DYSFUNCTIONAL BELIEFS ABOUT SEXUAL INTERCOURSE: INTERACTION EFFECTS OF SEX AND AGE ON THE BOSNIAN SAMPLE

The aim of this study is to examine the main effects of sex and age, as well as the interaction effect of sex and age in dysfunctional beliefs about sexual intercourse on a sample of the general population in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The sample of this study consisted of 900 volunteers of both sexes from three different age groups (18-29, 30-49, 50-65). The following instruments were used: A Sociodemographic characteristic questionnaire, Sexual Dysfunctional Beliefs Questionnaire for Men (SDBQ-M) and Sexual Dysfunctional Beliefs Questionnaire for Women (SDBQ-W). Using a two-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) on the total scores of SDBQ, a statistically significant main effect of the variable 'Sex' was obtained (F(1,894)=337.793, p=0.000, partial η²=0.27), but no statistically significant main effect of the variable 'Age' was obtained (F(2,894)=2.842, p=0.059, partial η²=0.06), while a statistically significant interaction effect 'Sex*Age' was obtained (F(2,894)=6.670, p=0.001, partial η² = 0.016). Simple main effects of sex indicate that men have a higher prevalence of dysfunctional beliefs about sexual intercourse compared to their female counterparts in all three age groups (F(1,894)=212.609, p=0.000, partial η²=0.192; F(1,894)=114.444, p= 0.000, partial η²=0.113; F(1,894)=53.374, p=0.000, partial η²=0.056). Simple main effects of age indicate that men have no statistically significant difference in the prevalence of dysfunctional beliefs about sexual intercourse between all three age groups (F(2,894)=0.751, p=0.472, partial η²=0.002). This difference however exists amongst women (F(2,894)=11.319, p=0.000, partial η²=0.025), as statistically significant differences were found between all three age groups, where respondents aged 50 to 65 have the highest prevalence of dysfunctional beliefs about sexual intercourse compared to the remaining two age groups, while respondents from the 18 to 29 age group have the lowest prevalence of such beliefs. The results of this study partially confirm the previous research that was done in different cultural contexts, and they point to the need for further research that will take into account specific characteristics of Bosnian culture

FEMALE SELF-DETERMINATION IN CHARLOTTE BRONTË'S JANE EYRE AND LAILA ABOULELA'S THE TRANSLATOR

In most cultures, if not all, women have suffered a lot from subjugation for centuries. It is rare to find a society that confesses that a woman is strong and can live independently because women have always been marked as other or something complementary to men. That is because the woman has always been marked as “other” or something complementary to the man. However, this article is an attempt to contradict this negative image of the woman and proves that she has enough self-determination to stand against traditions and rules that are prescribed by society and choose the best for herself without any outside interference. To accomplish this attempt, the researcher has selected two female characters from two different English novels and analyzed them from a feminist point of view. They are Jane Eyre, the main character of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontëe, and Sammar, the main character of The Translator by Leila Aboulela. The study depends on close reading to trace the lives of the characters throughout the novels to extract the situations that reflect female determination. As is shown at the end of the study, both female characters present a good example of female self-determination. They faced society's dictations that obliged them to go against their needs and wishes. On one side, Jane Eyre refuses to get married to a rich, married man because she believes that a man must have only one woman in his life; otherwise, he would be unloyal. Sammar, on the other hand, remains conservative in her beliefs and religion. She never gets rid of her conventions at any cost, though she lives abroad alone an

TRAINEES' INTRAPSYCHIC ATTUNEMENT IN THE PROCESS OF PSYCHOTHERAPY TRAINING

Effective psychotherapy process neither relies solely on techniques employed, nor therapeutic alliance. Various, independently occurring, intrapsychic processes may significantly contribute to a therapist's attunement capacity. Attunement, with the perspective ranging from affective areas to the field of relational needs, goes beyond empathy. Such connections require therapists' emotional equilibrium and self-soothing capacities, that may be governed by emotional intelligence (EQ). By mechanisms within epigenetic interplay, and with an individual engagement in self-growth, activities intended on EQ increase may offer to expand their own „window of tolerance“. Psychotherapy educational programs represent an example of how emotional competencies may increase due to training requests, and frequent exposure to intensive self-growth processes, that go beyond acquiring necessary skills focused on the client. The aim of this paper is to, from a theoretical perspective, discuss the role of emotional intelligence in the intrapsychic attunement of trainees in the process of psychotherapy training

