Richard E. NisbettBesprekingen

Frekar þurr frásögn af mis/- skilningi okkar og dómgreind -arskorti í daglegu lífi. Nisbett fer yfir rök og leiðir til að átta okkur á umhverfinu og gefur gagnlegar ábendingar til hjálpa okkur hvernig við getum varast helstu gryfjurnar í vanmati og rangtúlkunum á aðstæðum.

As someone who lives in the between the words of Western and Asian thought, I had to get my hands on this book. This book had some wonderful material but could have used some just never had that WOW moment where something just clicked. It's really a shame because this topic is really just up my alley.

The difference can be summarized as follows: Eastern thought tends to be more holistic, cyclical, and relationship-oriented. While Western thought tends to be more modular, linear, and object-oriented.

The book (unintentionally?) aims for a higher-brow audience who would appreciate a more PhD vocabulary and writing style. I found it off-putting. Though I don't think the authors intentionally wrote it that way, it's just the way they think. Perhaps, they should write a book on PhD thought process vs. common thought process.

Thinking: A memoir by Richard E Nisbett is a delightful blend of memoir and psychology, particularly as it relates to our cognitive processes.

While I have found his other books, well, the ones I read, quite accessible I think this volume takes some of the best parts of those and creates a wonderful new entity. I don't mean that it repeats what came before but that rather than scatter real life examples throughout a book of psychology we have psychology scattered throughout a personal narrative to both understand the writer and to understand the scientific principles. I know that many of the best lectures I've attended, whether on social psychology or physics, are most impactful when we are given some real-life examples of the principles discussed. So this book is like taking all of those examples and making an immensely interesting book.

This is far short of a textbook though it would make a great springboard for those who want to read more about certain topics. This is, first and foremost, a memoir and it succeeds as such. He has led a fascinating life and reading about it through a theoretical lens takes it from one man's story to something we can all, I hope, relate to. Which is why we did some of the things we did.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.½

How about 3.5? The premise is fascinating. However, the book is a tiny bit, well, dull in parts. Lots of retelling of experiments of various sorts and stripes. I loved the examples of divergent Eastern/Western thought when they came from history and literature, but those were few and far between. Basically, cultural differences create different world views and,more importantly, patterns of thought. Troubling was that most of the Western examples were U.S. While the East was represented by China, South Korea and Japan. Interestingly enough, certain Europeans were in between these two approaches in their thinking styles. If only some politicians and diplomats could read and understand his book, the world might be a better place. Not to mention the fact that we could all learn to move to the middle, as it were.

Dated and repetitive but definitely has an interesting thesis. I can see it play out in the films that I've watched... but is that just because he says so? This is why an updated version, with better studies, is needed.

My friend had a Korean student who refused to speak in class. This book explains why.

NA

Summary
"When psychologist Richard E. Nisbett shows an animated underwater scene to his American students, they zeroed in on a big fish swimming among smaller fish. Japanese observers instead commented on the background environment - and the different "seeings" are a clue to profund cognitive differences between Westerners and East Asians. As the author shows, people think about - and even see - the world differently because of differing ecologies, social structures, philosophies, and educational systems that date back to ancient Greece and China. This book documents Professor Nisbett's ground breaking research in cultural psychology, addressing questions such as: Why did the ancient Chinese excel at algebra and arithmetic, but not geometry, the brilliant achievement of such Greeks as Euclid? ; Why do Asians find it so difficult to disentagle an object from its surroundigns? ; and Why do Western infants learn nouns more rapidly than verbs, when it is the other way around in East Asia?"

Excellent and thought-provoking summary of the claim that East and West think differently.

Anyone who has spent time in another culture quickly discovers that people are people, that there is wide variation among people and their personalities. When you try too hard to generalize, you get it wrong because you'll always find exceptions.

Also, some of the things that characterize people are, frankly, a question of modernity and development. Once you've taken a logic class, you "get it", and you'll apply its lessons through the rest of your life. If not, you may not.

I also think many of the ideas presented are true only of americans in a particular period of time. One hundred years ago, people may have been more deferrent to authority, for example. Americans don't seem to be as detail-oriented as the Chinese I have worked with day-to-day-- but that could be self-selection, and I bet that's a common problem in the scientific studies

This book tries to see if the generalizations have merit, summarizing the psychological studies that have been performed, and boy does it do a good job: dozens and dozens of studies.

