Psycholinguistic features of proverbs and sayings about human security practicestices
Authors:   Moscow State Linguistic University, Tylets Valery G. , Krasnianskaya Tatiana M. ,   Moscow University for the Humanities
Published: December 2024

Society is focused on the transfer from generation to generation of accumulated experience that allows a person to survive in difficult conditions. Family institutions and the educational system provide knowledge and skills that underlie effective and safe behavior in various spheres of life. At the same time, cases of behavioral inefficiency, injuries and deaths caused by non-compliance with safety requirements are steadily reproducing in all social spheres. One of the reasons for this is the lack of persuasiveness of texts with broadcast safety standards, associated, at least, with their bulkiness, emotional and value indifference, suggestive neutrality.
In the search for samples of materials that would allow overcoming such shortcomings, it seems promising to turn to paremic material, primarily folk proverbs and sayings. Safety as a universal value is organically represented in the paroemias. Proverbs and sayings about security represent a model of successful translation of the experience of preserving human security and overcoming dangerous situations. The study of their content and design method can identify approaches that improve the quality of presentation of safety standards in other texts.
The purpose of this study was to identify the psycholinguistic features of a group of proverbs and sayings that define human security practices. By security practices, we understood a set of methods, methods and techniques for ensuring (preserving, restoring, increasing) human security in universal and specifically defined life situations. The paroemias, represented by the relevant subject proverbs and sayings, contain explicit or figuratively mediated recommendations for the implementation of safety practices. The research hypothesis was based on the assumption that, in addition to the lexical organization that stimulates adherence to certain security practices, this subject group of paroemias is characterized by a targeted focus on the characteristics of the subject of their perception.
The study was conducted on young people aged 19-20 years, students of a number of metropolitan and regional universities in Russia, with a total number of 100 people. The main method of collecting empirical material was an associative experiment. The results were processed by means of cognitive, semantic and content analysis with the
involvement of experts. Based on the results of the study, an array of proverbs and
sayings about security practices has been built, including 141 varieties. A general analysis of the obtained array of subject parodies shows that proverbs and sayings about security practices include texts that not only contain the key categories “danger”, “risk”, “enemy”, “fear”, “courage”, usually associated with the basic categories for the subject area “danger” and “security”, but also categories that have a figurative meaning. The content of security practices is conveyed to the subjects in various ways. Proverbs and sayings about security practices can contain both direct indications of recommended actions and encourage them using various linguistic means. The constructed array of paremias about security practices does not have a semantic core, however, it has sufficiently pronounced near and far peripheries, which indicates that the relevant proverbs and sayings are not included in the arsenal of frequent use, but are quite firmly rooted in the subjective experience of respondents. Their motivation to comply with the recommendations presented in the safety practices guidelines is carried out by various linguistic means. Proverbs and sayings describing security practices, for the most part, focus on the generalized subject of perception. Such addressing not only distributes the instructions/recommendations contained in them to the maximum possible number of consumers, but also expresses some command to be executed without long-term reflection on the necessary behavior. Thus, the greatest closeness with the subject of the perception of the paremia is achieved, his involvement in the presentation, which allows to reduce social distance and minimize the consumption of time, usually scarce in dangerous situations. The paremias of this group presuppose the unquestioning acceptance by the subject of perception of the recommendations embedded in them, which is quite acceptable in certain circumstances. The same purpose is served by the sufficient conciseness of this group of paroemias, in which nouns, verbs and adverbs predominate, giving a mini-algorithm of safety practice, and adjectives are minimized, ensuring emotionality of perception.
The form of “you are the address” was not universal for proverbs and sayings in the field of security. A significant proportion of indirect appeals in these subject parodies are aimed at more independent subjects. Addressing someone more or less abstract, as it were, moves them away from the subject of perception and gives the latter the opportunity to observe from the side the behavior of some others in threatening circumstances, assessing the effect achieved as suitable or unsuitable for themselves. There is a weakening of the pressure on the subject, which is characteristic of “you-conversion”. The lack of granularity of the addressee and the use of “they-address” leave enough room for him to identify his possible behavior with the described behavior. It can be assumed that, along with the transfer of some security practice, such proverbs and sayings solve the tasks of “adjusting” to the subject of their perception, “recommending” or “condemning” certain behavioral/personality traits, or “narrowing” the field of addressees, stipulating the conditions for the occurrence of some consequences.
In addition, the content of the characteristics makes the text more vivid, evoking an emotional response, and, consequently, memorable. Proverbs can be distinguished, the lexical means of design of which are probably focused on better perception by 4 types of recipients with developed intuition, emotions, feelings or thinking. The study confirmed the initial assumption and allowed us to make assumptions that require further empirical verification.