Motivational Structure of the Time Perspective of Combatants

Background. Stress can change a person's views on their past, present and future. Studying the motivational structure of the time perspective of combatants will help determine what motivational content ensures the narrowing of the time perspective both in chronological duration and in eventfulness and, as a result, determine the targets of psychological impact. Objectives. The purpose of the study is to assess the motivational structure of the time perspective of combatants. Study Participants. The study involved 98 men (31.6±6.87 years old) with combat experience. Methods. The study engaged the following methods: MMSE (Mini-Mental State Examination), Mississippi Posttraumatic Stress Scale (Military Version), the technique of event reconstruction of a person's temporal perspective (Nikishina V.B., Petrash E.A.), the technique of identifying suicidal reactions (SR-45) by P.I. Yunatskevich, the Method of Motivational Induction by J. Nutten. Results. As a result, it has been established that the time perspective of the participants in the hostilities is transformed both in the direction of chronological narrowing and in the direction of content. Chronological narrowing is characterized by the predominance of the duration of the past while reducing the chronological present (up to two weeks) and the chronological future (up to 6 months). The absence of a vector orientation of the time perspective with a focus on the future has been established. With a chronological extension of the future of up to six months, combatants note idealized motivational symbols that characterize transcendental themes ("peaceful sky above your head," "calm," "intention to change your own life," "to be happy," "just to live"), as well as rest and creative activity ("go home," "go to the dacha," "climb Elbrus," "return to family") as representative motivational content. Conclusions. The motivational structure of the time perspective of combatants with manifestations of PTSD at the level of cognitive representation is characterized by the predominance of motivational objects of abstract-transcendental content, which do not have a specific time localization and are not clearly localized in the period of the future life. Paradoxically, with a significantly limited chronological extent of the present and future, the motivational content is localized in the period of the future life without specification.