Personal Determinants of Coping with Fears of Modern Children

AbstractIn the article the authors research the specificity of the relationship between coping strategies, personal characteristics, content, and particularities of display of fears by 9-10 year old children. Theoretical analysis of scientific literature, document analysis, observation, polls, psycho-diagnostic method, expert evaluation method, content-analysis of children's ideas about fears and coping-strategies, method of group comparison, and other research methods were used for the purpose. The authors conclude that characteristic features of child's interpersonal relationships can form his/her adaptive or disadaptive coping-strategies that are shown in a form of fears. Fears become a disadaptive coping strategy if the child's interaction with his/her significant close people contributes to arising secondary emotional problems, which reflect the child's dissatisfaction with the current system of interpersonal relations