Psychological Research On Sleeping Sickness In Kalachi Village, Kazakhstan

Results of self-constructed questionnaire measuring physical and psychological states of participants

At the time of the testing, 88 % of the people who suffered from the sleeping sickness from 1 to 10 times noted overall deterioration of their health condition. 35 % of them stated that they suffered from anxiety, 7 % mentioned heart problems, 28 % of the respondents complained about memory impairment, and another 7 % complained about thyroid disorders. 14 % of the surveyed highlighted that they suffered from the elevated blood pressure, which might be the consequence of regular headaches stated by almost 94 % of the respondents. 93 % of the examined had disturbing attacks of fatigue: 14 % - from physical activities, and 14% - from weather changes. 60 % of the respondents replied affirmatively to the question “Do you see dreams?”. Some of them have dreams occasionally, 24 % do not dream during active sleep, and 18 % of them suffered from insomnia. In addition to physical fatigue respondents suffered from psychological fatigue: 24% of the surveyed indicated that they experienced stress, and 14 % of them claimed they had arm and leg pain (see figure 1 .).

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Results of the stress-resistance testing of the people subject to sleeping sickness

Stress-resıstance is an important attrıbute of an indıvıdual’s mental health demonstrating his psychological well-being and good health condition assumes Seaward (1999). It is an ability to bear certain psychophysical strains and to overcome stresses without any harm to the body and mind. The test was aimed at examining the adaptation potential of the surveyed after getting ill with sleeping sickness. The adaptation potential reveals a degree of the hidden opportunities of the patient with a sleeping sickness to adapt effectively to new or changing conditions of the social environment surrounding him (in this case - existence of a disease). In general, external forces, a disease, long-term anxiety, hunger and other factors reduce the adaptation potential of the individual, and when facing the situation threatening his life goals there can occur a disadaptation.

The resuts of the test revealed that 41% of the respondents have low resilience to stresses which demonstrates that patients with sleeping sickness do not have enough strength due to the general exhaustion. 47% of the surveyed demonstrated an average degree of the stress load resilience threshold. The findings demonstrate that the stress-resistance of the surveyed declines with an increase of stressful situations.

As a result, the individual is forced to spend a huge amount of energy and resources to cope with the negative psychological states arising in the course of the stress. In this regard repeated cases of sleeping sickness will gradually reduce the stress resilience level. Only 12% of the examined demonstrated high stress-resilience level which testifies good adaptation opportunities of these people in the face of any emergence of any new, difficult or unclear situation in his life (in this case, sleeping sickness) which means he has the resources to fight against the stress and to adapt to new conditions in his life (see Table 1 and Figure 2 ). The table and pie chart below the findings of this test.

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Results of the aggression and hostility level testing of the people exposed to sleeping sickness in Kalachi

Along with the study of general psychological state of the surveyed, it has been assumed that patients with sleeping sickness can exhibit anger and hostility as well. First of all it is connected with the fact that health deterioration and an excessive use of the body resources (what a human body does for survival and adaptation during the period of sleeping disease) lead to an increase of a person’s general aggressive mood. For this purpose, the Buss-Durkee hostility inventory testing was chosen. It contains the following subscales:

• Physical hostility

• Indirect hostility

• Irritability

• Negativism

• Resentment

• Suspicion

• Verbal hostility

Results of the given technique have revealed that 93 % of the surveyed showed a high level of "Physical aggression" compared to mere 6 % of the respondents with low aggression level. Indirect hostility, i.e. the implicit (passive) aggression directed at another person or no one was noticed among 92 % of the surveyed (high level) with 6 % showing a low level. 93% of the surveyed showed high levels of Irritability, and 6%, low levels. Low and average level of Negativism, i.e. oppositional manner in behavior, was observed in 93% and 6 % of the respondents respectively. This shows that the patients tend not to go against anyone even though they feel aggression.

It is important to note that 100% of the surveyed feel Resentment and Suspicion. It could have been caused by the disease (feeling of injustice for getting sick with the disease), or their general psychological state during and in between the disorders.

High levels of Verbal hostility, i.e. expression of negative feelings both through a form (shouting, screaming) and content of verbal response (frustration, rudeness) was observed in 93% of the examined whereas 6 % showed low levels of verbal aggression. It might demonstrate general exhaustion of the afflicted with various examination procedures and their overall health deterioration (See Table 2 ).

It should be highlighted that the person does not necessarily demonstrate the given hostility level; it only indicates that the person feels and experiences this aggression as a certain state due to the decline of his health condition at the given moment.

The TMMS results

According to Salovey and Mayer (1990), emotional intelligence refers to individual differences in the ability to process and utilise emotional information related to key areas of effective functioning in daily life. The TMMS was developed to provide an index of individual differences in a mood regulation process (the ‘meta-mood experience’) which involves monitoring, evaluating, and regulating feelings and emotions (Salovey, Mayer, Goldman, Turvey & Palfai, 1995). The TMMS is purported to measure three cognitive components of emotional intelligence: attention to feelings (i.e., how much attention individuals pay to their inner feelings and emotional states); clarity (i.e., the ability to understand and discriminate between feelings); and repair (i.e., the ability to regulate moods and repair negative emotional experiences).

The results showed that just over half of participants were able to pay attention to their emotions. Less than half felt and understood what they were feeling; only a third felt able to repair their feelings and emotions (see figure 3 ).

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When scientists started their investigation into the sleeping sickness in Kalachi village, they asked whether it was an ecological, viral, pathological or neurological problem (Koyen, 2015) Kalachi village is located close to uranium pore mines, developed in 1960s but which were closed in 1991-1992 with the collapse of the Soviet Union. The nearest mines are 500 meters away from the village. It has been postulated that radiation from the mines might cause the sickness, although an excessive level of radiation in surrounding areas has not been detected. Thus, this speculation has been refuted. From a psychological perspective, understanding the emotional state, the ability to recover and examine internal feelings, as well as emotional regulation strategies of the residents affected might pave the way of understanding this “psychosomatic” phenomenon.