experimental-psychology

More than a skiers book on fear. Mermer demonstrates how to tackle fear head on. If you need a book to get you over the edge....this is the one.

Ms. Blakeslee's writing captures the reader with thrills and laughter; she takes the experiences of skiing way beyond the realm of skiing. This book helps the reader to use ANY fearful experience as a learning tool to move forward.

"In the Yikes Zone" provided me with the tools to manage my performance anxiety for a recent Professional Ski Instructor Association (PSIA) exam. Mermer's book is filled with real-life anecdotes that the reader can relate to and transfer to their own experiences. "In the Yikes! Zone" lets you know when to push it and when to back-off, and how to manage your fears and emotions through-out. A definite read for athletes and non-athletes, this book is filled with important strategies to handle the many fears we face in all aspects of life.

One of the stressors of my life, and I suspect of many other people's lives is the nagging feeling that somehow we're approaching love wrongly. On the one hand, we want to experience it and we want to believe that the experience is real. On the other hand, our own experience and the experience of other's around us inclines us to feel as though it's a little bit foolish past the age of 16 to believe *too* much in the idea of enduring passion.

Does passion always fade? Do we need to choose relationships at the base of the pyramid of needs-- passionless but sustaining, predictable but safe? Can we ever sustain that passion that we feel at the beginning of a relationship?

What Mitchell says (with quiet authority that makes me believe him) is that yes, we can, if we are brave enough to really want that to happen. What he argues is that passion, while desirable, is ultimately quite threatening and that it takes both personal mastery and courage to be willing to let it into your life. Mitchell asserts that it is not romance which is the illusion, it is safety which is the illusion. Romance is the thing which brings the reality of the world to us-- with all its danger and complexity. Safety is a veil which we throw over others potentially close to us to keep them from coming close enough to hurt.

Mitchell created a readable book which should appeal to professionals in the field as well as ordinary folk looking for some answers to complicated problems. He builds his arguments carefully using a combination of prior work and original thinking derived from his practice and patients.

Very impressive, thought provoking, and blessedly free from overly complicated language.

How can love survive despite the vagaries of hectic schedules, work and parenting pressures, aging, and boredom? That is one of the many questions Stephen Mitchell attempts to answer in Can Love Last? While considering the oft-posed questions about "chemistry," real love, and soul mates, he looks at whether you can determine if you've found "the one"; and how to keep them if you have.

Dr. Mitchell, who died suddenly in 2000 at the age of 54, founded the journal Psychoanalytic Dialogues and was renowned for his work in relational psychoanalysis, which features a more collaborative approach than traditional psychoanalysis. As Mitchell's widow, Margaret Black, C.S.W., points out in her foreword to the book, when it comes to his analysis of relationships, "Freud's formulations have not been particularly helpful, certainly not very optimistic."

A shame, really, since it is love, according to Mitchell, that makes life worth living. But nurturing love is no easy task since, as he points out in his introduction, "Modern life, at all points on the socioeconomic scale, is difficult, draining, and confusing." That's where his book comes in, offering guidance on how to look at the differences between love and desire, and how to have both in a relationship; doing so with prose that is often illuminating and even poetic. Describing the need for both security and adventure in a relationship, Mitchell writes, "Romantic passion emerges from the convergence of these two currents," which are "at once both erotic and sacred."

Based on modern divorce rates, Mitchell argues modern relationships are "based on fantasies of permanence." Although we seek committed relationships for security, in reality, rather than safe, these relationships are actually dangerous. "Love, by its very nature, is not secure;" Mitchell concludes, although "we keep wanting to make it so." The key to Mitchell's approach to making love last lies in acknowledging this danger exists and harnessing its energy to restore desire and passion through spontaneity and romance.

He makes a good point when he argues it is curious how separated couples often resolve to recover their "lost youth" through reckless abandon, when in reality, during their youth they longed for commitment and security. Hence, one's youth was not "lost," but willfully abandoned. And when he takes this premise one step further, it stands to reason that within a relationship, we actually avoid adventure for fear of destabilizing our comfort and security. Subconsciously, it's a Catch-22 situation.

