Quarterly Journal Fides et Ratio

List of articles in Polish Vol 57

Redakcja Kwartalnika — Tue, 26 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0100

Wiktoria Ślusarczyk, Katarzyna Kwiatkowska, Anna Czyżkowska, Satisfaction with the marital relationship and the religiosity of spouses

Mateusz Barłóg, The family as a key context for positive youth development. Legal, organizational, and psychological opportunities for integrating the family into the network of support and development of adolescents.

Andrzej Margasiński, Agnieszka Marianowicz-Szczygieł, „The gender reassignment” controversy – between affirmation and kind restraining

Anna Koprowicz, Iwona Gumowska, Social support among young people in foster care as they move to independence and selected sociodemographic variables

Emilia Kardaś-Grodzicka, Foster parenting in old age as a crisis. Baseline hope, generalised self-efficacy, and positive orientation of foster parents in late adulthood

Satisfaction with the marital relationship and the religiosity of the spouses

Wiktoria Ślusarczyk, Katarzyna Kwiatkowska, Anna Czyżkowska — Tue, 26 Mar 2024 14:34:50 +0100

The issue of marital satisfaction has aroused great interest in the scientific community and has been the subject of many analyses. Research conducted in this field has mainly focused on the search for factors that determine marital relationship satisfaction. Among them, the importance of religiosity has been highlighted, in supporting the durability of romantic relationships and leading to greater marital satisfaction. This research aims to verify hypotheses and research questions based on the literature, answering the question: is there a relationship between personal religiosity and marriage satisfaction? The study included 86 married couples, a total of 172 individuals, whose mean age was 38.49 years. Personal Religiousness was characterized by the Jaworski Personal Religiousness Scale, while marital relationship satisfaction was measured with the Norton’s Quality Marriage Index (QMI) questionnaire adapted by Czyżkowska and Cieciuch. The results of the study indicate that spouses’ personal religiousness has a significant and positive impact on marital satisfaction.

The family as a key context for positive youth development. Legal, organizational, and psychological opportunities for integrating the family into the network of support and development of adolescents

Mateusz Barłóg — Tue, 26 Mar 2024 14:39:25 +0100

This article presents the importance of the family as a context for adolescent development. The concept of positive youth development was presented, which emphasizes strengthening adolescents' strengths, resources and potential, as opposed to theories focusing on the deficits and difficulties of adolescence. The idea is to propose creative forms of spending free time as a way to "break away" from various risky behaviors typical of the turbulent times of adolescence. The basis is the assumption that everyone regardless of previous functioning and experience, has the potential to develop and self-realization. To achieve this, it is necessary to believe in the teenager's abilities and to be surrounded by appropriate mentors who show development paths and create a support network. Among them, teachers, trainers, educators and extended family play an important role, but the primary role can and should be played by parents. The article presents the practical use of the theory of positive youth development in the Polish educational system - both legal possibilities and limitations that require research and development of interdisciplinary cooperation.

„The gender reassignment” controversy – between affirmation and kind restraining

Andrzej Margasiński, Agnieszka Marianowicz-Szczygieł — Tue, 26 Mar 2024 14:43:00 +0100

The review article presents the phenomenon of transsexualism through the prism of the etiology, scale and dynamics of the phenomenon as well as the most controversial social consequences concerning "sex change" and the acceptance or non-acceptance of voluntary personal forms adopted by children and adolescents. Review of contemporary literature, analysis of positions on the issues of the so-called gender changes (gender reassignment, gender matching). The text shows the evolution of understanding of gender identity disorders in the ICD-10 and DSM-5 classifications as well as the controversy related to the tendencies depathologizing gender inconsistency in the ICD-11. Looking at the etiological issues we present an attempt of in-depth psychological analyzes as opposed to the dominant, reductive medical approach. In the text, we also recall the basic developmental regularities of children and adolescents, often overlooked in discussions on transsexualism. The basic developmental regularities of children and adolescents, often overlooked in discussions on transsexualism, were also reminded. As the review of the data shows the rapid increase in gender identity disorders in recent years, their pronunciation leads to emphasizing the growing role of pop culture influences on young people. There is also a lack of research on the use of puberty blockers in children/adolescents - their introduction appears to be an experiment with, in fact, unknown consequences. The analysis of developmental regularities, the transience of dysphoric tendencies and the lack of reliable scientific data on the use of puberty blockers and the consequences of taking hormones of the opposite sex lead to the conclusion that accepting voluntary personal forms proposed by children/teenagers is premature.

