Self-critical Thinking Research Articles

Examining the role of post-event processing in test anxiety—Pilot testing in three student samples

This work investigates the occurrence of post-event processing (PEP) in the context of test anxiety; PEP involves rumination and self-critical thinking following an event and commonly observed in social anxiety. Three short-term longitudinal studies in student samples examined whether PEP occurs after exams and how it is associated with test anxiety. University students (N = 35 in Study 1, N = 146 in Study 2, and N = 37 in Study 3) completed measures of trait and state test anxiety before an actual exam; PEP related to the exam was assessed at various time points afterward. Results revealed that PEP occurred to a meaningful extent after exam situations. Overall, it was positively associated with trait and state test anxiety, although some variations in the relations were found across the three studies. These findings underscore the relevance of PEP in the context of test anxiety, as PEP might contribute to maintaining test anxiety in the long term. Implications for future studies are discussed.

CRITICAL THINKING DEVELOPMENT AS A KEY COMPONENT OF SOFT SKILLS IN EDUCATION

According to the competencies outlined in the current Higher Education Standard for the specialty 221 “Dentistry” within the field of knowledge 22 “Health Care” at the second (Master’s) level, students must be able to think abstractly, analyze and synthesize information, and demonstrate critical and self-critical thinking. Both general and specialized (professional, subject-specific) competencies highlight the necessity for students to critically understand educational challenges. The interpretation of these concepts aligns with widely accepted philosophical, scientific, legislative, and social perspectives. In this context, it becomes essential to identify effective methods for developing critical thinking in students as a component of Soft Skills, and to implement these methods in undergraduate education. Critical thinking serves as a key component that enhances students’ motivation to learn and prepares them for independent work. It plays a crucial role in acquiring both theoretical knowledge and practical skills. In order to improve and to develop critical thinking, undergraduate students must be able to interpret, analyze, and compare patient information; generalize, evaluate, and logically draw well-supported conclusions from the data obtained during patient examinations. The teacher must foster critical thinking in students by utilizing the technology of developing critical thinking, which operates through specific phases: challenge, comprehension, and reflection. To effectively cultivate critical thinking skills in undergraduate students, it is recommended to apply methods such as professional situation analysis, empathy, constructing effective arguments, and analyzing cause-and-effect relationships. These approaches will help develop critical thinking as a key component of Soft Skills in students.

EFFICACY OF INTEGRATIVE SELF-REFLECTION INTERVENTIONS ON THE SELF-COMPASSION OF ADULTS WITH SYMPTOMS OF DEPRESSION

Objective: The purpose of the research was to explore the impact of an integrated approach to self-reflections by combining the interventions from Naikan Therapy and Expressive Arts therapy on adults with symptoms of depression. It was hypothesized that after the successful completion of ten bi-weekly psychotherapeutic sessions over a period of 7 weeks (including pre and post assessment), participants would have increased levels of self-compassion compared to the pre-test levels. Research Design: The present research is a quasi-experimental research design. A total of eleven participants within the age range of 18-40 were included in the research using purposive sampling. Place and Duration of the Study: 1 year, at Bahria University, Karachi Campus Participants and Methods: Only participants who were experiencing symptoms of depression, between the age range of 18-40 and at least a 12th grade education level was included in the research. In addition to the Informed Consent Form, Demographic Information Form, Siddiqui Shah Scale of Depression (Siddiqui and Shah, 1997) and Self Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003) were used to assess the level of depressive symptoms and self-compassion of the participants before and after the intervention. Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) 22.0 was used for analysis and a paired sample t-test was conducted to see the differences between the pretest and posttest of the participants. Results: Results indicated a significant increase in the levels of self-compassion from pretest (M=57, SD=6.67) to posttest (M=102, SD=10.09) conditions; t (10) = -1.45, P<0.05. Conclusion: Integrative psychotherapies have been found to be effective in increasing awareness, improving self-awareness, improving mindfulness, and reducing self-critical thinking. Overall, these potential implications suggest that it may be an integrative form of therapy for individuals struggling with depression.

