Психологічні особливості формування емпатії у підлітків із порушеннями розумового розвитку

Abstract

The aim of the article is to identify and experimentally test the state ofthe empathy formation and its impact on the formation of emotional andvolitional sphere of adolescents with disorders in mental development. Thepurpose of the research was to provide step-by-step solution of the main tasks:firstly, to state the condition of the development of empathy by identifying itscomponents, indicators and levels of their formation; secondly, identifying themain factors for developing empathy of adolescents with mental developmentdisorders; establishing basic peculiarities affecting empathy as a component of the emotional-volitional sphere of adolescents’ personality with mentaldevelopment disorders.Мethods. Scientific and specific research methods were used to solvethe tasks and to ensure the validity of the research and conclusions. Amongthem there are theoretical and empirical methods, which allowed to establishquantitative and qualitative characteristics of the phenomenon, to characterizeindicators and to set levels of this phenomenon. Psychodiagnostics was conductedin accordance with the requirements and instructions of the methodologyhaving been used, conversations were also organized among the adolescents,and behavioral monitoring was conducted under the usual conditions duringtheir educational activities. For the purpose of comparing and analyzing thephenomenon of empathy, diagnostics of adolescents with preserved intelligenceof the relevant age categories was also performed under the same conditions asadolescents with disorders in mental development.The results of the research. According to the results of the diagnosis ofempathy as the indicator of the development of the emotional-volitional sphereof a personality and the structure of a personality, adolescents with disordersin mental development were found to have insufficient orientation of mentalprocesses, communicative properties, empathy, identification with others anddistance from them. It was found that the level of empathy was characterizedin adolescents with disorders in mental development like low and average levelamong adolescents with preserved intelligence. Channels of empathy and thelevels of their formation among adolescents were also described in details.Conclusions. The results made it possible to ascertain among teenagerswith disorders in mental development low differentiation of «Me»-image; lowadaptability to external stimuli (low level of adequacy of expression of emotionsaccording to the situation); the formation of a leading emotional modality –anger; insufficient mediation of interpersonal contacts, communicative ability;unconscious empathy, identification with other people and taking distance fromthem.