Abstract: Discussions about man’s spiritual world hold a high position in Paul Ricoeur’s works on philosophy. The philosopher associates the phenomenon of spirituality with the problem of man’s subjectivity. He appeals to the analysis of man’s passions and free will as the source of man’s actions. The immanence of passions, according to the author, shows itself when it is a full element of the free will. Paul Ricoeur is concerned about applying the method of hermeneutic analysis to studying pre-reflective forms of social and cultural life. He also touches upon the problem of ambivalent feelings that man may experience. Ricoeur distinguish between sign and symbol and underlines that the symbol does not only point out at an item. Symbol reveals the hidden meaning too, and the meaning of symbol has a spiritual interpretation. The author of the present article uses the hermeneutic method in his research. At the same time, the author takes into account the phenomenological method as well. The author further develops the idea of reflexive philosophy, finds out the dependence of reflexive philosophy on Husserl phenomenology and offers the hermeneutic variant of this phenomenology. The novelty of this research article is the author’s attempt to carry out a new analysis of the phenomenon of spirituality in Paul Ricoeur’s works. The problem under review relates to the pre-reflective forms of social and cultural life. The author of the research article establishes that these are the forms of social and cultural life when the first seeds of spirituality are being born. Based on that assumption, the author compares sign and symbol and describes the ambivalent nature of man’s feelings. Special attention is paid to man’s passions as the expression of truly human features.

Keywords: man’s subjectivity, spirituality, free-will, self-reflection, self-consciousness, feeling, myth, symbol, hermeneutics, faith.

Abstract: The research article is devoted to the usage of manipulative strategies by the senior management as well as the relation between manipulation and the level of trust felt by managers towards themselves and personnel in an organization. The authors of the article establish that trust I displayed differently at different business and budgetary organizations. They prove that the heads of business organizations (small business) are mostly oriented at using manipulative strategies which is caused by the features of modern Russian business culture and the low level of trust towards themselves and their employees. The results of the research also show that among senior managers who use manipulative communication strategies, there is the prevailing number of managers with the low level of both selftrust and confidence in the organization. Trust is difficult to be built and supported. Therefore it is very important to understand what level of trust corporate relations are built upon and what factors influence such a level of trust or mistrust. The authors of the article also offer a brief description of a psychological profile of a senior manager from the point of view of his using manipulative strategies, his level of trust/mistrust towards himself/his organization based on the example of the heads of business and budgetary organizations. This is necessary to define the hidden reasons and motives of using manipulative strategies which can help to understand a specific meaning that senior managers give to their relations with the personnel.

Keywords: manipulation, manipulative strategies, self-trust and self-confidence, confidence in the organization, phenomenon of trust, psychological profile, society, manipulations, control, management system.

Abstract: The subject matter of the present research article is the analysis of Alexander Chizhevsky’s style of thinking and consciousness. The author of the article provides particular arguments proving that the great philosopher actually had the cosmic mind, the higher state of consciousness that was in detail studied, described and illustrated by the Canadian psychiatrist of the second half of XIXth century Richard Maurice Bokk. The author of the article prove her arguments through a detailed analysis of phenomenology and nature of this phenomenon (special attention is paid to Stanislav Grof’s concept of the cosmic game) as well as personal qualities and creative work of Alexander Chizhevsky. In her research the author used the following research methods: analysis of literature, comparison, synthesis, induction, deduction and generalization. The novelty of the research article is the systematic study of the style of thinking of a so-called ‘Leonardo da Vinci of XXth century’ with respect to its ‘cosmic nature’ as defined by Bokk. The author also tries to draw a parallel between Chizhevsky’s theory of space ages (most likely to be meant for Tsiolkovsky) and the concept of the cosmic game offered by Stanislav Grof. The main conclusion made by the author of the research is that the hypothesis about Alexander Chizhevsky having the ‘cosmic’ type of mind proves to be true.

Keywords: cosmic sense, cosmism, cosmic game, evolution, overcoming the borders, trans-personal approach, mysticism, Chizhevsky, Bokk, Grof.

Abstract: Cosmogonic myths have always had a direct relation to social life. Life-sustaining activity of a social organism and human beliefs symbolically conformed to the perfect, sacred, harmonious cosmos, the picture of the world that was based on primary sources and roots. That created the main function of rituals which was the restoration of the cosmic order and constant returning to the beginnings of the universe in a cyclic stream of time. Therefore understanding the beginnings and primary sources was considered to be the most important. Understanding the beginnings of the universe was associated with the energy and libido necessary for the development of the society and human. Image-based symbolic language of the predynastic culture of Ancient Egypt laid the grounds for further development of culture which was reflected in religious and mythological texts and ritual practices. Mythological images and motives of the archaic period of Ancient Egypt can be compared to archetypal images and symbols in transpersonal psychology. Thus, the image-based symbolic language of Ancient Egypt helps us to better understand archetypal images stored in the unconsciousness of the ancient and modern human.

Keywords: energy of the first creation, returning to the beginnings, understanding the primary sources, symbol, transcendent function, archetypal images, embryology, transpersonal psychology, spirituality of the Great Mother, self.