Worth reading. I'm not sure what I think about it yet, but it's definitely shifting my conclusions.

This book presents a number of psychological studies comparing Eastern and Western cognitive styles. Although I initially felt the writing had a strongly Western bias (particularly since the author is prone to describing a Western trait and then the Eastern lack of said trait), it seems to even out as the book goes on, and the studies themselves are interesting.

Excellent book pointing out differences of behavior and thought I'd not thought about before. Made a really good impression on me, especially after living in Asia for a year.½

Logic-based deductive/inductive thinking versus holistic thinking. I don't think it is necessarily western versus eastern because I sure know of western pagan communities who share a similar a holistic worldview. An interesting read nonetheless about the two different modes of seeing and interacting with the world.

Asians & Westerners "have maintained very different systems of thought for thousands of years". Not interesting, Actually it was better the second time, but still redundant and not covering things well.

I was an Asian history major once upon a time and have at least imbibed some literature on the differences between Asian and Western culture. Often I think people overstate differences and end up repeating generalizations which are not helpful, thoughtful or insightful. This book is different. Richard Nisbett reports data based on numerous studies to demonstrate how East and West process things differently. Easterners see contexts and relationships more (no surprise). They are also better at holding apparent contradictions and dialectical reasoning. Westerners are better at seeing logic and uniqueness. What is fascinating about this, is that Nisbett is able to demonstrate that Asians and Westerners see the world differently, emphasize different things, which accounts for different outcomes. He doesn't advocate the superiority of either but rather suggests that listening and learning from the other can be mutually beneficial.

On the critical side, I think Nisbett is great when he is talking about his own research (most of the book). He is less compelling and overly simplistic when he tries to give an account of historic reasons for the difference (beginning of book). Also because this book is really a report on various studies and research, it is not a page turner. Nisbett tends to be a bit repetitive and circles back to the same themes. I borrowed a library copy and read it a little at a time (often weeks between chapters). Still the information is facinating if you want to take a deeper look at how people think.

I am interested in what the results of his studies would be in a place like a Hawaii (whose culture is more Asian than not). At several points, Nisbett points out where Asian Americans (usually 2nd Gen) will sometimes respond like an Asian or sometimes like the typical westerner. I feel like there would be interesting data here too.

I found this while organizing my paper-based bookshelf. I was sure I had read it, but I couldn't think of a single take-away. So I reread it. It was hard to stay awake. The focus was on the differences in style of thought between East (China, Korea, Japan) and West (US, UK, Australia, etc.)

Occasionally intriguing results from scientific studies, but overall very repetitious. And less was said than I had hoped about how to actually develop aspects of the style that's not your "native" one.

I plan to take the book to HalfPrice and trade it in on something else - maybe I'll like that better.

A pulp version of Thinking Fast and Slow but enjoyable none the less. A more practical guide to avoiding the pitfalls that are common to all our thinking.

A good read, and definitely interesting. But a few chapters too long

Fascinating to find that all the things we learn very early in the western world that we take for granted as natural development are not the only way to learn and that this early learning along with our native culture very much affects our perspective.

Fascinating book. I really was captivated and had read more than half way through before I realized time had passed. Very well documented, interesting studies. Something we could all use to better understand our neighbors.

This is a short book with simply presented discussions noting that attitudes are strongly affected by cultural traditions. In other words we don’t all think or reason in the same way. The emphasis is on comparing Western (mainly American) and Eastern (mainly Chinese) thought. The casual reader should be able to understand this book easily. Some will find it slow, but it is well researched and worth reading.

Nisbett describes how Western thinking is apt to focus too heavily on prominent steady features and fail to notice overall context, balance and changes. Surprisingly even though he stresses these tendencies, the author’s tale also falls into this same trap. Nevertheless he ends the book by suggesting that through education, travel and virtual contacts we will all change somewhat. Thus eventually the world will form blended cultures in which we can more easily and effectively move between different ways of thinking. This will not deny our traditions. However, hopefully the conflation will reduce misunderstandings and enhance reasoning.½

A scientist talks about things politicians and political-correct educators would love to ignore (forever), namely that differenct races actually think (if only slightly) different, or at least have slightly different preferences.