Self-critical thinking mediates the relationship between perfectionism and perceived stress in undergraduate students: A longitudinal study

• We examined the concurrent and longitudinal relationships between multidimensional perfectionism, perceived stress, and self-critical thinking in a sample of UK university students. • Longitudinal analysis revealed baseline perfectionism to predict increased stress and self-critical thinking at follow-up. • Self-hatred and inadequacy at baseline mediated the. longitudinal relationship between baseline perfectionism and perceived stress at follow-up • Whilst perfectionism may amplify perceived stress, self-critical thinking may accentuate this relationship due to self-defeating styles of cognitive appraisal. The present study examined the concurrent and longitudinal relationships between multidimensional perfectionism, perceived stress, and self-critical thinking in a sample of UK university students. Specifically, to determine whether self-critical thinking at baseline mediated the longitudinal relationship between baseline perfectionism and future stress at follow-up. At baseline, N=220 students completed measures of multidimensional perfectionism, perceived stress, and self-critical thinking, whereas N=84 completed the same measures at follow-up. Socially prescribed, and self-oriented perfectionism were related to increased stress, self-hatred, and self-inadequacy at baseline. Longitudinal analysis revealed that baseline self-oriented and socially prescribed perfectionism were significantly related to increased reports of stress and self-critical thinking fifteen weeks later at follow-up. More crucially, multiple mediation analysis found self-hatred and inadequacy at baseline mediated the longitudinal relationship between baseline perfectionism and perceived stress at follow-up. Perfectionistic and self-critical thinking appears to accentuate the experience of perceived stress in the university student population. Student-based interventions to reduce self-critical thinking may prove beneficial in preventing the onset of perceived stress.

Concept Attainment Model (CAM) in Empowering Critical Thinking Skills and Concepts Mastery for High School Students

Abstract.Existing human resources must be prepared early. Indeed, national education aims to create intelligent and competitive generations. This research is oriented towards the influence of CAM, which is implemented in the learning process. This research method is quasi-experimental. The research design used a non-equivalent control group design. As a sample is XI grade in SMA Muhammadiyah 7 Surabaya. Data collection techniques through observation and tests, critical thinking skills test sheets and students' concept mastery tests. Descriptively, self-critical thinking skills are 100% completed classically. The results of the t-test have a significance value of ≤ 0.05, which is 0.000. Then for mastery of the concept from the results of the t-test, the significance value is ≤ 0.05, namely with a significance value of 0.000. From the results of this study, it can be concluded that there is an influence of CAM p on students' critical thinking skills and students' mastery of concepts.

SAUDI TEACHERS’ KNOWLEDGE OF CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS AND THEIR ATTITUDES TOWARDS IMPROVING SAUDI STUDENTS’ CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS

Saudi teachers are unsure how to include critical thinking into their classrooms.This study aimed at identifying the knowledge of Saudi teachers regarding critical thinking skills and exploring their attitudes towards improving Saudi students’ critical thinking skills. To identify if there are statistically significant differences at the level of significance (0.05) between the response averages of the study sample members about the degree of assessment of Saudi teachers about their knowledge of self-critical thinking skills due to the variables (specialization, experience, and gender), the quantitative approach was used employing a three-part questionnaire as the study’s instrument to achieve objectives. The first part gathered the demographic information of the participants focusing on three variables: “specialization,” “years of experience,” and “gender. The second part was designed to assess the participants' critical thinking abilities. The third part was to determine the participants’ attitudes about improving students’ critical thinking skills. The sample of the study consisted of (408) teachers (male and female) who were teaching at secondary school level in Hail City, Saudi Arabia during the academic year 2020-2021. The results revealed that the level of Saudi Teachers’ knowledge of critical thinking skills was high and that their attitudes towards improving students’ critical thinking skills were positive. Statistically, there were significant differences in favor of the “sciences specialization” versus the “humanities specialization” in the questionnaire’s two objectives. On the other hand, there were no statistically significant differences in the “gender” and “years of experience” variables. For future research, there is still a need to further examine Saudi teachers’ critical thinking skills and their attitudes towards improving Saudi students’ critical thinking skills. Its relevance to e-learning and adaptable settings is also discussed. Future research could look into the many interactions between different learning methods and strategies utilized in the development of camel thinking. Keywords: attitudes towards critical thinking, Critical Thinking (CT), Critical Thinking Skills (CTS), Saudi Teachers (ST)