The book can be slow going at times, but only because Mitchell's theories - understandably so, given the complexity of human dynamics - are complicated. But if you take the time to sort through them, the rewards could be significant.

It's a fantasy most of us have shared: the-knight-in-shining-armour boy meets his girl-princess; girl marries boy and they live happily ever after. But in the real world, "back in our imagined castle, both the knight and the damsel, alas, often lose their allure." The most common reaction is to deduce that we have been deceived - that the knight was no knight, or the princess was no princess - which is often the "safest" recourse since blaming the other partner precludes the need to look at oneself.

When a patient not named Carl entered therapy with Dr. Mitchell, he discovered that although he still cherished his wife's many admirable qualities he could no longer tell her so since doing so would leave him vulnerable. To him, it would feel like "begging" because "He had come to feel that his stalwart performance as husband had earned him the right to her love. To approach her appreciatively or seductively would be to renounce those claims."

Coming back to the "danger" in a long-term relationship theme, Mitchell explains "falling out of love" with your partner can be a defense mechanism, and "What is so dangerous about desiring someone you have is that you can lose him or her." Especially revealing is the fact that our "ever-intensifying fascination with celebrities seems to feed our hunger for idealization and our fear of its consequences by glorifying and then exposing and destroying our 'stars.'"

At least one age-old question ("Why do opposites attract?") is finally answered here. According to Mitchell, "Opposites attract because they are inversions of each other, the same thing in different forms." If Harry is attracted to Sally because she is outgoing while he is shy, it could be because Harry also has a desire to be outgoing but has suppressed that desire.

When it comes to other advice, Mitchell says it's okay to be "made for each other" as long as you don't take it too far, for "fantasies of perfect harmony and synchrony can be enormously destructive if taken too seriously, as a steady expectation, rather than a transient, episodic connection." But the answers Mitchell offers to his question, "Can love last?" aren't always altogether romantic; especially his advice that "the capacity to love over time entails the capacity to tolerate and repair hatred."

At last, he suggests that instead of doing something to improve our relationships, "Time might be better spent on reflecting on what one is already doing!" "Spontaneity," he notes, is discovered not through action but through refraining from one's habitual action and discovering what happens next." And although "Desire and passion cannot be contrived," they "occur in contexts, and we have a good deal to do with constructing contexts in which desire and passion are more or less likely to arise."

Many of the case studies in the book - although sometimes perverse - are utterly fascinating, and Mitchell has taken relationship theory to a new level.

Dr. Stephen Mitchell was a respected psychoanalyst in New York City prior to his untimely death following the publication of CAN LOVE LAST? THE FATE OF ROMANCE OVER TIME. In this book, Mitchell explores the nature of romantic love -- the love two individuals unrelated by blood can have for each other but lose over time. These couples can be hetero, homo, married or not.

Mitchell suggests most relationships don't last because of romantic love. If romantic love exists at all in a long-term relationship, most of the time it does so in spite of other key factors that hold the couple together. In other words, there are many 'ties that bind' and most if not all kill romantic interest.

The most common motivation for coupling is the perceived need for security most people associate with connectedness to another person. Romance is not associated with security, however, it is associated with risk and unknowing. In the end, the need to acquire security via knowing all the details about the beloved, i.e. objectivity or elimination of the 'unknown', overwhelms romantic love. Generally, individuals who grew up in chaotic situations have an excessive need eliminate the unknown and are therefore very likely to kill romantic love.

Dr. Mitchell provides a number of case histories in his book to illustrate his key points -- ideas others have explored that he presents in a fresh and unique way. In the end, he seems to side with the existentialist Sarte who suggested that security is an illusion since death intervenes in every life. Dr. Mitchell asks, will you regret the things you did or did not do in your effort to secure your life? To truly live, one must work past the last illusion.

While rather simple for some of the more advanced counseling students in my pastoral counseling class, this book proved to be an excellent primer in basic helping skills. It was a good review for me as well (I have over 20 years experience in rehab counseling).

