The article deals with the education of the conscience in the development of the personality. It analyses the formation and historical development of the concept, its intellectual-emotional structure, as well as the ways of its functioning in personal behaviour and the main directions of the development of the conscience in the educational processes.

The author of the article discusses the relationship between historical fact and literary text using the instrument of Literary Ethics and emphasizing the significance of the emotional response of the reader. According to the definitions of Marshall Gregory s “ethical invitations” it becomes clear that the most important chain connecting the text and the reader is the reader s emotional response. Hence the article briefly discusses the informational theory of emotions as formulated by Pavel V. Simonov, a theory that explains the possible obstacles to the formation of this emotional connection. As illustrations of these theoretical reflections certain literary texts written by Julijonas Lindė-Dobilas, Bronius Radzevičius and Romualdas Granauskas during different historical and cultural periods are selected. These texts reflect important historical events and provoke the reader to ponder ethical problems. The article reaches the conclusion that the historical fact changes its nature once it enters the realm of literature: it loses its objectivity but becomes as an instrument for the creation of possible worlds.

Jausmai, būdami žmoniškosios brandos atspindžiu, padeda mums suprasti kankinių vidinį pasaulį. Ekstremaliomis situacijomis jausmai reaguoja daugiau ar mažiau spontaniškai. Kokios emocijos lydi kankinius mirties išvakarėse? Ar jų drąsa ir ryžtas sekti Kristumi yra be svyravimų? Siekiant atsakyti į šiuos klausimus, apžvelgiami žmogaus veiksmuose ir poelgiuose atsiskleidžiantys jausmai, kurie drauge yra asmens vertybių sistemos atspindys ir visiškai susiformavusios asmenybės ženklas.

The article discusses the capacity of poetry to evoke emotions in two different ways – by using metaphors and with the help of laconic language. The hypothesis that the effect on the reader generated by both a thick poetic text and poetic speech purified to the maximum could be very similar is tested by employing the concepts of cognitive poetics in reading the chosen poetic texts and focussing on the cognitive processes presupposed by different sorts of metaphors. The main task is to discuss the phenomenon of iconicity and to explain particular effects caused by the poems written by two popular Lithuanian authors – Justinas Marcinkevičius and Vladas Šlaitas. The comparison of the chosen texts by the two poets suggests that iconicity is manifested not only in a thickly coded poetic text, but also in a laconic poem. The results of the analysis have shown that iconicity can be created not only by using original conceptual metaphors, but also by specific visual images, which can help the poet not only to say something, but also to show. It may be that iconicity is more pronounced in laconic poetry, because the atmosphere envelops the reader instantly categorizing, rather than diving among the so-called mental spaces and interpreting the meanings of metaphors. The visual impression is stronger, but in the field of a poetic text it is rather difficult to define what this visuality is. Apparently, it is worth to investigate how fast one or another impression occurs to the reader, and which of the two – a metaphor or a simple image selected accordingly – is faster in generating a specific mental image. It would seem that the priority should be given to simplicity, but without a study it can not be stated categorically. Most important thing is that a writer succeeds in provoking a specific emotional state. Marcinkevičius and Šlaitas knew how to do it, even though their creative principles differed significantly.

International Affective Picture System (IAPS) is a database of photographs, which is used for studying human emotions, cognition, behavior and other areas. Although IAPS is considered suitable for using in different countries, there are some cross-cultural differences.Purpose. The aim of the present study was to determine the valence, arousal and dominance ratings of IAPS pictures in the sample of Lithuanian students and compare them with original United States (US) norms.Methods and Results. 103 Lithuania’s psychology students rated valence, arousal and dominance of 59 images from IAPS system. The results showed a high correlation between ratings of Lithuanian and US samples of all three dimensions. However, there were significant differences in the mean ratings of emotional valence and arousal – Lithuanian participants’ ratings were closer to neutral value. Moreover, some gender differences were found. Our study showed that men are more aroused by pleasant pictures compared to women, whereas an opposite tendency was observed with unpleasant pictures – women are more aroused by such images compared to men.Conclusions. The study findings suggested that IAPS can be reliably used as stimuli for studies of emotion in Lithuania.