Scientific Research on the Issue of Soft Skills Development (Review of the Data in International Databases of Scopus, Web of Science)

Introduction. In today’s world, professionals in any sphere of occupation should have soft skills in order to be in demand in the labour market, to quickly build a career and to achieve personal success. Soft skills involve: skills to communicate, to think creatively and unconventionally, to work in a team and to take responsibility, to organise own time effectively and to adapt quickly in new situations, etc. Therefore, it is necessary to be an owner of social qualities, which are commonly referred to as universal competencies, aimed at to finding optimal balanced solutions in a wide range of daily professional tasks. These skills are not quantifiable and are not generally described in job descriptions, but precisely these skills ensure high efficiency and productivity in any industry. In Western countries, the issues and strategies for soft skills formation in different categories of population have been studied for quite some time. Recently, these problems have become much more common among Russian scientists. The growing relevance of this issue is related to the changes in educational system, the changes in educational and personal guidelines, and the requirements for professional activities. This article is an overview of scientific Russian and foreign publications devoted to the aspects of soft skills development.

The aims of the present research are the following: to identify the main trends in the study of soft skills and the possibilities for their acquisition by a person; to find out the similarities and differences between Russian and foreign studies; to determine the most promising scientific inquiry.

Methodology and research methods. The study is based on the comparative-historical method. The authors used content-analysis and comparative analysis of documents, articles and results of statistical reports in international databases of Scopus and Web of Science within the period from 1975 to March 2019.

Results and scientific novelty. For the first time, the authors conducted retrospective panoramic review of publications on soft skills, systemised additional information concerning the topic under discussion and identified the similarities between existing problems in different countries: lack of appropriate attention to soft skills development when designing educational programmes; insufficient involvement of employers in this process; complexity of the process of observing and evaluating soft skills; difference between the set of competencies acquired by graduates during studies with expectations and demand in the labour market, etc. Diverse ways of soft skills development are offered: organisation of special courses taught out of the subject context (which have already shown their inefficiency), mastering soft skills in parallel with the process of subject-based training or through the potential of particular disciplines. The international scientific community agrees with the statement that educational programmes, in any case, need to be refocused on the soft skills development. However, the general trend is the presentation in most studies of local statistical results, rather narrow professional topics of research and limited time (1–2 academic years). Concerning methodological tools for measuring universal social skills, both Russian and foreign authors prefer case study, classroom research and questionnaires.

In general, Russian pedagogical science demonstrates the same vector of development as foreign science, but passes the same stages as other countries with a lag. The only significant difference was found in the research topic: according to the publications of Russian scientists, little attention is given to the problem of migrants’ soft skills. Indeed, the issue of soft skills development is one of the most relevant problems abroad. This can probably be attributed to the specifics of migration processes: for instance, many foreign citizens with completely different cultural and religious mentalities arrive in the European Union; on the contrary, Russia is migrated mainly from former Soviet republics, wherein people are close to the Russians in emotional intelligence.

Practical significance. The results of the analytical review allow the scientific and pedagogical community to obtain a comprehensive picture of the main trends in studying the problems of soft skills development and to identify priority directions of further research.

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