A thought too far. The author's overreach condemns this book to mediocrity. He is a psychology professor dabbling in philosophy, an American who proclaims to speak for "the West" who stuffs his (quite interesting) experimental evidence of cultural differences with half-baked, unscientific explanations.

The first flaw is his cafeteria approach in picking some elements of the Ancient Greeks (that fit his personal world view) to somehow define the Western mind. It would be quite difficult to authenticate the transmission mechanism that instills his Midwestern children and students with his Aristotlean perspective, especially as a majority of the US public does not exactly fit into his supposedly rational paradigm. After all, evolution is just a theory, right?

He commits the same error of discarding evidence that does not fit his preconceptions, when his concept of Westerners excludes Europeans and the "not real Americans" African-Americans and Hispanics when their answers do not fit into his preferred box. When women do not answer "correctly", they are discarded also. This leaves the essence of Westerness in the form of Midwestern white Americans (if his subjects were not students, I venture to say that his ideal Westerners are middle-aged, white professors). Curiously, this selectiveness does not occur on the other side. He is perfectly willing to lump Koreans, Chinese and Japanese into a giant lump of Asians who all share the same characteristics and behavior.

His bias often taints his experimental examples as his implicit American judgments color the "correctness" of the answers. The different Asian answer might be due less to cultural than political differences. There are places in this world where stricter health codes (and unions) are valued. A more Popperian approach would have curbed his confirmation bias and removed some of his logical fallacies. A discussion of the Western concepts of homo oeconomicus and homo sociologicus might have improved his cultural mental map. What remains is the repetition of the cliché of Asian holism and Western individualism. He ends his book with a wish for a cultural "stew that will contain the best of each culture". Apart from the fact that this stew can only be achieved by giving up the individualistic part, I don't believe that those that share his concept of WASP Westerness will be very enchanted by this dish.½

I got about 1/2 way through this book before I had to take it back to the library. It was more or less what I expected based on the reviews, although it came off sounding a little racist. It was a great lead-in to some of my other current reads (Idiot's Guide to Feng Shui) and reminds me that not everyone thinks the same way. I look forward to picking this book back up when I have more bandwidth to spare.

The experience of reading this book in public was not pleasant. I got several poorly-crafted observation jokes of "trying to be more intelligent, eh?" from some co-workers, who met my withering glance and then scurried away. But that was harmless in comparison to the on-edge feeling that I had in the subway, holding my book open as little as possible to minimize the potential for people reading over my shoulder. Was I ashamed of the topic? Not at all, but the language used to discuss a semi-sensitive topic sometimes left me wondering if people might think I was a racist as page after page went on about studies connecting race and IQ. (I realize that this suggests people read more than just a word or two when glancing at the things other people read on the subway, but still, it was enough to unnerve me. All someone needed to do was see "blacks with lower IQs"...)

That said, clearly the point of this book is to say that nature has little to do with IQ and nurture far and away takes the cake. And to make that point, many discussions of race and IQ had to take place (which bring us back to me feeling uncomfortable in the subway). Even in the event of disproving things, we do need to confront some awkward truths, and within Intelligence and How to Get It: Why Schools and Cultures Count, Richard Nisbett does a fair job at assuring us that we're not all doomed from the start to be limited in our abilities, though that doesn't mean we don't need to act fast in order to get our children prepared for their lives.

Nisbett includes a great deal of data to carry his point that environment is the major factor in affecting the intelligence of children (and for that matter, adults), which might seem overwhelming for someone who isn't a statistician, but I think it's all presented in a coherent manner, so I never found myself lost completely. Of course, the complex issue that is raised by Nisbett's work suggests that genes have little to do with predicting your IQ... but your cultural and socioeconomic influences do. The ugly truth of that statement? Your genes won't hold you back, but your ignorant family just might as soon as you're out of the womb, so keep those fingers crossed that you're born into an upper-middle class family that converses with each other.