Hubert J.M. Hermans, Rob Bartels. Citizenship Education and the Personalization of Democracy. Routledge. 2021. 220 pp. Paperback. ISBN 9,780,367,467,890

Citizenship education is a topic of great relevance in a historical period characterized by a strong change in social morphology. There is a shared awareness of the need to cross strict national borders in order to promote a broader sense of citizenship conceived in terms of globality. Hubert Hermans and Rob Bartels in the book Citizenship Education and the Personalization of Democracy, designed for undergraduate and graduate levels in higher education, support these goals by adding a psychological dimension based on the theory of the Dialogical Self. The authors aim to promote not only critical thinking in general, but also self-critical thinking, inviting students to examine the ways they relate to themselves. The book also underlines the personal and social responsibilities that everyone has as a citizen of a wider global community, that of the whole world, which must be preserved and respected from an ecological point of view. For this reason there is a need to develop "ecological identities" aware of being an integral and active part of the planet Earth. The book achieves these objectives through critical information on basic democratic principles, but mainly through the promotion of the personalization of democracy, through the exploration of students' life experiences.

“Imbecilization” in the disinformation society: what can information literacy do about it?

El artículo analiza algunos puntos sobre el estado actual de la desinformación en los procesos de información, principalmente en el contexto mediático. La globalización y su constante movimiento, de carácter socialmente asimétrico y separatista, genera discrepancias colectivas y abre caminos a lo que se denomina imbecilización colectiva. En esta coyuntura, el fenómeno ampliamente abierto de la desinformación en la sociedad resulta en una manipulación y distorsión excesivas de la información. Por tanto, esta discusión presenta, a través de un relevamiento bibliográfico, la urgencia del desarrollo de la alfabetización informacional –cuyo supuesto consiste en el aprendizaje a lo largo de la vida– orientada a la disfunción informativa presente en la comunidad. Dicha alfabetización se denota como una forma de remediación y no como la erradicación absoluta del problema, ya que es fundamental preservar el pensamiento crítico y autocrítico para reducir y controlar la calidad de la información consumida y compartida. Los esfuerzos para combatir la llamada “imbecilización” y disfunción informativa deben darse en diferentes ámbitos de la vida social, involucrando la fusión multidisciplinar de tecnología, educación, cultura, economía y política.

The development of the ‘Forms of Responding to Self-Critical Thoughts Scale’ (FoReST)

BackgroundSelf–critical thoughts are a feature of many mental health problems. Adopting a psychologically flexible response to thoughts has been highlighted as a key determinant of wellbeing. But, the measurement of psychological flexibility (PF) in relation to self-critical thoughts is under-developed. This paper reports on the development of the Forms of Responding to Self-Critical Thoughts Scale (FoReST). MethodStudy One involved the development and exploratory factor analysis of the FoReST in a convenience sample of 253 non-clinical adults. Study Two was a confirmatory factor analysis study of the FoReST in a sample of 110 University students. Study 3 explored the convergent and concurrent validity of the FoReST by examining associations with measures of similar constructs (PF, self-compassion, self-criticism) and relevant mental health measures (anxiety, depression, distress). Study 3 also explored the FoReST's incremental validity for predicting depression and anxiety levels beyond an established measure of self-critical thinking. ResultsIn Study One, exploratory factor analysis produced a 9-item/2-factor solution (unworkable action and mindful acceptance). The measure demonstrated good internal consistency. In Study 2, the confirmatory factor analysis also indicated a 2-factor model (unworkable action and mindful acceptance) and overall internal consistency that was excellent. In Study Three, the FoReST demonstrated high convergent validity with similar measures, and good concurrent validity with mental health outcomes. Analyses also indicted good incremental validity for the FoReST for predicting HADS depression and anxiety scores. ConclusionsThe FoReST appears to be a psychometrically sound measure suitable for measuring change processes in third wave therapies such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Mindfulness-based Interventions and Compassion Focused therapy.

