CONCEPTUAL SUBSTANTIATION OF THE CONCEPTS OF “LIFE CRISIS” AND “CRISIS SITUATIONS” IN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH

Abstract

The article examines the conceptual substantiation of the concepts of “crisis”, “life crisis”, “crisis state” and “crisis situations” in socio-psychological research. The theoretical study reveals the essence of these terms, in particular, the authors define a life/normative crisis as a crisis condition that occurs when a person faces a frustrating situation and does not have the appropriate resources, or subjectively perceives that there are no resources to overcome it, and therefore a person cannot effectively cope with an important life problem. A crisis state is defined as a normal reaction of the body to a crisis situation, accompanied by a high degree of stress, anxiety; depression, apathy, mental exhaustion, emotional imbalance, etc. In turn, a crisis situation is defined as a situation of obstacles to an individual on the way to realizing important life goals, when a person cannot overcome this situation using the usual methods. The article also describes the classification of crises, constructive and destructive strategies for overcoming life crises, the causes of their occurrence, the main markers of crises, and the stages of life crises (superficial, medium, and deep crises). The main indicators of a person’s crisis state are presented, and the types of personality attitudes to crisis situations are described, namely, ignoring, exaggerating, demonstrative, voluntaristic, and productive. The article is aimed at an in-depth understanding of the psychological dimension of life crises and crisis situations, their impact on the individual in the social context and is the basis for the development of effective interventions for constructive coping with life crises.