Vol 24, No 2 (2024)

The article analyzes the value orientations of regional students as a social group that has its own special evaluative attitude to the totality of material and spiritual benefi ts, expressed through cognitive, emotive and behavioral aspects of life. The article pays special attention to the theoretical approaches to the consideration of value orientations given in the works of E. Durkheim, T. Parsons, T. Lukman, K. Klakhonoma, P. Sorokin, J. Toshchenko and others. Understanding value orientations as one of the regulators of personality behavior allowed to identify the motivation of actions and ways to achieve the goals of regional student youth. In the course of the author's sociological research, a survey of the student youth of Balakovo was conducted (n= 332) – people selected according to a probabilistic quota sample. It was found out that a signifi cant part of the respondents are guided by traditional values such as family (82.2%), health (49.3%), money (34.0%), friends (29.5%). However, students have new dominant forms of value orientations, namely, «to live in prosperity», «to open their own business». According to more than half of the respondents (50.3%), the formation of their value orientations depends on the educational system, while the family plays the largest role in shaping the value picture of the world (69.2%). The article concludes that the value orientations of students of the Saratov region (Balakovo city) are specifi c and contradictory. On the one hand, they express young people's own activity and understanding of the need for self-development, and on the other hand, they refl ect the trends of the industrial economy, which is based on material capital and consumerism.

The paper analyzes the problem of accelerated maturation of children-athletes with reference to the theories of socialization and constructing their own maturation. To study the stated problem the theoretical and applied works of the researchers N. V. Veselkova and E. V. Pryamikova, aimed at revealing the social nature of the maturation competence, as well as two author's sociological researches were used. The first is "Longevity in sports of highest achievements", which was carried out by the method of questionnaire survey of high-class athletes (n = 400 people). The second is "Temporality as a factor of intensification of growing up", conducted by the method of focus-group of veteran athletes (n = 17 people) was realized at the Department of General Sociology and Social Work of National Research Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod in 2023. The object of the study is the process of accelerated maturation of children integrated into the sphere of sports activities. The purpose of the study is to identify the factors contributing to the intensifi cation of the process of growing up of children-athletes. As a result, the author's interpretation of the concept of "accelerated maturation" of child athletes is proposed. The system of factors contributing to the accelerated maturation of this category of population is revealed: individualization and autonomy of the subject, temporality of sports space, enhanced social mobility of children in the fi eld of sports, critical thinking, success of minors as a result of achievements in sports and recognition of their merits in society.

The historical memory of a people plays a big role in their understanding of the past and present, and directly aff ects their perception of modern events. The Russian Federation, the entire Russian people, faced with an unprecedented barrage of open Russophobia in the West, with the attempts to abolish Russian culture throughout the world, are perplexed as to how this became possible at the beginning of the 21st century, in democratic countries that for many years were proud of their tolerance to other opinions and democratic governance. A qualitative sociological analysis of the historical memory of modern residents of Germany and Austria will help to answer this question, the specifi cs of which show that such Russophobic ideas were characteristic of the majority of Germans. The work uses the methodology of qualitative sociological research, content analysis of German comments to the fi lms produced in Germany and Austria which are devoted to the analysis of the situation and fate of German prisoners of war who returned to their homeland in 1955–1956. The authors come to the conclusion that German historical memory is characterized by a complete disregard for cause-and-eff ect relationships, a high emotional intensity of memories, expressed in negative emotions: regret, sympathy for German prisoners of war, regardless of the degree of their guilt, ignoring the mistakes and miscalculations of the Nazi leadership during the war, especially during the Battle of Stalingrad. In the comments, German Internet users emphasized the suff erings of the prisoners of war, their moral and personal trauma and the diffi culties of adapting to German society. The German historical consciousness clearly views Soviet captivity as a major catastrophe that brought grief and suff ering to innocent people who found themselves dependent on cruel, vengeful barbarians. The Russian state and civil society are faced with the task of possibly correcting German historical memory, translating Soviet documentaries into German, publishing historical sources proving the genocide of the Soviet people during World War II, posting them on social networks and video hosting sites accessible to the Germans. The sociological data of the author's analysis of German historical memory proves that it is necessary to adjust Russian foreign policy, education and upbringing of the Russian younger generation to this reality, as well as to make changes in the Russian foreign policy.