I first used this book in my graduate program in a class for communication and leadership. This skills taught in this book are outstanding. Now, I plan to use the ideas from this book in my own career, as well as helping an undergraduate peer staff at a university learn the basic helping guidelines. This book is highly recommended.

We just completed a doctoral level seminar by using this book to guide process research. It's fabulous. While the book is certainly appropriate for teaching basic counseling/helping skills at the upper undergraduate and graduate levels, I also believe it has applicability for advanced practicum and research. Good work!

The number of instructional theories and camps of instructional theorists are growing at a rapid rate. Camps of constructivists face off against camps of reductionists and the debate rages on. Unlike many other scientific communities, educators and instructional theorists seem to spend as much energy tearing down the past as they do in inventing the future.

Charles Reigeluth has taken a very different approach to instructional theory. He has gathered together many of the best minds in instruction and assembled their writings into a second volume of instructional theory and practice. In this volume, he allows the various authors to present twenty-one different instructional theories. As editor, Dr. Reigeluth and others cross-reference these various theories and practices to create a discussion of similarities. Rather than take a position that one camp or another is right or wrong, each is allowed to make a case for the work they are doing. Each is given space to offer examples of process and results. If you are looking for a clear picture of the profession of instruction in 1999, then you need look no further than this volume. You will not find exhaustive descriptions of each theory or complete descriptions of all the associated research. This book is more of a summary of all the important work in the profession with extensive references to the larger body of work.
The message from Reigeluth is clear. Instructional professionals need to spend more energy looking for solutions and less energy on carving out individual positions. The focus should be on results because results ultimately determine what works. This work builds on the original volume of instructional theories published in 1983, and there is an indication from Reigeluth that a third volume is now in the works. This is must reading for anyone who wants to take the pulse of the profession.

Charles is my Ph.D. dissertation advisor and my mentor so I knew that he put in a lot of efforts on putting this book together. Please pay attention to the last chapter: formative research methodology. Not only for us researchers or professors in universities to get more insight about instructional design, theories and models, but I know a lot of corporate trainers are also using this book as "bible" to guide their daily design work. A very good book (green book vol. 2), highly recommended.

Reigeluths first volume of Instructional Design Theories and Models was published 16 years ago and quickly became "the bible for the development of many instructional designers in the years that followed" (p. 1). In this second volume, Reigeluth has assembled more than a survey of instructional design and learning theories. He sought to reflect the great diversity and changes in thinking since his first volume in 1983. He reasoned logically that the original book formed a picture of the topic in that time period and now it was time to assemble a new snapshot. Taken together, volumes I and II fully illustrate the roots and development of instructional design theories in the U.S. from the 1970s to today.

Volume two is organized into five units. An introductory unit and a reflective unit surround the three units that form the core of the book. These three units present instructional design theories grouped around cognitive, psychomotor and affective development themes. While the topics are divided, the overarching theme of the book is a systems approach to learning-- everything is related.

The introductory unit offers two papers presenting perspectives on the theories and changes that have occurred since the first volume. Reigeluth (1999) begins the unit by defining the terminology of design and theory. He works to establish the framework within which the reader can "analyze and understand the instructional-design theories presented in this book" (p.5).

Thirty-eight authors present twenty-three papers in the three units that form the core of this book-- the descriptions and reports on the state of learning and instructional design theory. Reigeluth organizes each unit purposefully. He explains the selected content and his thinking about their organization by briefly introducing each unit. Each paper is authored by a recognized authority on that topic: Jonassen on constructivist learning environments; Hanaffin on open learning environments; and Gardner on multiple approaches to learning, for instance. Romiszowski presents the single paper that comprises the second unit, psychomotor development.

The only comment that might be taken as a mild negative suggests that while there are many discussions of changing paradigms, the reader is left without a sense of one direction in which to develop instruction. This is more a reflection of our times than the quality or organization of the text. Thirty years ago there were fewer theories and more consensus than is evident today. Reiguluth has been fair to present the multiple points of view, even when they do not intersect to form one dominant theory by which to gauge the work of instructional design.

