Subjective Images of Terrorism among Higher Education Students in the Russian Arctic

Abstract

Young people constitute one of the risk groups most vulnerable to transmission of terrorist ideology and susceptible to entanglement in terrorist activities. This is related to social and psychological characteristics, social status, particular focus of destructive communities on the age group in question as well as increased riskogenics of social environment in general. Identifying subjective images of terrorism in higher education students is relevant since it is necessary to improve preventive actions taken by educational institutions alongside academic, nurturing and leisure activities.The article provides an overview of research on the subject specified and the results of a sociological survey conducted in two largest higher education institutions in the Arctic region of the Russian Federation. The survey took place from November to December 2021 and involved 3966 bachelor's, specialist's and master's degree students majoring in the following fields: natural sciences, engineering and technical studies, information technologies (IT), social sciences and humanities, psychology and pedagogics, economics and management, medicine. The article indicates certain correlations between an academic major of responding higher education students and knowledge-based, context-dependent, competence-related and affective components constituting the image of terrorism as destructive ideology. The author concludes that higher education institutions shall improve the existing models of preventive actions by paying more attention to individual (group) approach.