Social support among young people in foster care as they move to independence and selected sociodemographic variables

Anna Koprowicz, Iwona Gumowska — Tue, 26 Mar 2024 14:45:47 +0100

Background: Every year, about 5,000 people raised outside their family environment become independent in Poland. The time of entering adulthood may be more difficult for them than for those raised in their biological families, due to previously experienced neglect in care, as well as the lack of adequate support during the period of entering adulthood. The purpose of the research presented in this article was to learn about the variables relevant to the sense of social support of foster care alumni becoming independent, and to find an answer to the question of whether adolescents raised outside their families differ in terms of perceived support from their peers raised by their parents.

Method: 270 people were surveyed, half of whom are alumni of various forms of foster care in the process of becoming independent. The independent variables controlled in the study were gender, age of the respondents, the type of foster care they grew up in, and their current living situation related to their place of residence, source of income, continuing education and being in a stable relationship. The tool used (WSSWS) allowed us to find out the overall score, as well as the sense of support received from three sources: from family, friends and from a significant other.

Results: The results indicate that foster care leavers differ from their peers raised in families in terms of their sense of support received from family and a significant other, with the former rating lower and the latter higher than respondents in the control group. Among the variables relevant to perceived social support, especially from a significant other, were gender, age, type of foster care, housing situation, source of income, being in a stable relationship and the type of school where the alumni continue their education.

Conclusions: The article contributes to the discussion on the importance of social support in the process of becoming independent, especially with regard to the role of a mentor who can help ease the difficult transition from childhood to adulthood.

Psychological study of siblings subsystems – methodological considerations

Katarzyna Kamila Walęcka-Matyja — Thu, 28 Mar 2024 16:09:05 +0100

Introduction: The analysis of the literature devoted to scientific considerations on the relational aspect of the functioning of siblings, especially those who are in adulthood, allows us to draw the conclusion that they are relatively rarely undertaken by researchers. It is noticed that nowadays there is an increase in interest in this issue. The aims of the work were to consider some of the limitations occurring in the process of conducting psychological research on the sibling subsystem and to present tools for psychological measurement of the quality and dimension of the interpersonal relationship between siblings.

Method: The method of content analysis of publications in this field was used and a comparative analysis of issues undertaken in the context of psychological research on the relational aspects of the functioning of siblings was carried out.

Results: Five self-report questionnaire tools that were developed in 2014-2017 were presented along with their psychometric properties: Adult Sibling Relationships Questionnaire, Adult Sibling Family Relations Scale, STQ - Now, STQ – Then and Relationships Questionnaire with Siblings.

Conclusions: The specificity of research on interpersonal relationships in the sibling subsystem is related to methodological awareness of the high complexity of the family environment and knowledge of the uniqueness of sibling relationships. The researcher's consideration of both issues creates space for searching for new methodological solutions.

Foster parenting in old age as a crisis. Baseline hope, generalised self-efficacy, and positive orientation of foster parents in late adulthood

Emilia Kardaś-Grodzicka — Tue, 26 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0100

The article presents the results of own research presenting differences in the level of basic hope, the sense of generalized self-efficacy and positive orientation depending on the function of a foster parent for one’s grandchildren. For this purpose, the Basic Hope Questionnaire (BHI-12), the Generalized Self-Efficacy Scale (GSES), the Positive Orientation Scale (P Scale) and the self-survey were used. 160 people took part in the study. The study group consisted of 80 foster parents in late adulthood. The control group consisted of 80 elderly people who did not perform this function.

Statistical analysis showed statistically significant differences in the level of all the studied variables. It turned out that foster parents are characterized by a higher level of basic hope (this effect is strong), a higher level of a sense of generalized self-efficacy, and a lower level of positive orientation. In the case of the last variable, the effect was very strong. On this basis, it can be concluded that elderly people acting as foster parents, in the situation of a crisis occurring in the family, consisting in the disintegration of the previous way of its functioning, having a sense of agency and conviction that it is possible to build a new order, i.e. a strong basic hope, decide to take over the care of their grandchildren. At the same time, the results of research in the field of positive orientation indicate that it is a difficult situation for them related to the experience of lower satisfaction with themselves and their lives.

Surrogate parenting in late adulthood has been shown as a difficult situation in which the family and human life cycle are disrupted. The psychological situation of elderly people acting as foster parents for their grandchildren is particularly interesting, because the natural developmental crisis resulting from the aging process is superimposed by an additional situational crisis consisting in the loss of the care of the biological parents by the minors and the assumption of this responsibility by the grandparents