The author, Charles M. Reigeluth has been a Professor of Instructional Systems Technology at Indiana University since 1988. According to Reigeluth, his "research interests include redesigning educational systems and designing high quality learning resources" (Reigeluth, 2001, p. 2). An avid writer, his publications include eight books; two have received "Outstanding Book of the Year Awards" from the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT).

The author did a commendable job of keeping the reading at a level that was clear, concise, and simple. I had to have this book for a Research Methods course at Nova Southeastern University during the Summer I session (2003), and despite the difficulty of the course (e.g., the terminology, the somewhat dry concepts, and the statistics), Cozby "pounded" the concepts into my head by providing clear outlines of understanding. The text was very easy to read and a true psychologist chose to incorporate a reader-friendly font (10.5/12 Legacy Serif Book). The chapters are very short, too, and abstract concepts are minimal; Cozby ensured that the main points are kept as the focus of each chapter. Please enjoy this treasure! R. Beaux Ugarte, NSU

Everyone should know how to analyze events in the real world so they can understand what is really going on. This book is clear complete and easy to understand.

Twenty years ago, I was "forced" to purchase the 1st edition of this textbook, for a blech, introduction to social sciences course. I am very glad I did.

In reality, this is probably the only text I have reread (and many times) since leaving college. It's an introduction to the scientific method applicable to any of the sciences. It presents relatively advanced topics in statistics: the how and the why. And it's pretty humourous too.

The author provides simple and understandable examples that make abstract notions of statistics and the scientific method concrete and relevant.

Very seriously, I've used the knowledge I found in here will be used on a day to day basis to evaluate all those studies that we're assaulted with: is oat bran good for you, are mammograms associated with increased breast cancer for males under 40, all those things.

I have heard Eugene Schwartz lecture in many settings, and I always assumed that his remarkable combination of erudition and hipness, intensity and humor, could never be captured in a book. That is, until I read "Millennial Child." This is a book that places the "alternative" Waldorf schooling method squarely in the modern world. The first part of this book is a powerful and insightful critique of twentieth-century childrearing theories, with a look to the cascading damage they have done our children. The rest of the book examines the contributions that Waldorf schools may make towards the healing of today's children.
If you can read only one book on Waldorf -- or on education in general - this is the one!

This is a brilliant book that provides an answer to our pressing educational crisis. Anyone who has been teaching for ten years or more recognizes two things: that standardized tests are putting more pressure on kids, teachers, and parents; and that the kids coming into classrooms these days are different than they used to be. There ar more and more books being written today about how to deal with "the spirited child" emphasize the will, more than thinking or feeling. At the heart of our crisis is our failure to recognize the differences between thinking, feeling and willing. And that our stress on intellectual development, depriving children of their childhood, actually does more harm than good in the long run. He proposes a new curriculum based on doing, rather than passively absorbing intellectual material at an early age. The children play, do handwork, and listen to stories when young, and then move through a cogent and age-appropriate curriculum as they grow older, nurturing each level of development before passing on to the next. This is a kind of organic education, based on the insights of Rudolf Steiner, who developed the Waldorf system of education, among many other things. Every page lights up with insight after insight. But these are not merely theoretical. Schwartz backs up his insights with dozens of practical examples taken from his long expereince as a Waldorf teacher. This book could be for education what "The Silent Spring" was for the environment.

This book is essential reading for anyone seriously interested in understanding the crisis in education today and what to do about it. However, the book requires an open mind because the educational philosophy presented runs counter to the mindset controlling today's school systems and the proposals dominating the political races. Schwartz sees that the path to educational reform is not to teach to fulfill centralized testing requirements but to recognize that children need something far more comprehensive. Schwartz's thesis is based on the pedagogy of Rudolf Steiner which is relatively unknown or misunderstood in the United States today. This educatinal philosophy is based on a very deep understanding of childhood development and the appropriate curriculum and methods for each stage. There has been very little study of his "Waldorf" method on the university or teaching-college level in spite of the rapid growth of Waldorf and Steiner schools in North America.