Abstract: The article addresses the need for a new direction of psychology known as “sublimation psychology”, prerequisites for the creation of which have emerged in the scientific discoveries of the last decades in the fields of psychoneuroendocrinology, psychoneurology and psychogenetics. In the context of developing sublimation psychology, we have investigated the various properties and characteristics of “Sympho-Electronic Music” (SEM) — a new musical genre, which has a strong essence impact potential. We analyze the advantages of using SEM in the deepessence psychotherapy of art-humanitarian practice (AHP), based on the implementation of the major principles and fundamental medical and psychological aspects of Essence Coding Theory (ECT). Primarily, the article uses a complex methodological concept, in which the basal toolkit of holistic meta-heuristic ECT doctrine takes a central, key position. We show a fundamental difference of sublimation psychology from all other areas of psychology, expressed by its explicit focus on the scope of various ethical attributions and aesthetic competencies implemented in AHP. In the context of developing various aspects of AHP, we introduce new concepts, such as “essence code”, “essence psycho-neuroendocrine status”, “essence R-E neuroprocessing”, “essence genome-hormonal reception”, “essence transmutation”, “vital information system”, “ethical levels”, “passionary-evolutionary ethics”, “sublimation aesthetics”, “exo-psychological control”, “dormant genomic programs”, “matrix of essence standards”, “detector of essence errors”, “code of spiritual rank”, “aestheticsublimation insight”, “immortalization index”, “noematic theurgy” and others. We have identified reasons for which the psychotechnics of art-humanitarian practice should use music created with digital technology, and especially the music of the pioneering genre SEM, closely associated with such new musicological concepts as “timbrekeeping”, “emotive typology of timbre”, “class of organs”,“sympho-electronic organ”, “sonoristic analysis”, “sonoristic matrix”, “sonoristic bench mark”, “sacral acoustics”, “coding-numeric score”, “coding-numeric aesthetics”, etc.

Keywords: passionary-evolutionary ethics, noematic theurgy, aesthetic-sublimation insight, sympho-electronic music, essence coding theory, art-humanitarian practice, sublimation psychology, spiritual rank code, immortalization index, coding-numeric score.

Abstract: The subject matter of the present research article is the nature of human love as expressed in Plato’s philosophy. Plato viewed love as one’s desire to restore his integrity and become complete. The same idea was raised again by the followers of humanistic psychology such as Erich Fromm, Gordon Allport, Karen Horney, Harry Sullivan and others. The author of the present article describes different forms of love and touches upon the issue of emotional ‘poverty’ of a modern human compared to, for example, an ancient Greek. The author also underlines that new forms of neurotic love have been appearing lately. According to the author, this is the result of the invasion of market relations into the most intimate spheres of human life. In her research, depending on a set goal, the author uses general scientific methods of research such as the method of comparative analysis, synthesis, structured method and systems method. The scientific novelty of this research article is the discussion of Plato’s concept of love developed by neo-Freudianism which allowed to see the phenomenon of love in the ‘humanistic’ dimension. The author also emphasizes the fact that the representatives of humanistic psychology made a significant contribution to the studies of the phenomenon of love apart from their contribution to the development of the concepts of personality, individuality and value of human. Love exists in different forms so we can say it may have different expressions depending on the historical epoch, but the main motive of love has always been the longing for the lost integrity and the desire to overcome the feeling of existential loneliness and feel completed again in the union with the other person. However, a modern human has rather poor emotions and this leads to creation of new neurotic expressions of love where true feelings are replaced with the importance of market relations. For the first time in a long period of humanistic psychology the author attracts our attention to the topic of love again and restores the concept of love as the way to overcome the main problem of human existence based on the experience of the modern society.

Keywords: humanistic psychology, philosophical anthropology, love, human, essay, being, existence, integrity, social character, human nature, emotional world.

Abstract: The article is devoted to the basic trends and approaches to studying professional culture of design engineers. Professional culture of design engineers is viewed from the point of view of disciplinary and general methodological approaches which provides grounds for creating a methodological construct necessary for researching the actual status of professional culture in the modern Russian society and understanding possibilities of its transformation into the innovative type of culture. Analysis of existing approaches makes it possible to conclude that there are certain theoretical and methodological issues in interpreting professional culture. Each approach views only one side of professional culture and focuses only one certain aspects which creates different definitions of professional culture. The author of the article views the following approaches to studying professional culture: philosophical, cultural, personality-oriented, value-oriented, social and psychological, spiritual and moral, professional and activity-based, professional and stratificational and others. In this regard, the author makes an attempt to view professional culture from different points of view. Based on the above mentioned theoretical and methodological provisions and in accordance with the listed signs of engineering as a profession, the author clarifies the definition of ‘professional culture of design engineers’. The approaches defined by the author play a principal role for methodology and worldview because they create different coordinates for understanding and studying professional culture of design engineers.

Keywords: psychology, professionalism, culture, design engineers, approaches to studying, interpretation, special features, researches, construct, transformation.

