is positive psychology that brings to the center of psychological interest the topic of the strengths of a person's character and virtues. Within the approach of positive psychology, integrity is understood as the inner wholeness of a person who is truly himself and holds his inner states, intentions and commitments both privately and publicly.
In the following (5th) chapter Moral aspects of a non-directive approach to education and training, the author L. Ďuricová deals with the alternative of applying person-centered therapy to the conditions of education and training (not only in the institutional sense), as a possible inspiration from the point of view of cultivating the morality of contemporary people. The main thesis of this philosophy is the trust in the basic goodness of the human being and the assumption that under certain conditions a person fulfills his potential and moves towards personal growth, while preserving or improving the quality of interpersonal relations.
The authors M. Valihorová and J. Lajčiaková follow it up with the sixth chapter (Prosociality in the context of self-evaluation of a high school student), in which they emphasize the need to develop prosociality as one of the basic characteristics of a moral individual in the school environment in the context of his self-evaluation. They discuss self-evaluation, which is considered an important element for the development of prosocial behavior. In addition to the theoretical definition, they also present the findings of the research, the aim of which was to determine the existence of differences in prosociality, depending on the level of self-evaluation, which they examined through the Rosenberg scale of global self-evaluation. The direct connection between prosociality and self-evaluation, proven either in this research or in several previous researches, is the starting point for the possibilities of developing prosocial behavior of the pupil.
In the penultimate (7th) chapter (The influence of perceived social support on the life satisfaction of adolescents) L. Pašková analyzes the effects of social support as one of the basic variables facilitating the moral development of an individual. The chapter analyzes the variables of the relationship between life satisfaction and social support in adolescents. It is based on theories emphasizing the importance of social support in coping with difficult life situations, but also the problems of everyday life, which come to the fore especially during adolescence. Within adolescence, it focuses on its middle period, which is the search for one's own identity and uniqueness.
The last chapter (8th) entitled Formation of Students' Environmental Ethics in the Process of Their Scientific Activities by Alexandrovna Soloshich from the point of view of environmental ethics discusses the relationship of students to nature and analyzes values and motives in cognitive and operational activities.
Finally, we want to thank prof. J. Grácov and doc. P. Vacek for review corrections and comments, as well as to other colleagues and friends who contributed in any way to the creation of this publication. We especially thank the scientific grant agency VEGA, thanks to which this scientific monograph was created as part of the project Adaptation of new methodologies for assessing moral judgment in the context of moral education of adolescents (VEGA 1/1080/12).
We believe that the presented monograph will enrich the issue of psychological analysis of morality from several angles and will be beneficial for further research and applications in Slovak science. We wish all readers to find what they are looking for on the following pages, otherwise the authors of individual chapters will be grateful for critical feedback in the form of professional comments.
For the Lada Kaliská author team
Authors: Mgr. V. Poliach, PhD., Mgr. K. Čižmáriková, PhD., PaedDr. L. Kaliská, PhD., Mgr. Ing. E. Nábělková, PhD., Mgr. M. Kahancová, doc. PhDr. M. Valihorová, CSc., Mgr. J. Lajčiaková, PhD., PaedDr. L. Pašková, PhD., prof. I.A. Soloshich Title: Selected aspects of the psychology of morality Editor: PaedDr. Lada Kaliská, PhD. Scientific reviewers: prof. PhDr. Ján Grác, DrSc. doc. PhDr. Pavel Vacek, PhD. Scientific editor: prof. PhDr. Soňa Kariková, PhD. Extent: 187 pages Quantity: 100 pcs Edition: First Published by: PF UMB in Banská Bystrica Printing: Printing house Bratia Sabovci, s.r.o., Zvolen ISBN 978-80-557-0514-9