The book is part anecdotal and part scholarly so as to be able to describe the "education as art" methods suggested. Nothing less is needed to prepare our children for the future in the increasingly technological age.

William Baldwin writes for the novice as well as for experts in the field of hypnosis. His technique for releasing blocks and "dark" energy is greatly enhanced with actual accounts from clients in his spiritual work. As a hypnotherapist, I recommend this book to anyone in the field of hypnosis and related modalities. Thank you Dr. Baldwin for your research and thoughtful writing.

I am not going to try to add more details about what's in the book because the previous review covered it all. I can honestly say that I have learned more from this one book than any other book I have ever read. I have read so very many books on hypnosis, past life regressions, spirituality... you name it, I've read it. What makes this such a must-read is not it's significant background information (which it has), nor is it the specific examples of exactly what to say given different situations (these are invaluable - I wish I had read this book the first time I was suddenly confronted with an "attachment" because my skeptic self very much freaked!), but it's the many, many examples provided. So many! Not only did I discover a whole new world of knowledge but I didn't want to stop reading as there were so many stories. Every therapist needs to read this book. It is a masterpiece.

Reviewed by Roger Woolger, Ph.D.

William Baldwin's eagerly awaited book, Spirit Releasement Therapy, A Technique Manual is a brilliant, daring tour de force whose appearance I am delighted to celebrate. Dr. Baldwin has integrated an enormous range of techniques and much accumulated wisdom gleaned from past life therapy, spirit possession syndrome, soul retrieval, inner child work, multiple personality disorder (MPD), or dissociative identity disorder (DID), and traditional psychotherapy.

In the Introduction he offers a very useful and concise overview of spirit possession and its treatment throughout history. In section two, Regression Therapy, he presents an up-to-date survey of the principles and techniques currently used in present life and past life regression therapy by clinicians working in the field. Dr. Baldwin outlines induction techniques, ways of working though the life, remembered traumatic events, the death transition and many other techniques, and includes useful examples of how to apply them.

Section three, Recovery of Soul-mind Fragmentation, though relatively short, is in many ways the pivotal section of the book, theoretically speaking. Dr. Baldwin outlines and integrates the shamanic concept of "soul loss" in reaction to trauma with psychiatric views of personality splitting and the kind of dissociation to be found in extremis in MPD (DID). The key concept here is the idea of subpersonalities or fragmentary souls. This notion figured quite prominently in the early psychiatric work of Jung, Janet and Assagioli, and later came to form the basis of those techniques for the psychotherapeutic integration of the personality developed by Psychosynthesis, Jungian analytic psychology, psychodrama, Gestalt therapy, Voice Dialogue and, most recently, Inner Child work.

Section four, Spirit Releasement Therapy, is the longest of the book. It contains the highly original battery of techniques developed by Dr. William Baldwin during years of research and therapeutic practice. Because of its extraordinary comprehensiveness and mass of critical detail, will surely stand as a major reference source for years to come. Dr. Baldwin describes and illustrates therapeutic strategies for working with a huge range of possessing entities or psycho-spiritual formations. Most importantly, he provides specific lines of inquiry that enable the therapist to make a differential diagnosis in difficult cases (e.g. sub and alter personalities vs. human spirits, dark force entities, and those from "far away" that might be designated aliens or extraterrestrials).

This highly important breakdown of these confusing phenomena into three orders or types of possession necessarily implies a different metaphysical and metapsychological status for different possessing entities. There are different strategies for releasing a human entity and a demonic entity, or working with a multiple personality alter, for example. It is precisely such crystal clear differentiation between the different orders and types of attachment, along with an abundance of clearly illustrated case examples that makes this section so valuable and quite unique.

