Psychology: it’s hard to be popular

Press, 1 June 1985, Page 20

Psychology: it’s hard to be popular

The Dangerous Age. By Jane and James Ritchie. Allen and Unwin/ Port Nicholson Press, 1984. 157 pp. $14.95 (paperback). The Book of Tests. By Michael Nathanson. Fontana, 1984. 416 pp. $16.95 (paperback). The Peter Pan Syndrome. By Dan Kiiey. Corgi, 1984. 268 pp. $7.95 (paperback). (Reviewed by Ken Strongman) Psychology is an ideal subject to popularise. After all, it is about people and since, other than the occasional gifted cat, it is mainly people who read books, those that tell readers a little about themselves and others should do well. However, in the popularisation of the sciences and social sciences it is particularly important to do a good job with psychology. This is not merely for the sake of the subject, although as a psychologist that is of great importance to me, but because to do otherwise could be a great disservice to the reader. If someone is left with half-baked ideas and overgeneralisations, and acts upon them, this could be dangerous for anyone involved. The three books reviewed here are attempts to popularise psychology — one American, one British, and one from New Zealand; and it is a pleasure to be able to say that the local attempt is by far the best of the three. Kiley’s “The Peter Pan Syndrome” is a waste of time and money. He has taken the idea that there are some men who never properly grow up and has spun it out to 80,000 words. The book presents a biased viewpoint,

forgets women entirely, and represents an attempt to build a bandwagon. Hopefully, its wheels will never turn. Nathenson’s “Book of Tests” is a little better. It is sure to sell, since people seem to have a self-indulgent penchant for answering questions about themselves, probably in the hope of being pleasantly surprised by the answers. There are hundreds of personal questions to answer here, from social attitudes to personality, from health to politics, from aptitudes to stress. It is the sort of book to sit round with at Christmas and laugh at one another. The problem with Nathenson’s book again comes from popularisation. Test construction and administration is a very intricate, technically precise, and at times conceptually difficult matter within academic psychology. The status of psychological tests varies very widely according to their manner of construction and how well they themselves are tested. Their results also depend on how well they are administered. Nathenson gives very little of this flavour in his book and the lay reader could well end with the unfortunate impression that all the tests in “The Books of Tests” are equally sound and could be simply given by anyone. The Ritchies, already well known at the popular level (as well as in academic circles) for their “Growing up in New Zealand” and “Spare the Rod” have, in “The Dangerous Age”, written a thoroughly sensible and worthy book on the tribulations of adolescence. It should be easily understood by the non-specialist and

even offers some useful advice that is reasonably unexceptionable under the glare of one’s academic searchlight. The book ranges over all of the topics that adolescents, and their parents, might gain some comfort from reading about. The Ritchies discuss sex, unemployment, alcohol, drugs, smoking, driving, authority, stress, friends, leisure, and even pop culture. They base everything they describe on what has been discovered through the well-founded research investigations of psychologists, sociologists, and anthropologists. For the most part, they do not moralise, being particularly sensible about alcohol and drugs. In this context, they make some very cogent points about alternative, natural, even healthy ways to change consciousness. They do, however, come out quite unequivocally against smoking, on health grounds. In my view, they should have done the same with overeating.

Although it represents a very good attempt at popularising an important aspect of psychology, “The Dangerous Age” is not perfect. The Ritchies sometimes slip into using everyday, slangy language (booze, randy, wanker). It seems contrived and is so self-consciously not condescending that it ends by talking down. Also, their understanding of punk is, I suspect, a little off and slightly dated. However, these are mild criticisms of what is a sensible and readable book. It offers far more of psychology at the popular level than is achieved by “Peter Pan” or “Tests.”