Post-Soviet Perspectives on Russian Psychology - Hardcover

by Vera R. Koltsova (Author), Yuri K. Oleinik (Author), Albert R. Gilgen (Author)

The study of psychology for the uses of the state, for industrial/labor purposes, for dealing with individual and ethnic tensions has a long history in Russia. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian psychologists and scholars of the discipline from outside Russia have had the opportunity to reexamine the directions the discipline took as well as the directions likely to result from the new academic and political environments. This volume brings together many of the leading figures in contemporary Russian psychology, who show how the discipline got to where it is and examine what may result in the future.

The volume begins with essays examining historical background; next the writers look at the period from 1985-1994 and its impact on research opportunities. This discussion is followed by a review of the major theoretical viewpoints and issues in contemporary Russian psychology. By bringing together many of the leading figures in Russian psychology, readers and researchers in psychology have a unique insight into the state of the discipline and its likely future directions.

Author Biography

VERA A. KOLTSOVA is Head of the Laboratory of the History of Psychology and Historical Psychology of the Institute of Psychology of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

YURI N. OLEINIK is Dean of the faculty of psychology of the Youth Institute in Moscow and senior scientist of the Laboratory of the History of Psychology and Historical Psychology, Russian Academy of Sciences.

ALBERT R. GILGEN is Professor of Psychology at the University of Northern Iowa and a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the American Psychological Society, and the American Association of Applied and Preventative Psychology. His most recent book is Chaos Theory in Psychology coedited with Frederick David Abraham (Greenwood Press, 1995).

CAROL K. GILGEN has a background in Russian and political science./e She is the coeditor, with her husband Albert Gilgen, of the International Handbook of Psychology (Greenwood Press, 1987).