The notion of attributing numerous varieties of psychopathology and physical conditions to the intrusion of non-resident spirits or entities is one that has been assiduously resisted and ridiculed by main stream psychologists and psychiatrists for most of the century. If the straight psychological world scoffs at past lives and reincarnation it is openly contemptuous about practices that go by the name of exorcism, depossession, or spirit releasement therapy (Baldwin's own user friendly coinage). After all, they would say, haven't the great advances in psychoanalysis and the grounding of psychological research in empiricism and scientific method come about precisely because the old superstitions about ghosts, witchcraft and magic have total discredited?

Apparently not. Much of the populace at large still continues to believe in "the presence of other worlds" (to borrow a phrase from Swedenborg) while the open antagonism of the split between religion, channeling, esoteric healing, etc. (the perspective of spirit) and psychology (the perspective of soul or psyche) refuses to go away. The very fact that Dr. Baldwin does not publish separate books on past life therapy and spirit releasement therapy is of crucial significance in and of itself. And secondly he implicitly recognized that regression therapy and spirit releasement therapy complement, in the sense of complete each other. They are part of a greater endeavor, as Dr. Baldwin himself puts it:

The purpose of regression therapy is to heal the scars of the soul. Nothing is left out, no human experience is denied; the aim is uncovering the truth. No amount of narrowly defined professional training, no restrictive religious training, no arbitrary limits of any kind can be allowed to interfere with the exploration of the spiritual reality (p.38).

This long overdue reintegration of the spiritualist/shamanic perspective back into psychotherapy and spiritual healing is, I believe, the next and essential stage in the development of psychology, a kind of return to the source. And right at the vanguard of this reunion we have William Baldwin's remarkable book. It is a milestone we will all look back to. I predict it will be referred to and argued about for years.

Wholeness: On Education, Buckminster Fuller, and Tao is a treatise divided into three main chapters; as its subtitle suggests, the chapters focus upon Education, Buckminster Fuller, and the Tao. Unifying the theme of this scholarly, superbly crafted presentation is the concept of wholeness and how it applies to life in a world where so many are often blind to the whole picture that encompasses the countless different threads that make up the tapestry of global events. Six appendixes offer further selected readings and more thought on the interdependence of world problems. Highly recommended for philosophical and educational studies collections and reading lists, Wholeness is a scholarly, vital look at the unifying factors connecting diverse global problems today.

i have read alex gerber's book on wholeness. in my view gerber

clearly represents with facts and figures the essence of the

thinker richard buckminster fuller, who was known as bucky, by

those who aspired to his aspiration for a world that worked for

everyone. after one reads the chapter on fuller, one comes away

with an understanding that fuller was not just a technocrat, but

one who had a firm understanding of nature's subtle display.

Alex extends fuller's articulations of nature with

the notion of tao in education, which is quite similar to

william irwin thomson's take on tao in his chapter the road

not taking from his book entittled "coming into

being : artifacts and texts in the evolution of consciousnes"

Yet the differences that come forth from the synergy of

universe represented by dr. alex gerber are significant in

their turns to plays. He stresses thoroughtout his book that the

individual realization of wholeness is feasable in ones life

time. the book is designed for the person, who just wants a

gist, albeit a fragrant one, of the notion of wholeness; also it

designed for thinkers, who want to pursue this inquiry with the

necessary rigor required for good scholarship

in retrospect, this book will endure. fuller

wished his work be usefull for future generations; this idea

of wise use strikes me as similar to the views of the many

native amercian indians, and other indigenous people on this

planet.

Life on Planet Earth is in serious trouble. We're adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere through fossil fuel burning, creating holes in the protective ozone layer, decimating forested lands, contaminating land and water, and ever-increasing our population.

Wholeness explores options for a brighter future--indeed salvation from an ultimate destruction. Author, visionary, and educator Alex Gerber Jr. demonstrates the theories of the famous inventor/philosopher Buckminster Fuller and the principles of spirituality found in Tao, and offers a means to understand where we are globally, as well as locally and individually, and what we can do about it.

Dr. Gerber writes, "'The whole' refers to everything--the entirety of creation, all that is, undivided, without diminution." By learning to view the world's many facets (e.g., ecology, energy, economics, ethics, and education) not as parts but as an integrated whole, we can begin to live in accord with each other and with nature rather than in fragmentation, discord, and self-destruction.

