Customer Reviews

How To Think Straight About Psychology (9th Edition)

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a wise, thoughtful book about the scientific method, and how we use these techniques to arrive at an understanding of the world. It talks about the nature of knowledge, what scientific truth is, and how common misconceptions can lead us astray. In short, the phrase "about psychology" is superfluous; this is a book about thinking straight.

I was forced to read this book upon taking up my role as Lecturer In Neuroscience in Sheffield Uni Dept of Psychology. I run the course that uses this text as its examinable material.

Like many practioners of 'hard science' I'd always view psychology as a bit of a light-weight subject with its over-reliance on statistical methods, questionaires, touchy-feely-types etc and the many TV psychologists one can see almost daily, further dragging down their subject into the depths of pseudoscience. However, on reading this book I realised that there IS some merit in psychology. This text explains many concepts that turn observation into SCIENCE. It explains why science is so powerful in getting at the truth of the matter by constantly trying to refute itself! Which other disipline would have the courage to try and disprove itself and, if successful, rethink its hypotheses in light of the new findings to forge a new and more robust hypothesis? Stanovich explains how the scientific process does just this and he does it in an entertaining and light way without dumbing down in any way. Stanovich could make this text more appealing to a wider audience by expanding its scope and perhaps not concentrating quite so much on psychology, but on science in general. He'd have to change the title then, of course!

I wish I'd read this book when I was an under-/post-graduate studying Physiology/Neurophysiology-it would have given me a greater understanding of what I was trying to do. Its other great gift to me is when I'm confronted with a New Ager expounding the virtues of crystals,chakaras,angels,faith healing etc and trying to bring modern science into disrepute. The information in this book helps me to show them why they're barking up the wrong tree and I'm not! I often end such a conversation with, "...science isn't all bad, but there's nothing you can show me that I can say is at all good"

Buy this book! My students, buy this book, read it and learn from it! I'm setting the exam questions right now!

Stanovich was assigned reading in my psych class years ago (this review is of the 4th edition). It's the best introduction to sound methodology in the behavioral sciences I've ever read. As previous reviewers have pointed out, the critical thinking skills you learn from this book can (and OUGHT to) be applied) to many, many other facets of our daily life. It's not just for psych majors, but for everyone who reads a newspaper, buys consumer products, votes in elections, etc. And you don't need a background in statistics to benefit from it. A worthy companion to Darrell Huff's classic "How to Lie with Statistics" and John Allen Paulos's "A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper".

I read this book during my research methods class while completing my undergraduate education four years ago. This was one of the most helpful books that I have ever read related to psychology. More specifically, this book reminds us that, as psychologists, we need to remember to take in all information with a grain of salt. In other words, remember to critically evaluate all information presented to you and not believe everything is face valid.

I have been waiting for years for a book like this to come along. It is truly a great read and gives tremendous skeptic treatment to the 'science' of psychology. For a long time I've considered myself a skeptic, but I have been on the fence as how to treat psychology--art or science? This book helped me to see it very clearly as science. Psychology has a long way to go to shed the soot of pseudoscience that has collected upon it in the last century, but if more people can cut through to the heart of the matter, like Stanovich has done, then the sooner it will emerge and bloom.

A very insightful introduction into scientific method as it used in Psycholgy. The text is well-written and full of references to research projects. The author incorporates real life situations as well as psychological research programs into the text. The way the author communicate is amazingly straightforward. Read it and you start to look at Psycholgy in a clearer way.HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

The concepts in this book should be required understanding in all introductory science classes. The book explains how to think scientifically, so they don't develop false beliefs about the natural world and behavior. In today's world, our science classes teach students facts about the world but don't give them the tools to figure out what to believe and what not to outside the classroom.

How do we recognize pseudoscientific claims? Clinical Psychologist Scott Lilienfield (2005, p. 40) lists:

* The claim is unfalsifiable. There are no control standards and every outcome can be explained after the fact.
* An emphasis on confirmation rather than refutation
* Place the burden of proof on the buyer rather than the maker of the claim
* Excessive reliance on anecdotal and testimonial evidence to substantiate claims
* Evasion of scientific peer review
* Failure to build on existing scientific knowledge (lack of connectivity)
The book tackles all these issues, as well as chance, multiple causation, probabilistic reasoning, artificial settings for experimentation, and correlation and causation. Stanovich develops the book extremely well, with hundreds of references and powerful statistics as he tackles some of the most prominent pseudoscience of our day. He gives countless examples, including facilitated communication (where an aide supposedly could help autistic children communicate and became such a fad in the 90's that many parents went to jail on the sexual abuse charges that "came out"), infomercials with celebrity endorsements but no scientific success, miracle pills, esp, and much of popular "psychology".

This book gives you the tools to understand scientific claims. It's extremely powerful and only 200 pages. When you understand the tools to evaluate if something sounds to good to be true, you'll become a much more informed citizen.

This book was assigned by my professor in Research Method class and it is the first textbook that I actually enjoy reading!
Accessible language, examples helpful in understanding complicated concepts- really great book!

How to think straight about psychology is a great book about how to critical thinking in psychology. Excellent examples are provided for all concepts discussed. Great for the begining student.

I read the 1st edition, short of a year ago. I was very impressed with Dr. Stanovich clear explanations of the systematic methodolgy that is scientific psycholgoy. The significant majority of clinical psychologiest do not seem to be aware or at best ignore most of the work and research available in the field.