Self-criticism, negative automatic thoughts and postpartum depressive symptoms: the buffering effect of self-compassion

ABSTRACTObjective: This study aimed to explore the direct and indirect effects of self-criticism on postpartum depressive symptoms, through postpartum cognitions, and analyse the moderating role of self-compassion in this relationship.Background: Self-criticism and self-compassion are associated with postpartum depression. However, further research is needed to understand how these mechanisms operate in the development/maintenance of depressive symptoms.Methods: 686 women in the postpartum period (up to 12 months after birth) recruited in-person and online answered a cross-sectional survey.Results: The effect of self-criticism on postpartum depressive symptoms occurred sequentially, increasing the frequency of negative automatic thoughts and subsequently the metacognitive appraisal of these thoughts. Self-compassion had a moderating effect only on the relation between self-criticism and postpartum cognitions. The effect of self-criticism on postpartum cognitions decreased in the presence of higher self-compassion.Conclusion: This study emphasises the negative effect of a self-critical thinking style and of a negative appraisal of thought’s content on depression symptoms. Moreover, this work underscores the buffering role of self-compassion in the relationship between self-criticism and postpartum cognitions. These results highlight the need to address the reduction of self-criticism and the promotion of self-compassion strategies to deal with postpartum cognitions, in order to prevent and treat postpartum depressive symptoms.

The political theorist, Fujita Shōzō: between his sense of hope (kibō) and his sense of despair (zetsubō)

AbstractIn this article, I describe an important aspect of the intellectual tradition of Japanese political theory while focusing on the Japanese scholar Fujita Shōzō’s political and scholarly activities. Not surprisingly, he has been chiefly considered a thinker or a historian of ideas, due to his being a pupil of Japan's brightest political scientist, Maruyama Masao. It must be stressed, however, that his scholarly works do not confine his academic scope to their ingredients; they are composed of theoretical requisites for the disciplinary activity of political theory, as can be seen particularly in his early contributions. He requires his theory to constitute integral aspects of practice, experience and perspective on the basis of his political concerns and practices in terms of detachment realism. From this perspective, I explore how Fujita changed his primary purpose from criticising Japan's ‘Tennō system’ (Tennōsei) to criticising its ‘high-speed growth’ (kōdo seichō) by highlighting the psychological transformation of his self-critical and self-reflective political thinking and acting according to his optimistic state of ‘hope’ (kibō) and his pessimistic state of ‘despair’ (zetsubō), especially in terms of his early work.

The phenomenology of self-critical thinking in people with depression, eating disorders, and in healthy individuals.

To explore the phenomenology of self-criticism, and the relationship with constructs such as rumination and perfectionism. The study followed a three-group (Depression, n=26; Eating Disorder, n=26; Non-clinical, n=26) mixed methods design. Participants completed a set of questionnaires and were interviewed about the occurrence, impact, and content of self-critical thinking, along with their beliefs about self-criticism. Both clinical groups reported more frequent, persistent, and less controllable self-criticism compared to controls, present on average 50-60% of the time. They reported a negative impact on mood, and a moderately severe impact on daily activities. They indicated greater desire to change self-criticism whilst judging it more difficult to reduce. Habitual self-criticism was highly correlated with lower self-esteem, lower self-compassion, greater rumination, and greater negative perfectionism. Compared to those with depression, the eating disorder group reported harsher self-criticism, felt it was more part of their personality, and was more beneficial. The findings highlight the importance of exploring people's beliefs about their self-criticism, and imply that treatment for self-criticism may be more challenging with people with eating disorders than people with depression. This study highlights that self-criticism is common in depression and eating disorders and that some people find this a significant problem in its own right. Careful assessment of self-criticism is recommended when working with these clinical presentations, which should include the perceived positive consequences and desire to change.

Self-Critical Thinking and Overgeneralization in Depression and Eating Disorders: An Experimental Study.

Self-critical thinking is common across psychological disorders. This study hypothesized that it may play an important role in 'overgeneralization', the process of drawing general implications from an isolated negative experience. To explore the impact of two experimental tasks designed to elicit self-critical thoughts on the endorsement of general negative self-views of clinical and non-clinical populations. Three groups (depression, eating disorders and non-clinical controls), completed standardized questionnaires and the two tasks. Participants rated their self-critical thinking and general negative self-beliefs before and after each task. Following a failure experience, both clinical groups showed a greater increase in general negative self-views compared with controls, indicating greater overgeneralization. Both habitual and increases in state self-critical thinking were associated with overgeneralization while negative perfectionism was not. Overgeneralization was more strongly associated with post-task reduced mood than self-criticism. Self-critical thinking may be an important factor in the process of overgeneralization, and the increase in general negative self-views may be particularly crucial for lowering of mood.

