This volume takes advantage of recent political events to study the ways in which two major world powers have defined contemporary psychological issues. It explores areas of psychology that are important at this time in history, and addresses these topics from post-Soviet and American perspectives.

1. Introduction to States of Mind: Psychology in a Sociopolitical Context ; Part I. Politics and Persuasion ; Political Psychology ; 2. The Psychosemantic Approach to Political Psychology: Mapping Russian Political Thought ; 3. Psychological Perspectives on International Conflict and Cooperation ; The Psychology of Truth and Lies ; 4. Comprehension of Lies: A Russian View ; 5. Deception, Lying, and Demeanor ; Advertizing and the Media ; 6. Russian Advertising in Search of Psychology ; 7. The Social Psychology of Mass Communications: An American Perspective ; Part II. Contemporary Crises in Mental Health ; Alcoholism ; 8. Alcoholism in America: Extent, Diagnosis, Etiology, Treatment, and Prevention ; 9. Alcoholism in Russia: The Enemy Within ; Psychological Trauma ; 10. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: A Historical Context and Evolution ; 11. Post Traumatic Stress Disorders as a Loss of Meaning of Life ; Changing Demographics: The New Old ; 12. Gerontological Psychology: The Western Perspective ; 13. A Lifespan Approach to the Study of Psychogerontology in Russia ; Part III. Prejudice and Interethnic Hostilities ; 14. Strangers in the Homeland: Problems of Forced Immigrants in Russia ; 15. Changed Ethnic and National Identities in Estonia ; 16. Interethnic Intolerance in Post-Soviet Ukraine ; 17. Prejudice and Discrimination: Old Paradigms in New Models for Psychology ; 18. Ethnic Psychology in the United States ; Part IV. Environmental and Ecological Psychology ; 19. Environmental Psychology: Evolution and Current Status ; 20. Environmental and "Green" Psychology in the Former Soviet Union ; Index

"What a brilliant idea to bring under the cover of this book the results gained by Eastern (post-Soviet) and Western researchers on the same or close psychological problems. The authors are not competing with eachother, they are making a mutual breakthrough to meet the challenge for the benefit of world science and of each particular reader."--Victor A. Sadovnichy, Rector of Moscow State University "The main overall contribution of this book is in the recognition that national psychologies that may have grown up in isolation from each other should not stay that way. We in the United States have a great deal to learn from post-Soviet and Soviet psychology . . . Too often, textbooks and research articles are written, and courses taught, in almost total isolation of traditions outside those in which the writing is taking place. . . . States of Mind has many valuable lessons to teach us, and we recommend it highly to all psychologists and students of psychology in any field. It is a joy to read. A book that represents such an ambitious undertaking inevitably will be less than perfect, but the editors and authors deserve a great deal of credit for embarking on a mission of great bicultural importance. The field will benefit from more volumes of this kind in the future."--American Journal of Psychology "This book is part of a larger project to bring together articles by psychologists from the United States and the former Soviet Union and make them available to both English- and Russian-speaking audiences. . .The contributions to this volume were carefully chosen to reflect on contemporary changes in both post-Soviet and American societies. They are taken not from conventional academic subdivisions, but from the application of psychology to socially relevant issues: politics and persuasion, mental health, prejudice and ethnic conflicts, ecological and environmental problems. . . .A reader curious about the psychology of everyday life in the emergent countries of the former Soviet Union and willing to interpret all the contributions in context, will have a rich time. To the reviewer, the book provided an abundance of material with which to reflect on the differences between psychological communities." --Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences "What a brilliant idea to bring under the cover of this book the results gained by Eastern (post-Soviet) and Western researchers on the same or close psychological problems. The authors are not competing with each other, they are making a mutual breakthrough to meet the challenge for the benefit of world science and of each particular reader."--Victor A. Sadovnichy, Rector, Moscow State University