DIGITAL SKILLS AND COMPETENCES ACROSS EDUCATIONAL LEVELS IN BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

The presence of digital technologies in every aspect of contemporary life requires the development of skills and abilities suitable for digital, connected and knowledge-based societies. The need to develop these skills and abilities has taken on even greater importance with the COVID-19 pandemic, as it has clearly revealed the shortcomings of our society and our overall education system. The aim of this research is to help us understand whether there are differences between different education levels and knowledge and skills in digital media environment in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The data has been collected by surveying 502 respondents through structured questionary aligned in accordance with the EU Digital Skills Indicator framework. The results have been tested in SPSS and have showed that higher education graduates have advanced knowledge and problem-solving skills. Keywords: Digital Literacy, Education, Digital Competences, Digital Skills, Bosnia and Herzegovin

CLASSICAL VERSUS BLACK MUSIC AS AN IDENTITY TROPE IN LANGSTON HUGHES’S THE WAYS OF WHITE FOLKS

The Ways of White Folks (1934) is Langston Hughes’s first collection of short stories. Inspired by the reading of D.H. Lawrence’s The Lovely Lady (1927), the fourteen stories collected in this volume offer a disillusioned portrait of that early-1900s black America torn apart by the Du Boisian double consciousness. Through sharp and direct language, these stories present poignant daily-life incidents dealing truthfully with—in Hughes’s words—“some nuance of the race problem”. Among the wide array of issues touched on, the dichotomy classical versus black music becomes a powerful identity trope, remarkably in “Home” and “The Blues I’m Playing”, whose protagonists stand between the Western classical tradition—a marker of a presumably “higher” culture—and black vernacular music, notably blues and jazz, revealing their allegiance to “authentic” blackness. The staging of this musical double consciousness is further complicated by the contradictions of patronage and the power relations involved in the white patron-black artist relationship. The paper tackles these musical identity dilemmas by making a comparison between the allegedly polarized dichotomy classical vs black music of the 1930s as against today’s more intricate scenario

GROUNDINGS FOR AN ECO-JUSTICE DIALOGICAL ETHICS OF EMANCIPATION

Through the eco-justice ethical criticism, which is the basic methodology of research in this paper, the authors attempt to weave the concept of personal identity as a dialogical virtue, while linked to the process of interaction with a human and, inevitably, more-than-human “otherness”, commonly referred to as Nature or the holistic other. Such a gesture serves to go beyond Humanism and turn to what Posthumanism could mean, in order to overcome the questionable narcissistic, supernaturalizing and predatory attitude of the latter. This gives way to seeking groundings for eco-justice ethics, by pointing to a dispossessment and dispossession of the self as a contribution to a new, after all, more intimate degree of relationship mediated by the forms the value love may assume. In line with these assumptions, a new paradigm of education for citizenship is proposed, with relation to alterity and an indispensable form of non-reproductive emancipation, not giving up on the critical exercise of unmasking the practices of naturalization of injustice, namely through carrying out the parrhesiastic function of telling a truth to power. This not only resituates the problem in the educational field, as in the awareness of the more-than-human to be considered, but it also looks for the caring about the natural and human (material and immaterial) “commons”. Finally, the main goal of this paper is to redress possible imbalances between the conditions provided by power and the legitimate expectations of peoples, including their eco-systems, without losing sight of the defined emancipatory ethical framework grounded in the values of love, peace, and hope. Keywords: eco-justice, ethics, identity, otherness, emancipation, lov