A Cognitive-Behavioral-Based Workshop Intervention for Maladaptive Perfectionism

Maladaptive perfectionism (MP) can have adverse consequences for mental and physical health and can interfere with treatment success for various conditions. Theoretical conceptualizations of MP largely surround overly rigid and self-critical thinking as well as excessively high standards. Treatment for MP thus often focuses on these cognitive aspects and has been successful, albeit lengthy. The present study evaluated a brief cognitive-behavioral workshop for those with high, moderate, and low MP, which was defined as a composite of perfectionism subscales that included concern over mistakes, doubting of actions, parental criticism, parental expectations, and discrepancy. Workshop components focused on psychoeducation about MP, setting high standards, fearing mistakes and doubting oneself, and preventing distress and maintaining gains. Ratings of MP as well as anxiety, depression, and distress were significantly lower from pre-treatment across post-treatment and 3-week and 3-month follow-up assessments for those with high and moderate MP. Participants with low MP showed no significant change over time, as expected. The workshop thus provided a useful, brief, and cost-effective intervention for MP and related distress. Clinical implications are discussed, including routine assessment of MP in clinical practice, intervention for MP early in the clinical process, specific focus on self-criticism and setting high standards, and implementation in university counseling centers. Recommendations for future research are also discussed, including dismantling of workshop components, identifying treatment mechanisms, expanding to clinical populations, evaluating more diverse samples, and understanding the possible preventative aspects of a workshop approach.

Identifying Client Emotional Signatures: Development of a New Scale

This article describes the development and refinement of the Annandale Emotional Signature Scale; a measure that was subsequently employed as part of a battery of tests to explore the validity of the constructs of abandonment and annihilation. The Annandale Emotional Signature Scale (AESS) was first developed and administered to undergraduate psychology students, followed by a group of practitioners who were aware of the abandonment and annihilation dimensions. Based on the results with these sample populations, the AESS scale was modified and administered to a clinical population. From these studies with three different samples, two highly reliable factors emerged from the AESS. The Abandon factor comprises items describing feelings of inadequacy, self-critical thinking, and pleasing behaviours that indicate anxiety and worry about over-responsibility and rejection by others. The Annihilate factor comprises items describing adverse and traumatic events from the past, as opposed to currently anxious feelings and self-critical thoughts. Overall, the results of these studies indicate that, in line with our initial clinical observations, two different dimensions in client profiles may be identified, each with their own characteristic signature of feelings, thoughts and behaviours, and childhood memories.

Self-criticism as a mediator in the relationship between unhealthy perfectionism and distress

Unhealthy or negative perfectionism has been identified as both a risk and maintaining factor for a range of psychological difficulties. A cross-sectional online study with a predominantly student population (n=381) investigated cognitive processes suggested to mediate the relationship between unhealthy perfectionism and distress. Hypothesised cognitive processes were assessed using questionnaires about rumination, habitual self-critical thinking, unhelpful beliefs about emotions, self-compassion and mindfulness. Factor analysis of these questionnaires suggested two distinct underlying constructs, labelled self-criticism and present-moment awareness. Higher levels of self-criticism were associated with unhealthy perfectionism and psychological distress, and partially mediated this relationship. Present-moment awareness was associated with unhealthy perfectionism but not distress. These findings are consistent with the possibility that repetitive or habitual self-critical thinking is a process through which unhealthy perfectionism may result in greater distress. Future research could investigate whether interventions targeting self-criticism may help to reduce distress in individuals with high levels of unhealthy perfectionism.

