Psychology And Psychology. Episode Three

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Continuing the series of articles, I decided to introduce readers to a person who is rightfully an honored specialist in the field of psychology and psychodiagnostics. I present to your attention a well-known psychologist, doctor of psychological sciences, professor, specialist in the field of medical psychology, personality psychology and psychodiagnostics, academician of the National Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of Ukraine, head of the Department of Psychodiagnostics and Clinical Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - Burlachuk Leonid Fokich. In addition to all of the above, Leonid Fokich is the president of the All-Ukrainian Psychodiagnostic Association, the author of many works on clinical psychology and psychodiagnostics, as well as the author of a popular dictionary-reference book on psychological diagnostics.

Journalist: Leonid Fokich, please tell me how you came to psychodiagnostics?

L. F.: I have been doing psychodiagnostics for a fairly long period of time. In this area of science I was led by the complete absence of such in the former Soviet Union. At that time, there was a very primitive idea of what psychodiagnostics should do. Almost no one did this, and if they did, then gross mistakes were made due to ignorance of elementary things. There is also a historical reason for this. In 1936, psychodiagnostics was banned and until the mid-70s did not exist in the Soviet Union as a line of research. That is why at one time I began to engage in this very direction.

What can you say today about the achievements of psychodiagnostics and the accuracy of the data obtained?

Let's start with the fact that psychodiagnostics is not an independent science. In many ways, successes and achievements in this area are associated with the solution of general psychological problems. In order to measure and get the maximum result from the application of methods, it is important to understand what exactly we are going to measure. Here it is important to look for new approaches in connection with the development of the general volume of psychological knowledge. Psychodiagnostics works with the so-called middle-level theories. That is, it acts as a connecting link. Today, the situation with the development of psychodiagnostic tools is gradually improving. If earlier it was more of an intuitive work of a psychologist, now it is a fairly large empirical work that allows you to get information about the validity and reliability of psychodiagnostic techniques.

Moving on to the topic "psychology and psychology" I ask you to describe the criteria that you think a real psychologist should have?

Of course, working with a person is extremely different from, say, working with a machine. Indeed, there are certain qualities that a real psychologist should have. We can talk about this for a long time, but I want to emphasize perhaps the main criterion in the work of a person who proudly calls himself a psychologist is objectivity.

Leonid Fokich, what can you say about such a phenomenon as false psychology? How common is it today

A person is inclined to fall into the hands of scammers due to excessive gullibility. There are many reasons here: ignorance of the real situation in society, in science, banal lack of education. This creates conditions for people to be seen by false psychologists. I cannot say that this phenomenon is very widespread in Ukraine, but I must note that pseudo-psychologists in Ukraine, Europe and Russia really occupy a certain niche. To such a phenomenon as false psychology I am sharply negative. Their activities can have fatal consequences not only for patients, but also for academic science in general.

Thank you for your sincere response. I suggest you now conduct a so-called linguistic examination. I will cite a number of statements and ask you, as an expert, to comment on each of them. You will find out the last name of the author of these statements at the end of the interview. In my opinion, this approach will provide maximum objectivity

Well, let's give it a try.

Statement # 1: "Diagnostics using the Szondi test is quite simple."

I disagree. Diagnosis using the Szondi test is not easy at all. Knowledge of depth psychology and, of course, many years of practice are extremely important here.

Statement # 2: "Szondi's test results are sometimes incredibly accurate."

Sometimes the fortune-telling of a gypsy woman or the conclusions of a graphologist are also surprisingly accurate. The accuracy of the test results is manifested not by trying on this conclusion, but by its validity and validity over time. The selection of such pseudo-psychological conclusions indicates that there is a certain basis of behavior that is inherent in 99% of the population. It is on this that they play and place bets.

Statement # 3: "The Szondi test is viewed as an abbreviated fate analysis."

I disagree. We can call the whole theory of Leopold Szondi in the complex by fate analysis. There can be no abbreviations here. I want to note: Sigmund Freud spoke about the individual unconscious. Carl Jung spoke of the collective unconscious. And such a concept as the generic unconscious is a necessary gap between these two levels of the unconscious. It was Leopold Szondi who introduced this concept, and this is his great merit.

Statement # 4: "To understand how the Szondi test works, study the morphogenetic resonance hypothesis."

I disagree. Morphogenetic resonance concerns Rupert Sheldrake's theory, which has nothing to do with fate analysis.

Statement # 5: "The choice of color cards is a fateful analytical diagnosis."

There are no color cards in Leopold Szondi's test. This statement is not true.

Statement # 6: "Passing the Szondi test, a person has a dramatic plot in his head and selects characters from life for this drama."

I do not agree with this statement. Working with the Szondi test is based on choice. When passing the test, the examinee makes his choice unconsciously.

Thank you for such an objective and impartial linguistic expertise. It is worth noting that the author of these statements is Tsyganok Igor Ivanovich - a psychotherapist, a narcologist who works in such areas as psychoanalytic and fate-analytical psychotherapy

I plan to revise and republish a guide to psychological diagnostics. I am also engaged in adaptation of the most famous foreign techniques, created, alas, not yet in Ukraine, in cooperation with the "OS Ukraine" division. This work is very important and extremely time consuming. The reason is that we did not get the tools that are in the West today. To some extent, we all have to start over. The adaptation of MMP-I 2 has been completed. This is a rather powerful tool that we have recently been using in professional selection for the police and other law enforcement agencies. Also in the final phase is the adaptation of the test to determine the level of intellectual development of children. In addition, I, as before, teach at the university, teach students and prepare graduate students. Also, practical work is underway to select various groups of the population in terms of their professional suitability.

At the end of the article, I would like to thank Leonid Fokich for an extremely informative conversation. I am sure that every reader will be able to draw quite a lot of practical conclusions for himself. WITH Leonid Fokich we have planned a whole series of interviews so to be continued …