Background: The human ability to adapt to extreme environments is fascinating. Research into this adaptation has been lacking in Arctic isolated teams because it has concentrated on Antarctic teams. The hazards of the poles often confine the researchers indoors with their colleagues, reducing their privacy. This deployment also limits their contact with loved ones at home. Subsequently, over the course of polar night, rates of anxiety, depression, irritability and sleep disturbance increase (Suedfeld & Palinkas, 2008). Often, the teams complain of cognitive impairments. The High Arctic’s distinctive feature is the polar bear. The presence of bears requires Arctic research station teams to handle fire arms for their personal safety. It also means that fire arms – which are highly restricted in the Antarctic – are ever-present and easily accessible at Arctic stations. This poses a unique psychological challenge for these teams which has not been well-researched. Methodology: This thesis is an original contribution to science in that it employs a mixed-methods approach combining phenomenological interviews, cognitive testing and mental health assessment via questionnaires with a team spending a year at the Polish Polar Station, Hornsund, Svalbard. The participants were ten of the eleven winter team members who spent the year between July 2015 and June 2016 at Hornsund (“Explorers”) and an age-/gender-/education-matched control group (“Controls”). They filled in the Symptom Checklist-90-Revised and the Profile of Mood States-Brief Version in July, September, January, April and June of that year. Cognitive testing was completed in September, January and June; it comprised the Figural Learning and Memory Test, the Sustained Attention to Response Task (SART), the elevator tasks of the Test of Everyday Attention (TEA) and the Raven Standard Progressive Matrices. The interviews took place at the same time as the cognitive testing. Results: The results showed that the most stressful time reported in the questionnaires was April 2016, just after the winter isolation had ended and the sun had risen again. The Explorers reported little subjective complaints about their cognition but they performed near-ceiling on the TEA while scoring far below their Controls on the SART. This implies a dichotomy between sustained attention and inhibition in the Explorers. Their lived experiences were shaped by a struggle to adapt to the other team members rather than by struggling to adapt to the hazardous environment. The environment was perceived as awe-inspiring. Over time, the Explorers shifted their view of the team from informal colleagues to a family which they did not choose to be a member of and then, to friends. Unanimously, other people were seen as the most difficult aspect of the mission. Conclusions: This thesis provides unique insight into a non-Anglo-Saxon Arctic wintering team: the conclusions suggest that participants should receive social training to get along better and be emotionally prepared. The findings can be implemented by my research partner, the Institute of Geophysics (Warsaw) to better select and prepare their future expeditions to Hornsund. Some of the insights such as the nature of the interpersonal stressors may be applicable to space missions.

Tyrimo problemos aktualumas: Gyvenant permainų ir reformų visuomenėje daugiau dėmesio skiriama vaikų ir jaunuolių socialinių, asmeninių įgūdžių ugdymui. Seimo patvirtintas Lietuvos Respublikos Švietimo įstatymas (2003) nurodo, kad, įgyvendinamos Gyvenimo įgūdžių ugdymo (2004), Našlaičių ir tėvų globos netekusių vaikų savarankiško gyvenimo įgūdžių ugdymo (2007), Našlaičių ir tėvų globos netekusių vaikų rėmimo ir integravimo į visuomenę 2005 – 2008 metų programos, Bendrosios programos ir Išsilavinimo standartai (2003), Vaikų globos įstaigų tinklo optimizavimo planas (2007 m. spalio mėn. 11d. Nr. A1-282), iškelia būtinybę ugdyti savimi pasitikinčius, komunikabilius, įvairius gyvenimo sunkumus įveikti gebančius jaunuolius ir sudaryti tinkamas asmens socialinio integravimosi į visuomenę sąlygas. Socialinių įgūdžių lavinimas padeda asmeniui prisitaikyti socialinėje aplinkoje ir kartu gerinti aplinkos sąlygas siekiant užtikrinti sėkmingą funkcionavimą. Darbo naujumas ir reikšmingumas. Pateikti vaikų, gyvenančių globos namuose, ir vaikų, augančių biologinėse šeimose, socialinių įgūdžių charakteristikos skirtumai reikšmingi socialiniams pedagogams, socialiniams darbuotojams dirbantiems mokykloje ir globos namuose bei norintiems efektyvinti darbą socialinių įgūdžių srityje. Pritaikyta socialinių įgūdžių tyrimo metodika, padedanti tiksliau apibrėžti socialinių įgūdžių raiškos ypatumus. Tyrimo objektas: globos namų auklėtinių socialinių įgūdžių ugdymas (is). Tyrimo tikslas: atskleisti... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The topicality of the problem of the research. In the society of changes and reforms the training of social, personal skills is paid more and more attention. The Decree of Education of Lithuanian Republic, ratified by Seimas (2003), pointed out that such current programmes as the Programme of the Training of the Life Skills (2004), the Programme of the Training of the Self-sufficient Life of the Children-Orphans (2007), the programme of the Maintenance and Integration into society of Children-Orphans of the years 2005-2008, General Programmes and Standards of Education (2003), the Plan of Organization of the System of Children Foster Institutions raised the necessity to educate self-confident, communicative children, who are able to overcome the difficulties of the life and to create suitable conditions for the social integration of the person into society. The training of the social skills helps the person to conform in a social environment and to improve the surrounding conditions in order to warrant successful work. The newness and the importance of the work. The differences of the characteristics of social skills between children, living in Children Home and children, living in their families are introduced in this work. They are important for social pedagogues, social workers, who work at school or Children Home as well as for those who want to improve their work in the field of social skills. The object of the researches: the training of social skills of children... [to full text]

The introduced diploma thesis is of theoretical-practical character and deals with a theme of the personality-social training in the first two years of school education. The first synthetic part deals with general theoretical resources of the PST and also with psychological specificities of the early-middle chidhood in connection with the personality-social skills training. In the second practice-oriented part are executed examples of three specific programmes which present three possible ways of an implementation of the PST themes in school education. The programmes result from principles and pieces of knowledge described in the first part of the thesis.