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This new series of epigraphical notes (continuous numbering) suggests corrections concerning the reading, restoration and interpretation of five Greek and Latininscriptions and two Byzantine seals. 18. Improved edition of a newly published inscription from Kalos Limen (SAPRYKIN & KUTAJSOV 2015). 19. The sequence ΕΟΡΤΗ in a fragmentary inscription from Istros/Histria (BÂLTÂC & BOTTEZ 2007-2008) should be taken as a PN, Ἑόρτη , not as ἑορτή ,“festival”. 20. In the inscription ILS 8851 = IGR I 623 = ISM II 106 χώρτης Ἐσπάνων (sic) should be corrected into χώρτης εʹ Σπανῶν , i.e. cohortis V Hispanorum. 21. New edition and commentary on the inscription CIL III 7547 from Tomis (4th century AD), not included in ISM II. 22. Restoration of a formula which seems to be typical for Christian epitaphs in the6th century AD in IGLR 51, fr. b: κα[λ ς / ἤλθ]ατε κα[ὶ | καλ] ς ὑπάε[τε | καὶ] εὔξα[σθεὑ|πὲρ ἐμ]ο[ῦ]. Suggestion for the restoration of the whole inscription. 23. Improved reading of the legend on the reverse of two seals from Tomis: prae/f(ecto) insu/lar(um), not pri[m](i)/singu/lar(i), as in ed. pr. (A. BARNEA 1986, p. 134-135, no. 1). The owner, a certain Theodoros, also known through five other seals, was a praefectus of the quaestura Iustiniana exercitus created by emperor Justinian I.
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Changes currently taking place in rural areas in Poland are in line with the concept of “smart villages”, which emphasizes the importance of knowledge and innovative activities for the functioning of contemporary rural local communities and the development of rural areas. Referring to the issue of the local community, the article presents the image of the inhabitants of the village of Czarny Las, paying attention to the specificity of this community. In the empirical dimension, the main goal of the authors is to verify the thesis about the dependence between knowledge about one’s own town place of living and involvement in local matters on the example of a specific rural community, as well as to determine the factors affecting both dimensions. For this purpose, indicators concerning the individual knowledge and commitment of the inhabitants of the village of Czarny Las in the commune of Grodzisk Mazowiecki, were created and used. Age, sex, education, time of residence in the examined town and formal registration status were assumed as predictors of both knowledge about one’s own village and involvement in its current affairs. In order to determine the statistical significance of the predictors of the inhabitants’ knowledge about the village and their involvement in it, the multiple regression analysis was used.
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The rapidly spreading COVID-19 pandemic caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (2019-nCoV) has led to an educational transformation of traditional academic activities in distance learning through intensive digital communication in an electronic environment. So we witnessed how universities in Bulgaria and around the world were forced to start using with flexibility different types of communication software applications, electronic and learning platforms and/or cloud platforms in their work environment for remote classroom management (Microsoft Teams, Skype, Zoom, G Suite, Viber, Facebook & Messenger, Google Classroom, Blackboard, Moodle, Dropbox, OneDrive, etc.). Unfortunately, the lack of direct contact between students and lecturers during classes in the process of distance learning had a direct impact on the level of student motivation. The long period of implementation of distance learning measures has shown that the effectiveness of distance learning directly depends on the conscious motivation of the learners. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to study a model related to increasing the motivation of students during distance learning. The results of the research have been used to propose specific recommendations for increasing the motivation of university students during the educational process.
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The article presents a study of the levels of perceived stress and strategies for coping with it during the first lockdown on the spread of COVID-19 infection in Bulgaria. The survey was conducted through a survey using online questionnaires through social media software - KwikSurveys. The periods of conducting the two waves of research during the first lockdown are March 22-28, 2020 (N=695) and April 25 - May 2, 2020 (N=456). These results fit into the paradigm outlined by Lazarus. The methods used include the Constructive Thinking Inventory (Epstein, 1998, Bulgarian adaptation Karastoyanov, 2018) and the Perceived Stress Scale (Cohen, Kamarck, Mermelstein, 1983, Bulgarian adaptation Karastoyanov, Hristova, 2000). The data from the study on the negative correlation between constructive thinking and perceived stress show that the constructive thinking questionnaire can be a good predictor of the level of stress experienced during a crisis. More frequent use of emotional and behavioral coping as the two most important components of constructive thinking, expressing the ability to deal with the inner world of feelings and the outside world of events, and less frequent use of components of destructive thinking (e.g. personal superstitious thinking) are associated with experiencing lower levels of stress.