Analysis of Nascent Managers’ Worldviews through the Weltanschauung – Ego Questionnaire

Abstract Through the ample and interdisciplinary research “Personality and Weltanschauung”, which contains like a puzzle piece the present article, I am developing a study on the adolescent personality searching for the special treat Weltanschauung which designates and describes one's ego in symbolic form, his frame of reference, his worldview. The test sample includes 100 matriculates of the Faculty of Management, Economical Engineering in Agriculture and Rural Development within the University of Agronomic Sciences and Veterinary Medicine of Bucharest; they are attending license studies within 2012 – 2016, aged 19-22, coming from both urban and rural areas, and both genders. I applied on them four various and complementary investigative tools: 1. the personality questionnaire Weltanschauung - Ego; 2. the Smiescheck's questionnaire for pronounced predispositions; 3. a brief test on mental flexibility; 4 the projective test DAT. The personality questionnaire Weltanschauung – Ego, whose foundation structure, apology and function were described in a former article, was especially conceived for this research and the present paper represents the statistical analysis and approach of the main data gathered through it. The results showed that the interviewees come under the psychological profile of the adolescent, with the observation that 60% of subjects have modest practice regarding the logical-formal structures and systemic thinking, the ability of interpretation and assessment, planning, anticipation, prediction, critical thinking and self-critical thinking, while 40% of subjects practiced these structures and have them developed or in active developing process.

Neural representation and clinically relevant moderators of individualised self-criticism in healthy subjects

Many people routinely criticise themselves. While self-criticism is largely unproblematic for most individuals, depressed patients exhibit excessive self-critical thinking, which leads to strong negative affects. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging in healthy subjects (N = 20) to investigate neural correlates and possible psychological moderators of self-critical processing. Stimuli consisted of individually selected adjectives of personally negative content and were contrasted with neutral and negative non-self-referential adjectives. We found that confrontation with self-critical material yielded neural activity in regions involved in emotions (anterior insula/hippocampus-amygdala formation) and in anterior and posterior cortical midline structures, which are associated with self-referential and autobiographical memory processing. Furthermore, contrasts revealed an extended network of bilateral frontal brain areas. We suggest that the co-activation of superior and inferior lateral frontal brain regions reflects the recruitment of a frontal top-down pathway, representing cognitive reappraisal strategies for dealing with evoked negative affects. In addition, activation of right superior frontal areas was positively associated with neuroticism and negatively associated with cognitive reappraisal. Although these findings may not be specific to negative stimuli, they support a role for clinically relevant personality traits in successful regulation of emotion during confrontation with self-critical material.

A Changing Child in Changing World: Psychological and Educational Problems of the New School

In his Address to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation (November 2009) Dmitry Medvedev, when speaking of Our New School national educational programme, set a crucial goal which consists disclosing abilities of each student and nurturing him/her as a personality ready for life the modern world. Unfortunately, despite the huge number of works of economists, philosophers, sociologists, historians, who designate it as a global community, speculate on the transition to postcivilization, neosphere, anthropogenic civilization, and draw attention to civilization breakdown, the meaning of our world is still not disclosed.In spite of the fact that the human development and functioning have undergone changes this changing world, we know even less about the man and changes him.Despite the diversity of the researches, practice we can deal only with contradictory data, observations or views, which fix the real changes. We are faced with the difficult situation of development of a contemporary human individual.For example, on the one hand, the growth of self-awareness of a human being and development of self-critical thinking are being traced and indicated. On the other hand, uncertainty, tension and anxiety come to the fore. Instability of social, economic and ideological situation is discrediting most moral values which cause immense psychological stress. The latter influences mental and physical health of people who live the global community. These factors make people passive and indifferent.In short, nowadays social and psychological sphere have obviously changed. This can be objectively related to ongoing changes cultural and historical environment. According L.S. Vygotsky, genius of the Russian psychology, environment acts in the sense of personal development and specific human characteristics, not as furnishings, but serves as a source of development.Therefore, there arises a problem of comprehending the environment of the contemporary person. The problem focuses on how we understand what is the world around us, what kind of society we live and what are behavioural patterns and developmental features the contemporary situation, and what the requirements of this society are. In this connection it is important to quote Abraham Maslow, American psychologist: Every age but ours has had its model, its ideal ... - the saint, the hero, the gentleman, the knight, the mystic. About all we have left is the well-adjusted man without problems, a very pale and doubtful substitute.The substitute is more than ever doubtful the developing society, within the significant shifts interpersonal, intergroup relations of human individuals, including family relationships at work and their general attitude to work.We find it important to unveil the nature of mentality change, value guides, dramatic changes of cognitive and emotional sphere of people, accompanied by, inter alia, implementation of behavioural patterns which are alien to Russian culture, the consumerism, increasing indifference to the communication and, what is very alarming, general and individual psychological alienation of the adults from children, which is generating a risk of deteriorating the entire system of cultural and historical inheritance.Two or three decades ago a child belonged mainly to a small group or a social community such as a family, a class, a group of peers, Pioneer and Komsomol organizations, but always with a clear attachment to a particular adult person. Nowadays a child is placed a completely new situation with broken boundaries. While at kindergarten and junior school (Russian preschool), a child finds himself/herself submerged a boundless social space.A child's mind is influenced by the chaotic flow of information coming from the TV, the Internet, which blocks the knowledge obtained from parents, educators and teachers, and also opens up a boundless area for various forms of relationships, ties and activities. …