THE ALTERNATE HISTORY OF THE 1918 FLU AS A CONSPIRACY IN DON’T NOD’S VAMPYR

Pandemics have always been under scrutiny as part of conspiratorial schemes to control humanity. The 1918 Flu (1918-1920), suspiciously following World War I, is a case in point that inspired the video game Vampyr (Don’t Nod, 2018). Recounting the Great Flu and the conditions of post-WWI London in 1918 with a dose of cultism and mysticism, Vampyr presents us with an alternate history of the world. This paper, following an interdisciplinary approach in investigating the alternate worlds of virtual games in light of quantum physics and conspiracy theories, tries to explore the nature of alternate histories and their plausible scenarios about the way of the world, here about the cause of pandemics. Vampyr is thus played as an alternate history where overcoming the Flu, as in other pandemics, is an existential game of schemes, choices and consequences. Considering the open world of Vampyr and the range of choices the player has in developing its storyline, this analysis reveals how conspiracies by shadow governments or polities may run the world and how the mass of people are blind to them. The mystical reason behind the disaster in Vampyr is associated with an evil entity appearing every few centuries to unleash a new pathogen into humanity, implying conspiracies against overpopulation at certain periods throughout history. Accordingly, players in Vampyr can choose to make the world better or continue with darker schemes, a gaming fact that runs through the world with policy-makers as its players

HAMLET’S STOIC DELAY: SHAKESPEAREAN APPROACH TO SENECAN PHILOSOPHY

Seneca’s impact on the Renaissance tragedians is undeniable. His depictions of violence, terror and murder experienced by humans pursuing their passions became a model for the early modern English tragedies. Senecan tragic elements, the ghost, the chorus; and stock characters such as the hag and the tyrant can be found in the works of Thomas Kyd, John Marston, George Chapman, and others, guiding their style in tragic writing. As a Renaissance dramatist, Shakespeare, in Hamlet, refers to Seneca from a different perspective by responding to his stoic philosophy. It is asserted in this study that in the play, Hamlet struggles to be a true stoic and desires to be purified like Horatio as it is apparent in his famous delay. He takes the stoic cure of delaying to deal with anger and pursues this judgement almost until the end of the play. Hamlet fails, while Horatio succeeds, in following the stoic teaching of avoiding human passions. This study argues that through these characters, Shakespeare shows that stoic teachings that block human emotions are not practical with the extreme conditions one faces in life. Hamlet is a human with all the dilemmas, passions and rage that make him real, while Horatio does not seem realistic with his indifference towards all the tragedy around him. Thus, Shakespeare keeps Hamlet within the boundaries of humanity by enabling him to finally decide to take action, no matter the outcome

STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT IN TÜRKIYE’S PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

The aim of the study is to examine strategic management regulations in public administration in Turkey. At the present time, there is a rapid change process in the social, political and economic fields. An ongoing process of research and inquiry into the design of a new society that envisages sharing on a more equitable basis by improving living standards in many countries is becoming increasingly important. Whether or not the new management techniques developed to provide efficiency and productivity in management that can be applied in public administration continues to be at the focus of discussions in the field of management science. Strategic management is one of these new management techniques. With the developments after the 1970s, it began to be implemented in many countries of the world. In Turkey, strategic management first emerged in the private sector and then began to be implemented in public administration. In this study, after examining the strategic management, strategic management in the public sector and the literature from a conceptual point of view, the legal legislation related to strategic management in Turkey is included. It is a qualitative research. Legal and administrative regulations regarding strategic management in public administration in Turkey are examined in detail

EFFECTS OF BLENDED TEACHING-LEARNING STRATEGY ON ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF UNDERGRADUATES IN RESEARCH METHODS COURSE AT A NIGERIAN UNIVERSITY

The use of technology and creative teaching techniques is becoming more crucial in the changing field of higher education. This research examines the influence of a blended teaching-learning approach on the academic achievement of undergraduate students who are taking a Research Methods course at a university in Nigeria. The study used an ex-post facto research design. The study focused on undergraduate students who had taken both Test and Measurements and Research Methods courses. A purposive sampling approach was used to choose a total of 2,931 students who had scores in both courses. The study used descriptive and inferential statistics to address and examine the research question and hypothesis. The results indicate that the academic performance of the undergraduate students in the Research Methods course, which was taught with a blended teaching-learning approach, showed a substantial improvement compared to their performance in the Test and Measurements course, which relied on face-to-face interactions. Students valued the adaptability provided by the online aspects of the course, such as webinars as well as discussion boards. This research presents empirical data demonstrating the beneficial effects of implementing a blended teaching-learning approach on the academic achievement of undergraduate students enrolled in the Research Methods course at a university in Nigeria. The amalgamation of technology and internet resources not only cultivates active participation, but also augments analytical reasoning and investigative proficiencies, equipping students for the requisites of contemporary academics and research Keywords: Blended learning, teaching-learning strategy, academic performance, undergraduates, research method