Fifty Key Thinkers in Psychology (Routledge Key Guides)
by Noel Sheehy
Routledge, ISBN 0 415 16774 4 (hbk), 0 415 16775 2
Psychologists will recognize the usual suspects, and a few less expected ones, among these ‘key thinkers’. Each gets a page or so of biography, and four or five of exposition. These will be useful to students who have already done say a year of psychology, and want summaries, and to teachers who want a few personal details. The problem is that, first, the thinkers are presented alphabetically rather than chronologically, and second, too little is said as to why they tackled the problems they did, and how, and what it all meant – at least in terms understandable by the lay person. What, in fact, are they the key to?
Psychology, like all science, is cumulative, but more than most, it is reflexive, part of its own subject matter. Understanding needs some grasp of its social, cultural and scientific setting, and of the progression of enquiry. These I did not find here. The reader may be left with an impression of unrelated bits and pieces.
John Radford