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This article evaluates the psychometric properties of the Brief Resilience Scale (BRS) in Bulgarian. BRS is 6-item self-report scale used for assessing resilience (Smith, Dalen, Wiggins, Tooley, Christopher & Bernard 2008). The ‘resilience’ construct is seen as ‘ability to bounce back’ from adverse events. The study with 413 respondents in two samples is conducted and exploratory factor analysis revealed the evidences of single-factor structure in both samples. The internal consistency of the scale in two samples is satisfactory (Cronbach’s alpha: α=.856 and α=.865).
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The COVID-19 pandemic and the measures introduced to contain it have created a new social reality in which people continue their lives in ways that for many are different from the previous routine. Spatial mobility is one of the most affected areas of everyday life and an integral part of the sociocultural dimensions of this crisis. According to some observations, restricted movement during the state of emergency in the country additionally activates these processes, prompting some people to seek more spatial freedom in rural areas. This article observes and analyses the urban-rural migration within the context of the current coronavirus crises, based on ethnographic materials, commented alongside information from secondary sources - statistics, sociological surveys, analysis of the real estate market, and materials from print and electronic media.
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The present study explores the pictorial emotional Strup test with children of typical development from three age groups. The objective is to explore the factors that influence the processes of selective attention and interference of irrelevant information in the processing of emotional stimuli by children (N=161) in the age period 7-12 years. The results show that the reaction latency to stimuli with emotional content is significantly shorter than those of emotionally neutral stimuli. A comparison of response latency to emotional stimuli with different valence shows that it is significantly shorter in the case of positive emotions than in the case of negative emotional expressions. The expectation of age differences about decreasing the response latency to stimuli was confirmed, which is associated with the development of executive functions, attention resources and the ability to control motor response, etc.
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118 children ranging from 3 years and 10 months to 4 years and 4 months old and 118 children ranging from 5 years and 11 months to 6 years and 3 months old were studied with a Facial Emotion Recognition Task (FERT) with the aim to verify the hypothesis that emotion recognition abilities develop during the period of preschool age. The test required children to recognize the facial emotion expressions of the six basic emotions (anger, sadness, fear, disgust, surprise and happiness) based on naming them orally by the experimenter one by one. The results showed significant differences in the performance of facial emotion recognition task between 3-4 year old and 5-6 year old typically developing children, suggesting age-related improvement of the overall accuracy in facial emotion recognition, as well as of the recognition accuracy for all studied emotion categories, with significantly most prominent positive change for sadness and disgust, and the weakest change for happiness.
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Attachment styles play a pivotal role in psychological research. Researchers indicates that a big part of the analysis how adult attachment theory is functioning in others is based on the patterns and models acquired and begun during childhood and the relationship with parents (Fraley & Shaver, 2000) The present article focuses on a cross cultural study conducted between two samples – Bulgarian (N=150) and United Kingdom (N=120) populations. Attachment Styles were measured by items from the Adult Style Questionnaire (ASQ). The results have a theoretical and a practical implication – although preliminary, our empirical evidence demonstrates significant cultural differences in the attachment preferences: the UK respondents are showing signs of anxiety to be in a relationship and having some difficulty in sharing feelings with others. There are also more likely to show more signs of strong dependence, unlike the BG representatives who are showing higher results in Confidence and lower in Attachment anxiety.
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Organizational climate is a multi-dimensional construct strongly related with organizational effectiveness. The article reveals the main conceptual aspects of the construct and distinguishes it from the related concept of Organizational culture. After that presents a methodology for measuring Organizational climate, based on one of the established theories, created by Lawrence James and Alan Jones. The methodology introduces a very applicable tool, customized according to the features of the business organizations operating in Bulgaria. The approbation procedure is based on a sample consisting 308 respondents, employees who work in different sectors such as machinery production, IT, healthcare etc. Report shows good reliability and validity of the questionnaire and make a strong appeal for its practical application.