Abstract: Personal and motivational aspects of students studying in traditional face-to-face system and distance education system: As the popularity of distance higher education has been growing rapidly all over the world, the importance of understanding psycho-pedagogical issues of learners studying in distance education has been growing too. In this article an attempt has been made to present findings of a dissertation research on various psycho-pedagogical components like self-actualization, self-regulation, locus of control, achievement motivation, and academic performance. Research methodology: A number of scientific methods such as colligation, comparison, theoretical analysis of philosophy, pedagogical and psychological literature, regulation and guidance documents issued by the government of Russian Federation; empirical methods: observation, discussion, interview, test, questionnaire; psychological methods: test and questionnaire. Psychological tests: To reveal personal characteristics of students following tests, well-accepted and widely used in Russia and other countries, are used: Self-actualization Test (adapted and modified version of Personal Orientation Inventory developed by Everett Shostrom (Aloshina, Gozman, Jagik and Kruz); Locus of control (basedon Rotter but adapted and modified for using in Russia) (Bajhina, Golinika, Atkin); Self-regulated behavior by Marasanova. A test originally developed Ryan and Yakunin but modified by Badmaeva has been used to diagnose academic motivation of students. A test developed by А.А.Реана. “motivation to success or feature of failure” has been used for diagnosing achievement motivation level of students. The study reveals influence of the following psychological characteristics of students studying in the face-to face and distance education: the student of the both forms of education show a similar pattern of personal development for the following characteristics: self-esteem and self-actualization value; distance learners exhibit higher level of self-actualization and internal locus of control but no significant difference is found in the level of self-regulated behavior. Achievement motivation is higher for distance learners; significant correlation exists between achievement motivation and various indicators of personal development of students of the both forms of education.

Keywords: self-actualization, self-regulation, locus of control, achievement motivation, academic performance, distance education, face-to-face, academic motivation, psycho-pedagogical aspects, personal development characteristics.

Abstract: The author of this research article offers her own research method for studying the relation between peculiarities of one’s subjective picture of life path and personal creativity for the purpose of developing recommendations on how to train successful, in a wise sense, personalities. The first stage of developing such a method was to form a group of respondents to be tested. The main idea was to analyze relations between creativity peculiarities and the subjective picture of life path demonstrated by successful respondents. The second stage was to select the methods of testing respondents. Based on tests selected, the author has prepared an easy to fill in questionnaire and detailed instructios. In other words, the main idea was to statistically generalize the experience of successful (and, consequently, creative) personalities in building their life paths. In order to make respondents give honest answers to the questions, the author has undertaken certain measures to keep their answers confidential.

Keywords: methods, subjective picture of life path, creativity, personal creativity, divergent thinking, significant event, success, biographic questionnaire, cause-consequence analysis, purpose analysis.

Abstract: Based on the theoretical analysis, the author of the article shares her views on psychological assistance at schools as the way to help a child be ready for studying at school. Analyzing the role of psychological assistance in the educational process, its goals and efficiency criteria as well as peculiarities of certain measures undertaken by a teacher to help a child get more successful at school, the author of the article suggests that w should view psychological readiness for school as the purpose and subject matter of psychological assistance. Psychological readiness for school consists of the following components: cognitive, emotional and motivational. Methodological grounds of this research involve the activity approach to teaching. According to this approach, child’s development consists of different stages of his activity. The author’s approach to psychological school ability allows to prove that even though the main indication for psychological assistance involves only the cognitive component (usually, school failures), psychological assistance should be aimed at motivational and emotional components in the first place in order to increase efficiency of the future education.

Keywords: working with cognitive abilities, psychological readiness, defense reactions, motivational readiness, emotional readiness, cognitive readiness, willingness to work with a psychologist, attitude to learning, the purpose of psychological work, education.

Abstract: The author of the article describes the results of using the behavioral technique ‘step by step’ in psychological counseling of parents. The purpose of the research is to prove effectiveness of the aforesaid technique in counseling. Even though the technique was initially created for therapy with families who have a sick child, it meets all the requirements set forth for psychological counseling. The author of the article analyzes how the technique can be used at different stages of counseling. She also defines factors that are necessary for using certain mechanisms of the behavioral technique depending on the parenting style. The research involved parents who were the clients of a psychologist. In the course of the experiment, the author of the research article compared the two groups of respondents. The aforesaid technique of behavioral psychotherapy was applied in the first group of respondents while the second group consisted of parents who were given only recommendations. The results of the research show that parents can actually demonstrate changes in their parenting style and self-conception if they systematically analyze undesired child’s reactions and their own system of requirements. The main psychotherapeutic effects included realization, distancing and restructuring. The aforesaid technique proves to correspond to the main principles of psychological counseling of parents and satisfy their need for help and assistance.

Keywords: age-related psychological counseling, behavioral psychotherapy, parenting style, undesired child’s reaction, activity, involvement, reinforcement, distancing, realization, restructuring.

Abstract: The article is dedicated to the memory of a famous philosopher, psychologist, member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Psychology, professor and a legendary person Vladimir Petrovich Zinchenko.

Keywords: psychology, philosophy, in memorium, Vladimir Petrovich Zinchenko.