Customer Reviews

Adolescence and Emerging Adulthood: A Cultural Approach (3rd Edition)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

I came to write about my disappointment with this text, and I am pleased to see that someone else felt compelled to offer the same feedback. To what has already been said I would like to add that for a "cultural approach" this text is alarmingly culturally insensitive. It is written entirely from the White American perspective, and all other cultures and perspectives are lumped together as "other." Jensen Arnett's biases and personal opinions shine through in every chapter, and I find distressing that this information is being passed off to students as legitimate scholarship.

Additionally, the book is out of date. It relies heavily on research conducted in the 1980s and 1990s --these "adolescents and emerging adults" are now in their 40s and 50s.

The text has an array of details referring to adolescent development. Not a subject I enjoy reading about... but if you do than I highly recommend it!

I recieved this item quite quickly and just in time for class and amazingly I enjoyed the book as much as a student can possibly enjoy a textbook.

Yet another episode in a trend of dreadful textbooks. Semester after semester I deal with these texts and this is the first time I have ever despised a book enough to actually write a review about it.

Firstly, although this may simply be a pet peeve of mine, I am tempted - in the spirit of the season - to send the author a Christmas gift: a dictionary, with the word "Redundant" highlighted; and a thesaurus, with the page containing the word "Nevertheless" dog-eared.

Aside from that minor nuisance, however, I often find that the author writes with a vindictive attitude. What I mean by this is that I found many instances where he writes something along the lines of "these people believe this, and these people believe that, and this is why they're ALL wrong." In all honesty, he comes across as being bitter that anyone other than him would ever do research on any subject.

Also, because of the author's tendency to frequently cite his own research - more so, in fact, than any other one source - this text appears to me to be some sort of feeble attempt to legitimize the author's previous works and thus validate him as a doctor. ("Look here! It's in a text-book, it must be true!")

In summary, this textbook is entirely amateurish and - although it may occasionally contain some useful information - many of the pages consist entirely of poorly written filler information which negates any positive effect the good information may have had.

My suggestion to any other adolescent development professor out there: write your own book. You'll make some extra money AND validate yourself as a "scientist" (or whatever else you might want to claim - crawl into a breadbox and call yourself a loaf of bread for all I care but DO NOT use this text.)

P.S. If you think this review is especially scathing - read this garbage for an entire semester and then you may judge.

The writer of the book, Jeffrey Arnett, is my professor of the class Adolescent Devenlopment. I just had my first class and it was already very impressive. I haven't read the book yet but I have a very high expectance to it. I will comment more towards the end of the semester.