The internal factors of stress resistance as elements of future psychologists’ professional resourcefulness

Abstract

The proposed article analyzes a part of the dissertation research results on the psychological features of resource provision for future psychologists' professional development, specifically the role of internal stress resistance (resilience) factors in the professional resourcefulness of higher education psychology students. These factors encompass constructive coping strategies as behavioural techniques for stress management, psyche’s defence mechanisms as their foundation, and the unconscious basis of overall personal resilience and tolerance to uncertainty. In the current context of traumatic and crisis events in Ukraine, there is a growing priority for cultivating resilience and resistance to traumatic events, behavioural flexibility, and adaptability among the population. These individual-psychological traits are especially crucial for professionals in socionomic fields, particularly consultant psychologists. The professional effectiveness of these experts will depend on the formation and development of these dispositions, hence they have been incorporated into the structure of the future psychologists’ professional resourcefulness. According to the theoretical model of our research, the central characteristic of this structure is the self-assessment of the professional development level. The interconnections of resilience internal factors with this self-assessment were examined through a mathematical-statistical analysis of the results. The study was conducted on the basis of two higher education institutions – Vinnytsia Mykhailo Kotsiubynskyi State Pedagogical University and Khmelnytskyi National University. It involved 197 psychology students from the 2nd to 4th year of the bachelor's degree program and the 1st year of the master's degree program. Based on the results of the empirical research, in particular the factor analysis, we determined that the most significant internal factors of stress resistance in the professional resourcefulness structure of future psychologists are constructive coping strategies "positive reinterpretation and growth", "active coping" and "planning". Additionally, the psyche’s defense mechanism of "intellectualization" was also found to be significant.