Psychological aspects of adaptive response in changed living conditions

Relevance. In early 2020, following the WHO declaration on the COVID-19 pandemic, the population of Russian Federation faced a major change in lifestyle. Quarantine became the main measure to combat the new coronavirus infection COVID-19. As a result, many people, including students, found themselves in conditions of social deprivation and limitation of habitual forms of activity. Such conditions were created for the corrosive tests of the psychic adaptation of astronaut in the 1970s by O.N. Kuznetsov and V.I. Lebedev. Interest in these phenomena has been heightened again by the obvious and significant transformation of the socio-cultural situation resulting from the widespread introduction of digital communication.

The aim of this study was to analyze changes in the mental state of young people (university students) during adaptation to quarantine and distance learning.

Methodology. The study involved 132 students aged 17 to 26 years. Students were asked to fill out a questionnaire, which contained a number of socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents, such as: gender, age, living conditions, form of employment, etc. The semantic differential method was used to assess the experience of one’s own “Self ” in a comprehensive study of the adaptation of young students in conditions of quarantine, and the SAN method was used to assess the functional state of the respondent in his manifestations of well-being, activity and mood. For mathematical data processing, Student’s t-test was used.

Results and Discussion. As a result of the analysis, it was revealed that the meaning of “Self ” in respondents significantly changes with deterioration of the functional state. Some groups of subjects such as: female subjects, subjects from 17 to 22 years old, subjects who have a negative attitude to distant education, subjects who often have a negative attitude towards others, subjects who live with friends, were found to experience more difficulties during quarantine. There is a greater distance in the semantic space between the meanings of the concepts of I before the pandemic and I during the pandemic. Thus, we can say that these groups are more susceptible to the change of their own “Self ”.

Conclusion. The data obtained can be used to create a prevention program, which is necessary to prevent a traumatic situation during anti-epidemic measures.

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