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No need for shrinks: Russians believe psychologists don’t solve problems, says poll

Just 1% of Russians go to a psychotherapist in tough times, whereas the majority of Russians, 66%, turn to their relatives for help

MOSCOW, December 6. /TASS/. Just 1% of Russians go to a psychotherapist in tough times, whereas the majority of Russians, 66%, turn to their relatives for help, according to a poll carried out by the Russian National Public Opinion Research Center, and available to TASS.

"When faced with a problem, Russians tend to go to their relatives and family members (66%). Almost one-third (30%) of the respondents seek support among their friends (the majority of those - 46% - are people aged 18-24), and one in five (18%) confide in their partners (as a rule, this group is aged 18-24 and comes to 27%). Women tend to be comforted by their relatives more often (71%), while men are supported by their friends (34%)," according to the poll.

Just 4% of those polled take solace from their colleagues, and 3% go to their neighbors for help.

As little as 1% of those polled, go to a psychotherapist to get things off their chest when faced with a difficult situation. "However, 27% state that they do not need outside help or any pick-me-ups, and deal with problems by themselves. That being said, this share has been 15 percentage points up since 2009," the public opinion poll says.

One in five (21%) of those surveyed said they had an in-house psychologist at their place of study or work. This share reaches 36% among those working in the public sector. A total of 67% of those polled, reported that their organizations had no in-house therapists.

According to the survey, one in ten (9%) went to a shrink for help, but as few as 5% of them said that their problem was solved.

The survey was carried out by the Russian state-run pollster on November 21, 2018, by telephone among a stratified dual-frame random sample of landline and mobile numbers of 1,600 adult respondents. The margin of sampling error does not exceed 2.5% with a 95% probability.