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The main purpose of this research paper is to explore the alternative forms of behavior within the organizations as well as factors that influence their occurrence. The model of Van Dyne, Graham and Dienesch for the “active citizenship syndrome” is followed (Van Dyne, Graham & Dienesch, 1994). The accent is put on the voluntary and prosocial character of different actions of the employees in the organizations. Three types of citizenship behavior are analyzed – participation, obedience and loyalty. The results of the research with 359 specialists from different sectors have good psychometric characteristics. The values for all three behavioral forms are within the mean: obedience (М=3,25, SD=0,70); participation (M=3,10, SD=0,67); loyalty (М=2,89, SD=0,63). From the demographic and positional factors, more influential are the age, education, total working experience and the sector. The human resources management approaches are also analyzed as well as their relation with the occurrence of civic virtues. Key strategic orientations in HRM turn to be building trust between employee and organization, organizational structure, learning and development opportunities, the perception of the role and the function of the HR specialist and the formation of the remuneration. The results have practical implications by directing and provoking activeness and initiative in the employees as well as increasing the effectiveness of the work of the HRM specialists, organizational consultants, managers of different levels in the hierarchy, etc.
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The current article presents the results of the re–test procedure applied to Personality Inventory for DSM–5 Brief Form (PID–5–BF, Krueger et al., 2013) with two random samples. The first sample consists undergraduate students of the Sofia High School of Mathematics at 10 to 18 years old, while the second sample is consisted of Bulgarian citizens aged at 9 to 59 years old. The aim of the study is to reconfirm the accuracy, bandwidth and sensitivity of the inventory after wording adjustments of three statements that have been made to. Some of the already published key correlates of PID–5–BF indicators were attested. The self–assessment measures demonstrates high levels of consistency, and the latent structure of the indicators is almost completely confirmed by the data obtained in the exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. New findings are also contribute to the nomological network extension process and the breadth and fidelity of measurements are confirmed. During the analysis was found that some of the expected adjustment and dysfunctional traits are moderately to strongly interrelated. A useful profiling model of two participants’ cases considering the psychological counseling of level of behavioral and emotional disfunctions experienced during the period of second and third Sars-Cov-2 spreading.
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The study presents a review of the scientific literature in the fields of life planning and application of calendar methods in social research. The essence and the origin of the calendar approaches are considered; an analysis of the advantages and challenges for researchers is presented. The current trends in the field are outlined, as well as recommendations for the design and procedures when working with calendars. Contribution to the field is the analysis of the applicability of calendar methods to research in the realm of migration and life planning. The connections between life planning and other constructs are traced. Special focus is put on the potential of the calendar approaches in the field of socio-psychological research and in particular in the study of psychological determinants of significant life choices.
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The article presents research with Roma children from Bulgaria and the development of the Theory of Mind. In two studies (n = 60) with children aged 3 to 6 years, children were tested with tests for so-called False Belief Task. The first study was conducted with 30 rural children, and the second study was conducted with 30 urban children living in a large city (capital). In both groups the children are natural bilinguals, they do not attend kindergarten, and in both cases the Bulgarian language as a second language for them is learned at home. In the first study, children were offered 4 tests for False belief, and in the second study, two tests for False belief and two language tests were offered. The aim of the author is to identify the factors that support the early acquisition of the Theory of Mind by Roma children and to experiment to what extent the knowledge of interrogative sentences with the mental verb to want and the grammatical category of evidentiality influence the development of the theory of mind in bilingual Roma children. The results clearly show that Roma children who grow up in large Roma families in which 2-3 generations coexist acquire the Theory of Mind earlier (between 3-4 years of age) than English-speakingmonolingual children who acquire the Theory of Mind between 4-5 years of age. The reason for this is that in large Roma families children hear different registers and everyone talks to the children with complex linguistic structures, which turn out to be very important for mastering the Theory of Mind. The results of the second study did not confirm the expectation that there was a statistically significant correlation between the interrogative sentences and the evidentiality and the tests for Theory of Mind.
