Psychodiagnostics of Extremist Personality Tendencies in School Environment

Abstract

This research featured the psychodiagnostics of extremist tendencies in school environment. Extremism is a dangerous international phenomenon that can take many forms, especially on the Internet. Students prone to extremism should be detected as soon as possible and be subjected to a proper psychological correction in order to prevent illegal actions in the future. The detection procedure requires a set of reliable psychodiagnostic tools. The present research objective was to study the extremist tendencies of students and describe them in the context of socio-psychological maladjustment. The express screening of extremist tendencies was based on an authentic questionnaire, which included the following criteria: loneliness, signs of depression, dehumanization of the other, declaration of one’s own superiority, attraction to violence, and antisocial sentiment. The empirical study involved 157 high school students of Vladivostok (Russia), of whom 29 demonstrated extremist tendencies. Other techniques included G. Eysenck's EPI personality questionnaire, R. Cattell's 16-factor personality questionnaire (form C), Cook-Medley hostility scale, A. Ellis's method of diagnosing irrational attitudes, and Twelve Archetypes+ projective method developed by R. V. Kadyrov and T. V. Kapustina. Nonparametric Mann-Whitney U-test (≤0,05) and STATISTICA 10.0 were used for statistical processing. The results obtained revealed the state of crisis and social maladjustment of students prone to extremism, who may choose radical and violent actions to cope with this state. The developed method proved to be a sensitive and reliable tool for diagnosing extremist tendencies in the context of socio-psychological maladjustment in school environment.