NEUROPSYCHIC ADAPTATION AND SUBJECTIVE PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY OF STUDENTS IN THE CONTEXT OF THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC
Authors: Tsvetkova Nadezhda A. , Kislyakov Pavel A. , Volodarskaya Elena A. 
Published: July 2022

Background. The COVID-19 pandemic has put at risk the lives and health of both the students themselves and their relatives and friends. The changed living conditions required rapid adaptation to changes, the success of which can be determined by the level of neuropsychic adaptation and subjective psychological well-being of the individual. Most of the studies conducted in 2020-2021 show the need for psychological assistance to at least half of full-time students. In order for it to be effective and ensure the sustainability of the achieved results of personal recovery, it is necessary to identify personal prerequisites, work with which makes the goal of adaptation of students in new conditions achievable. Judging by a number of scientific publications of domestic and foreign studies, such a prerequisite is the type of attachment.

The aim of the study was to identify the influence of attachment type on neuropsychiatric adaptation and subjective psychological safety in male and female students.

Materials and methods. The sample, compiled randomly, included 130 students, 97 of them girls and 33 boys. For diagnostic purposes, the following were used: 1) “Adult attachment scale for close relationships” R. 2) Self-determination of the attachment type according to the short version of ECR-R (Chistopolskaya K.A., Mitina O.V., Enikolopov S.N., Nikolaev E.L., Semikin G.I., Chubina S.A., Ovol S.N., Drovosekov S.E.) 3) the test “Neuropsychic adaptation” by I.N. Gurvich, which allowed to distribute the student sample by levels of mental health, as well as to make a diagnostic conclusion about the general level of neuropsychic adaptation of the subjects; 4) self-assessment of the level of subjective psychological safety in the range from 1 to 7 points(R. Likert scale).

Mathematical and statistical data processing was carried out using the MS package Office Excel, IBM SPSS Statistics 23. Correlation analysis of empirical data (Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient) and comparative analysis were used (the reliability of intergroup differences was established by the Student’s t-criterion). A comparative analysis of the data was performed depending on the gender of the subjects and the type of their attachment.

Results. It was found that the “reliable” type of attachment dominates in the surveyed student sample (43.8%); the proportion of students with an anxious type was 40%, with an avoidant – 16.2%. Complete mental health was diagnosed in 29.2% of the total sample; limited mental health – in 30.8%; in 33.1% of the subjects, the probability of borderline mental pathology, neuroticism was revealed; in 6.9%, the probability of severe mental pathology. The overall level of neuropsychic adaptation was 29.8 points – this characterizes the sample as having limited mental health, but without signs of stress, maintaining neuropsychic stability; at the same time, the overall level of neuropsychic adaptation is significantly higher in the group of male students. Students with a low level of subjective psychological security (they feel in trouble; pressure, insecurity, dependence, threat; there are many things that make them feel unsafe) are in the minority (12.4%); students with a low level, tending to the average (there is something that makes them not very comfortable and safe) they make up the majority (35.4%); the proportion of students with an average (normal) level is 30.0%; with high and very high – 22.2%. At the same time, the group indicators of subjective psychological security in the male and female samples are almost equal and correspond to the average (normal) level. A close relationship has been established between the type of attachment and the level of neuropsychic adaptation and subjective psychological security of the individual, as well as with gender and age; high indicators of subjective psychological security and neuropsychic adaptation are closely related to the “reliable” type of attachment, low – with the “anxious” and especially closely with the “avoidant” types. Detected: 1) the tendency to significant differences between male and female student samples in the proportion of students with a reliable type of attachment (among male students, this proportion is greater); 2) the tendency to significant differences in the level of subjective psychological security (in the female sample, its indicator is higher); 3) statistically significant intergroup differences in the level of neuropsychiatric adaptation (male students are more adapted than female students).

Conclusion. Students with a “reliable” type of attachment, in contrast to students with “unreliable” types – avoidant and anxious, have a higher level of neuropsychiatric health, neuropsychic adaptation and subjective psychological security. Therefore, it makes sense to build psychotherapeutic and psychoprophylactic work aimed at strengthening the neuropsychiatric health of students, providing for the use of methods for the development of a “reliable” type of attachment.