ruff's Full Review: Morton M. Hunt - The Story of Psychology
Do NOT click this epinion unless you love psychology. And don't read this book, either. It ain't for you.
And now that I'm done thoroughly amusing myself with silly reverse psychology (Ka-CHING!), I need to explain. Morton Hunt's book, The Story of Psychology is very long and somewhat intimidating. I doubt many people will read it just on a whim; however, those who do will be rewarded with an engaging and thorough overview of the people and events that took psychology from a branch of philosophy to science in its own right.
Hunt begins, reasonably enough, with psychology's roots in ancient philosophy and spends the next four chapters guiding the reader through twenty-four centuries of psychological speculation. Hunt's intense tour of philosophy, like the rest of the book, is comprised of short, flowing biographies of the philosophers, from Plato and Aristotle to Kant, who've shaped the discipline. Though peppered with quotes from the philosophers themselves, Hunt is forced to summarize the major themes in their lives in order to save space. (Otherwise he'd be writing an encyclopedia.) This, unfortunately, allows his personal biases to tint his storytelling.
As is well documented, psychologists as a whole tend toward atheism and agnosticism. Though I don't know the man personally, I feel it's safe to include Hunt in that category. His work strongly emphasizes empirical contributions to psychology, and downplays or even mocks spiritual, religious, or metaphysical attempts at understanding humans. It's a shame because his attitude, which seems to defend psychology's "hardness" as a science at every opportunity, is distracting and suspicious.
Back to the book: After Kant, Hunt tackles psychology's empirical beginnings, prominently featuring Wundt and James, who get their own chapters, as does Freud. (Hunt considers Freud more of a scientist than others do.) These men also receive very useful, detailed lists explaining their major contributions to the science. Science is the operative term here, as Hunt admittedly glosses over large areas of psychoanalysis, claiming that his book is "concerned with the development of psychological science, and not the treatment of mental disorders." (177)
The remaining chapters address behaviorism, focusing on Watson, with Skinner as a relatively minor character, developmental, social, perceptual, motivational, and cognitive psychologies. Since most of my readers, I know, are falling asleep, I'll just make a comment about the chapter on perception, which (though skipping four of the senses) is surely the most accessible:
Most famous optical illusions are reproduced, starting on page 345, which makes for a great icebreaker; it's a lot easier to chat about "which line is longer" than to start boring friends with stories about Kholberg's developmental theories. The Gestalt chapter also has a couple of pop-worthy illustrations. And starting somewhere around perception, Hunt loosens up his biographic style just a little, coming off a bit more as an introductory psych. textbook than a historian. The respite is welcome, though.
And finally, Chapter 17 finds Hunt revisiting psychotherapy, summarizing its popular forms. Then Chapter 18 deals with the positive and negative applications of psychology, especially as a tool of advertising (military propaganda is skipped, and even "considered ethically justifiable"! p.619), and 19 ties things up in a bow, starting with a quick, memorable description of rodent snuff sex, and proceeding with a thorough explanation of the various fields that comprise modern psychology.
It should be obvious, but is still worth noting, that a single history book can never give a complete story of any discipline. The Story of Psychology is an overview of psych history, not its Bible. Hunt's narrative style manages to keep the interested reader's attention with fascinating anecdotes, and even historical limericks, and his references are appropriately thorough--they go on for 86 pages. Although it's not a dry book by any means (Hunt has a great sense of humor) The Story of Psychology is best characterized by the following rigid format,
-This is the guy. (Women are scarce.)
-This is how the guy grew up.
-This is how the guy's theory came about.
-This is how it conflicted with previous theories.
-This is why he was wrong.
-This is how he died.
-Next contestant.
If you can stomach that, you're in for a great time.
Hunt, M. (1993). The story of psychology. New York: Doubleday.
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By the way, I scored my copy of this book for $1.98. My painfully simple secret for getting cheap books is in an epinion entitled "Libraries and Bookstores are Useless" in my profile. Ka-CHING.
Socrates, Plato, Descartes, Spinoza, Mesmer, William James, Pavlov, Freud, Piaget, Erikson, and Skinner. Each of these thinkers recognized that human ...More at HotBookSale
Socrates, Plato, Descartes, Spinoza, Mesmer, William James, Pavlov, Freud, Piaget, Erikson, and Skinner. Each of these thinkers recognized that human ...More at HotBookSale
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