Artifi cial intelligence is an important part of modern life. AI exists to improve lives and free up time and resources for the tasks that require thoughtful human action. The advent of artificial intelligence (AI) created new data analyzing the capabilities of the modern phenomenon of social networking, accurately analyzing and understanding the dynamics of online communities and users` sentiments. AI succeeds in such area as social media. Internet users use social media to communicate, search for information, buy things and even work. Social networks also have a high amount of data that can be used to analyze social processes and people's behavior. However, the amount of data is so large that so its processing and analysis can be a time-consuming process. Artifi cial intelligence can help to solve this problem. The article is devoted to the study of the role of artifi cial intelligence in the analysis of social networks, highlights the possibilities of AI and problems, considers various methods of analysis and data collection, such as social listening, natural language processing, as well as an automatic content classifi cation system. The use of a heuristic approach to this issue based on AI helps to signifi cantly speed up the process of data processing and reduce the cost of analysis that would be performed by manual labor. As a result, it was established that artifi cialintelligence has a great heuristic potential in the analysis of social networks. Its ability to analyze large amount of data, recognize patterns and identify data trends and also automate management tasks makes it a valuable tool for understanding social media trends and users` behavior.

The article presents results of a study of young people’s attitude towards the Special Military Operation (hereinafter – the SMO). Data from monthly measurements carried out from March 2022 to January 2024 by Levada Center (recognized as a foreign agent in Russia), as well as the results of two online surveys (n = 2872) and a series of focus group interviews of young people (n = 74) conducted in November 2022 and November 2023 by employees of the Department of Political Science of Saratov State University are analyzed. It turned out that young people assess what is happening more moderately than society as a whole. At the same time, the majority of young people still support the SMO itself, but the level of this support is signifi cantly lower than that of representatives of older ages. The degree of approval of decisions to carry out partial mobilization and to include four new regions in Russia turned out to be below 50%. Regarding the preferred options for continuing the confl ict, there are more young people who are in favor of starting peace negotiations with Ukraine. Possible reasons for more skeptical attitude of young people towards the SMO are formulated, i.e. age features of representatives of this social group; specifi city of the conditions in which their political socialization took place (ideological vacuum at a certain stage was fi lled with Western values, some of which do not correspond to the national culture, traditions and mentality of Russians); features of media consumption by modern youth and imperfections in information support for the SMO by media resources loyal to the state government. One of the ways to improve the current situation is substantiated.

This paper reveals the impact of voter turnout on the legitimacy of presidential elections based on the materials of 20 largest states holding such elections in terms of the number of voters. In March 2024, presidential elections were held in Russia and in November elections are scheduled in the United States, the outcome of which will have an impact on the domestic and foreign policies of these states. The author has tested the hypothesis that in most cases, for the existing political regime in countries where subject and patriarchal political cultures are widespread, high voter turnout acts as a donor of legitimacy, therefore, the authorities seek to involve the maximum number of voters in conventional political participation in presidential elections and ensure victory for the person holding the offi ce of president (incumbent). In countries where the political culture of participation has become more widespread, the competition of strong candidates is a source of legitimacy for political regimes that do not seek to mobilize all voters to participate in presidential elections and are most often unable to ensure the re-election of the incumbent. Based on the analysis of electoral statistics of presidential elections in the studied states, it was concluded that high electoral activity in countries with a predominance of national and patriarchal political cultures, even if there is no real competition between candidates, but with broad public recognition of the existing political regime, ensures the legitimacy of elections. In countries where political culture of participation has become more widespread, high turnout is a consequence of interest in elections, and not the result of the mobilization of the electorate by the political regime. Examples are Turkey and France, where the last presidential elections were held with high turnout and competition between the two most popular candidates; low electoral activity in the presidential elections is a prerequisite for the subsequent political crisis and dismantling of the political regime (Afghanistan, Nigeria). Acceptable level of voter turnout in the presidential elections, which can act as an indicator of their legitimacy, is about 60–66%.