Customer Reviews

Psychology

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This introduction text represents a "tour de force" in dealing with a complex subject. Psychology is divided into 5 sections dealing with Action, Cognition, Social Behavior, Development, and Individual Differences. Each chapter contains the biological basis at work, because, as the authors so beautifully put it "we aren't just minds; we are minds embodied."

This book is for the serious student; the dabbler, and those whose understanding of psychology is limited to pop psych-type self-help, psycho-babble will be bored.

An outstanding, scholarly work worthy of reading.

I've used the text for my honors section of Psych 101 and as a source for lecture material in my other sections. IMHO, this the the best textbook for Intro Psych that I have ever come across in terms of the depth of material presented. It is, however, probably too difficult for the large lecture hall sections or sections taught entirely by graduate students. For these sections I would recommend David Myers' textbook. Much more student-friendly, and still an excellent source of information. Fridlund, et al., is still the gold standard.

Great for learning the basics of psychology in a comprehensive, thorough, easy to understand manner. I used it for my university freshman psych course, and even though the professors had to add some additional information to the texts, it served as a great guildline for psychology majors.

This is the psychology book of your dreams!This is the book which made me decide that i want to become a psychologist(which was a hard decision since i am an engineer).The authors ask some profound philosophical questions which beckon you to explore psychology further.At no point do they claim that they(or psychology)have all the answers but they've tried to do full justice to the richness and complexity of human behavior and life.I've read three other introductory texts besides this one and none of them comes close to the brilliance of this one.Why?This is intelligent writing at it's very best.Any psychology intro book can give you the relevant information to crack an exam but to package it as well as the authors of this one have done is a rare art indeed.All the relevant concepts have been made crystal clear with unique and pertinent examples.In every chapter,you find examples from the arts(movies/books/music/everyday life etc)that make the content relatable.There is also an online website which accompanies the text wonderfully.You can take quizzes,learn more,watch videos,review what you've studied and so on.The writing itself is so high quality that you won't be bored even when you revisit the book's pages to study for your exams.I bought the eighth edition even though i already had the seventh edition just because i was curious to see how they'd improve upon the earlier edition.Buy it,spend time with it,learn from it and even if you don't touch other intro texts you'll be far ahead of those who couldn't lay their hands on this one.It's not even about competing with others,reading the book itself is so intrinsically rewarding.If you've ever pondered about the deep mysteries of the human mind or if you are someone who appreciates good writing(movies or the arts)then look no further.This is the psychology book for you.My personal favorite was the chapter on Language(written by Mrs Gleitman).

Actually I'm reviewing the paperback edition; Amazon has a bug in this one.

I wanted to buy the "text book" of Psychology so I checked the hardcover, there in the tab "other editions" I noticed a paperback edition (which was $100 cheaper) so i followed the link, after reading the reviews and "looking inside the book" I decided to buy the paperback edition (the reviews and the "look inside the book" were supposedly for the paperback edition).

The problem was when I received the book... it wasn't the book but the "study guide" (which is worthless without the book) I went back to Amazon and checked carefully and alas when I went to the paperback edition there is a slight change in the title (which one doesn't check again because it's supposed to be the same book) but the reviews and everything else is the same which is VERY misleading.

I already sent them an e-mail asking them to change this, but for the meantime be careful.

P.S: I rated with 3 stars because I had to put something I'll fix it when I get the hardcover edition and I can actually use it.

This book is great. I expected, yet another textbook that is dull and difficult to read and understand; this textbook, however, is filled with humorous interjections, along with complex information presented in a simple way.

Since Gleitman teaches at my school, for Intro Psychology we are required to use this book, so I bought it at the beginning of last semester, begrudging the high cost of it. After having read it virtually from cover to cover, I can now say with a high degree of certainty that this must be one of the best books for Introduction to Psychology that I can imagine.

Each chapter of this book is filled with useful and relevant anecdotes and other things that help to lead the reader into understanding the concepts portrayed by Gleitman and his fellow authors in the book.

Also, the online accompaniment with quizzes and chapter summaries is a major help in studying for the exam, and the Study Guide: for Psychology, Eighth Edition is a phenomenal tool to use in conjunction with this book because it distills all the information down to what you just need to know.

i got this textbook for an intro class and it was very helpful. it scratched the surface of every topic without explaining too little and if you get lost it has little summaries after every chapter. its expensive but very worth it

Hello im just wondering if anyone would happen to know if this international edition is the same a the hard cover 8th edition.

thank you

I bought this book from amazon for my fundamentals of psychology class. The book is much more detailed than the Myers edition also commonly used for psych intro classes and the writing seems much more professional, whereas the Myers edition is a little more humorous and witty.

Being that it is much more comprehensive you get a lot more out of it and it serves as a really good introduction and foundation of the topics studied in psychology. You will definitely notice the difference in detail if you switch from the Myers book (this doesn't mean that the Myers edition is inferior to this in any way).

However the con associated with an increased amount of detail is the increased likeliness that the reader will get bored much more quickly, which does sometimes happen. Despite this it still serves it's purpose and is a recommended read for psych majors and people wanting an intro to psychology.

Btw if you want to buy the book off amazon check the other sellers/vendors first, you can save about ten bucks (shipping included) if you buy from them than straight from amazon.