North Central Sociological Association 2009 Ruth and John Useem Plenary Address: Education for Democracy in Peirce, James, Dewey, and Mead

C. Wright Mills frequently referred to the tradition of sociological thinking as the intellectual foundation of the social sciences. He recognized, however, that though the classical thinkers understood the social and political structure of whole societies quite well, they had comparatively little to say about how the actual processes by which forms of social consciousness emerge. He therefore recognized the urgent need for a social psychology grounded in sound principles. Those principles, in his judgment and in mine, were best formulated by the American pragmatists: Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, John Dewey, and George Herbert Mead. It was Charles Sanders Peirce who founded the American philosophical movement called pragmatism from the Greek word pragma, meaning action, practice, practical. He introduced die term in his first published article titled, to Make Our Ideas Clear. Somewhat later, John Dewey proposed that the aim of a good democratic education is to create a questioning individual. So our primary aim is to explore the means by which we can achieve clarity in our ideas and educate ourselves and our students toward the ideal of and self-critical thinking. Peirce himself suggested that another appropriate name for his pragmatic approach is critical commonsensism, so don't be surprised if the things I have to say are commonsensical. He begins his brilliant investigation with the concept of beliefs, which, he says, are really rules for action. Our beliefs are belief-habits. And like all habits, some have good for oneself and for others, while other habits have the opposite effect. That is why our mothers urged us to learn good habits and break the bad ones. Habit and consequences are, therefore, key concepts for the pragmatists. However, long before Peirce coined the term pragmatism, the pragmatic approach was evident in the classical tradition of social and political thought. Aristotle, for example, recognized that we are not born with virtues. Nature endows us with the capacity to learn the virtues and to know how to strengthen the virtues by means of habit. How do we become good or virtuous? There is only one way, says Aristotle. We become morally virtuous by forming the good habit of acting rightly. Aristotle demonstrated that we acquire and perfect the virtues by actually practicing them. We become just by doing just acts; we become temperate by doing temperate acts; brave by doing brave acts. It is by acting in dangerous situations and forming the habit either of confidence or of fear that we become courageous or cowardly. In a word, our moral virtues are formed in close correspondence with our patterns of action or conduct. Habit, conduct, and are, therefore, directly relevant to the project of becoming questioning individuals ourselves and helping our students to become clear thinkers about the human condition. As Aristotle suggests, it may be a part of our nature to ask challenging questions, as exemplified in the conduct of young children who quite naturally ask: Why? come? Regrettably, however, although it is characteristic of children to ask good questions and to see attempts to deceive them for what they are - as did the child who recognized that the emperor had no clothes - something soon happens in too many cases that inhibits and even squelches the child's natural impulse to ask challenging questions. By the way, impulse, as we shall see, is another key concept for the pragmatists. What is it that inhibits, weakens, or even represses the child's impulse to ask good questions prompted by reflection? The best term for the inhibiting factor is, I think, ideological indoctrination. Certain ideas as dogmas or articles of faith are inculcated, which the child is taught never to question, even though such ideas are contrary to the child's best interest and contrary to the interests of the group to which the child belongs. …