The characteristic discriminant of contemporary societies, particularly in economically developed countries, is, on the one hand, the expansion of consumerism in various spheres of economic and social life, while on the other hand, it is the attempt to restrict excessive consumption. The principal aim of this paper is the description of the chosen changes in consumption in contemporary society and their economic consequences. The author searches for answers to the following question: What orientations mark out the behaviour of consumers in (...) the market? In the search for answers to this question, the orientation towards excessive consumption that is stimulated by the ideology of consumerism and deconsumption as a protest against consumerism have been placed under analysis. In analysing the ideology of consumerism, the main styles of consumerism have been indicated as follows: consumption of pleasures, compulsive consumption and symbolic consumption. In contrast to the behaviour associated with over-consumption, the behaviour in pursuit of the restriction of the consumption of goods indirectly connected with actual needs has been described, namely sustainable consumption and anti-consumption, as well as the voluntary simplicity movement in consumption. (shrink)

The paper is an overview of the connections between scientific psychology and religion. The thesis that scientific psychology, which deals with empirical research of all manifestations of spirituality and religiousness within the different principles and contexts of culture, cannot refer to the doctrine of religion, but it should take into account in its research the cultural aspects of the religion without valuing them at the individual human level and their influence on the "fate" of the world, is being discussed. Conclusion: (...) Against the background of the twentieth-century Anglo-Saxon psychology, based on the positivist paradigm, there is no place on the basis of valid methodological canons for building a direct relationship between scientific psychology and religion. (shrink)