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The aim of this paper is to examine various components of school environment as a factor for manifestation of different forms of aggression in Bulgarian schools. The acts of aggression have been examined in view of both students and teachers, in the perspective of the interrelations: student-classmates, student-teachers and teachers-students, and also in terms of perceived (in) security of the students at school. The study was carried out in December 2017among 992 students and 115 teachers at 18 primary and secondary schools in 6 Bulgarian towns from different regions of the country. Two structured questionnaires have been developed and used – one for students and one for teachers. The findings show that worsening of interpersonal relations with classmates and teachers, as well as perceived insecurity at school, are associated with more frequent and heavier acts of aggression. In view of both students and teachers, the most widespread form of aggression in the interpersonal relations with classmates and teachers is the verbal one. Some gender differences in aggression were also found.
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The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of social support on academic achievement of university of Ghana students. The sample size consisted of 15 undergraduate students drawn from three halls of residence at the University of Ghana. The sample was made of 5 level 100, 5 level 200 and 5 level 300 students. The age range of participants was between 19 and 23 years. Qualitative data was collected using semi structured interviews and the data was analysed using content analysis. The findings of this study suggest that social support contribute significantly to students’ academic achievement through three categories which include; social support enhances good mental state or wellbeing which boost students’ cognitive engagement in learning and academic activities. The findings also suggest that social support is a motivator which drives students towards academic success, and also, the findings suggest that social support enhances academic achievement through self-belief and self-confidence. This study implies that as part of making educational reforms to improve student’s academics, all stakeholders involved such as lecturers, policy makers and the government should consider the psychosocial needs of students that can enhance their academic performance.
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The report presents initial data on the adaptation of GASP questionnaire that examines individual differences in experience of guilt and shame. A critical review of the literature is made and several general characteristics of the two constructs are derived, as well as two main approaches in their distinction - the first emphasizing the distinction between personality and behavior (self-behavior distinction) (Tangney & Dearing, 2002; Tracy & Robin, 2004) and the second focusing on public-private differentiation (Combs et al., 2010; Smith et al., 2002). We found that the Guilt and Shame Proneness scale (GASP, Cohen et al., 2011) was the first to combine these two empirically validated approaches: personality-behavior and public-private, distinguishing emotional and behavioral responses through four subscales: Guilt-Negative-Behavior-Evaluation (NBE); Guilt - Repair (GR); Shame-tendency to negative self-esteem (Shame-NSE); Shame-Withdraw. The translation of the individual subscales indicated a very good internal consistency, a good factor structure, delimiting one main factor in a sample of 125 students from master’s programs in Sofia. The correlations between the subscales proved associations suggested by the authors of the questionnaire. Construct validity of the instrument was confirmed with expected presence or absence of relationships with constructs such as perceived stress, need for belonging, regulatory focus, global self-esteem and fear of negative feedback.
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Disinfectants and antiseptics are substances or solvents which play a key role in the control of infections. Their wide functionality is applied in almost all human activities. These agents can have antiviral, antibacterial and antifungal effects. Disinfectants are synthetic agents the biocidal effect of which destroys microorganisms in the environment, while antiseptics are applied locally, primarily on skin and/or mucosae. The morphological differences between Gram (+) and Gram (–) bacteria raise questions regarding the biocidal effects of antibacterial agents against different types of infectious agents. The aim of our study is to evaluate the biocidal effect of disinfectants and antiseptics available on the market. The study uses a reference strain of Escherichia coli and a laboratory isolate of Staphylococcus aureus. The analysis was conducted using the agar well diffusion method. Results show that sodium hypochlorite, hydrogen peroxide H2O2 and mouthwashing water demonstrate strong bactericidal effect on both Gram (+) and Gram (–) bacteria. The bath cleaner gel, which is considered effective against Escherichia coli, demonstrated effectiveness against Staphylococcus aureus instead. The dishwashing gel, ethacridine lactate, silver water and lavandula water show intermediate or zero effect against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus.
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The study discusses new approaches designed for the purposeful selection of archeological and geological sites and sample collection for analysis via archaeological chemistry techniques. The approaches discussed provide opportunities for coherent interpretation of analytical data in view of the project’s objectives: gaining fundamental knowledge of material culture in different archaeological periods as well as of people’s knowledge of the environment in ancient times.
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