Focusing particularly on design (in the fullest sense of the word), education, and spirituality, Gerber shows us how Buckminster Fuller's philosophy of "comprehensivity" helps us to connect with and act in accord with the whole. He then presents the timeless philosophy of Tao as a complement to Fuller's that encourages continual connection with "the oneness of being" and teaches us, as Gerber puts it, "to exist and act in that state of wholeness."

Wholeness: On Education, Buckminster Fuller, and Tao is an awakening to a better way. Here is a book intended for the broadest spectrum of people--those seeking to navigate in this complex and often bewildering world. Wholeness is far and away the best book this reviewer has ever read on this vital subject. Alex Gerber Jr., in his exceptional, timely offering, has given us a means to see the forest before there are no trees.

I sure as heck never had before. I am dyslexic, math phobic, and a graduate student in Psych who must take 1 full year of advanced stat. Terrifed of this prospect, I bought this book. It is, without doubt, the best text book, ever. It is funny (to the point of being downright cheeky), laid out exceedingly well, progresses from one idea to another naturally, and explains all these confusing concepts easily. I actually looked forward to reading it in my spare time, and I promise you, I am not a math geek! There simply is not a better Intro to Statistics book out there. Better than cartoon guide, stats for dummies, etc. Save your money and time and go right to the source.

In my field I must read many research studies dealing with various topics. I've taken research classes and have learned to recognize key statistical concepts but I must admit that I've never fully understood how they work, what they really mean (no pun intended) or how they were derived. Don't get me wrong. I've studied, but most texts were just too advanced right from the start. Now that I've read and worked through the sample questions in this text I finally feel ready to tackle more advanced texts. The language used is clear and concise with clearly presented examples and applications of concepts. The sequencing is well thought out and quite seamless. I highly recommend it for anyone just starting research classes who has had little or no preparation in statistics. However, knowledge of basic algebra is a must. If you haven't had algebra for some time, you may want to brush up a bit.

Generally, I agree with the high ratings that other reviewers have given to this book. After I obtained my bachelor's degree in philosophy, I took the end-of-the-book test. My thinking style at that time was primarily an idealist. But after I earned my master's degree in American Studies and took the test again, I was primarily an analyst. Both these test results made sense to me given that my two degrees were separated by six years. This is one of the "hidden" values of the book: that one's "Styles of Thinking" (the original hardcover and, in my opinion, the better title for the book) may change over a period of years.

However, I do not agree that the social scientific basis for the book and the test are well-grounded. The authors give a quite vague description for the validity of their five styles of thinking. And the only basis for the validity of the test is that they have given it to thousands of people. Purportedly, because they intended to write a follow-up book, and they wanted to keep their testing criteria secret at least until the sequel. But keeping the criteria for a test secret is simply poor social science.

Nevertheless, I find the book subjectively useful and still refer to it from time to time. I have also given the test to college students, and most of them identify with the test results. So four stars for usefulness but not five stars because of the lack of documentation.

it's a very useful books and practical. i've started applying and feel pleasure getting to know my thinking style and others as well. you can improve the way you think. useful...

Thinking-- a process we normal people are constantly doing in most of our lifetime. However, have anyone of us thought how do we think? It's an interesting question. Indeed, only very few of us have come across this question. This book have classified most people's styles of thinking into 5 main categories. Nevertheless, the book includes a test to help you identify your preference of thinking. If you do it seriously, you'll eventually find the result very accurate in helping you know more about yourself. Meanwhile you will identify the which classes do the people surrounding you belong to, in order that you will know how to deal with them using the most suitable approach. More importantly, you'll realize your own strengths and liabilities by reading this book. In such a way, you can develop the strengths that you already have and improve your liabilities. Hopefully, life can be a lot better if you can take the suggestions mentioned in the book into practice. Even if you are not preparing to take what this book alleges solemnly, it's still a great fun letting your friends do the test. You'll discover a load of things that you've overlooked! Thinking is a child's play, as well as a Herculean study.