Of course, that's the negative view that one can take away. The positive approach is that parents and schools (or any kind of programs) can have a big impact on the intelligence of children... provided that they're good ones. Without concerned and caring parents, experienced and committed teachers... well... things don't look good. The current socioeconomic system then becomes a kind of caste system, condemning children to repeat the lives of their parents and be unable to rise above, resulting in children who end up classified as disabled when different circumstances could have certainly avoided such a fate.

As a reasonably intelligent person, I feel that most of the conclusions drawn from this data are, in fact, things that make perfect sense if your mind ever happens to alight upon the topic. If you only surround the average child with influences that aren't encouraging or challenging, then the child's curiosity and intelligence will suffer as a result. Of course, Nisbett has data to back all of this up, resulting in some fascinating (and frightening) statistics. (And, of course, he states from the outset that not all families are alike an it's not great to make generalizations, but then the studies make their generalized statements and I start feeling awkward again.) For instance... a child in a middle class family will hear several million more words than a child in a lower class family, and beyond improved vocabulary isn't the only thing that results from that. Parents of middle class children (and again, the generalizations make me uncomfortable, but this was how it was presented in the book) are more likely to be engaged in conversation with their parents, to be asked questions that both draw out the child's opinions and logical reasoning abilities. When lower class children are spoken to by adults, they're often spoken to in terms of orders, such as to perform tasks, rather than engaged in conversation. It sounds pretty bleak, but thankfully, he did at least report on some programs that are invested in teaching better parenting skills or serving as day care facility with trained staff.

And lest you think he dodged some other issues in terms of race and IQ, Nisbitt did include chapters on "the Asian Advantage" and Jewish intelligence. While speaking of Asians, I feel that he didn't include nearly as much research in his discussion as he had with other chapters... which seemed rather odd, given that he himself does a great deal of research in Asia. He made some interesting (though not new) statements about the cultural differences between Asian and Western societies, given one's focus on the family and society's success and the other's focus on personal and individual success. What seemed a bit out of place, however, were statements like Confucius is responsible for all Asian thought, etc. (I did, however, like one Asian father commenting on the idea that it's not "Asian overachievement" so much as it's "American underachievement" when he witnessed his daugher's class give an award for completing all of the homework assignments.) And as far as Jewish intelligence, this chapter jumped away from his general format and seemed only to bring up the various theories that people have about why Jews are so smart and dismissed them pretty quickly. Perhaps he thought the majority of the book's arguments covered these, but still, it might have been worth repeating a bit.

We read this book for my book club and we actually had some great conversations result, particularly surrounding the idea of affirmative action and school funding. A great deal of Nisbett's points seemed to bring focus to early childhood development (though clearly, many educational researchers do), but almost to the point where it overlooked what can be done for older students. And I couldn't help but feel like I was waiting for Nisbett to make some kind of recommendation... to endorse certain practices or programs... but if you're waiting for that, you might as well skip to his last chapter when he tosses in a few common sense recommendations for parents (which can hardly be seen as serious, given that if someone is reading this book, they're clearly committed to their child's education and must be doing all these things already).

Don't feel intimidated by the size of the book if this isn't your usual kind of reading, for you're only reading about two-thirds of the pages... the rest are taken up by optional appendices, footnotes, and research citations. And yes, you can say that the title is stupid, as the book isn't much concerned with telling you how to acquire intelligence, be it for you or your precious little one. It was an interesting read (the studies were my favorite part, when certain things are isolated and the variables are charted) and you'll feel like it was worthwhile if you can manage to stir up some discussions on the topic. Since I work for an educational publisher, you can bet that it wasn't too hard to collect a group that wanted in on the discussion when I started talking about this book with co-workers, and I think that anyone (particularly parents) will be asking you to borrow your copy once you're finished.

Fascinating psychology study. Compares the cultures of the eastern United States and shows the south to be a "Culture of Honor". Since I live in a border state (Maryland) I can see the clash of northern and southern culture daily. More so it explains the concept of an honor culture which goes a long way in explaining historical forces. Really a very neat book. It's a bit dry, but the ideas light up and its very pithy.½

I've lent this book out to a couple of friends so far (Chinese). I've also discussed it with Chinese friends and what the author reports here is very real and, I feel, relevant. Having tried some of the experiments on myself I begin to understand why I, a westerner, prefer to live in China - I gave the same answers that Chinese (and Japanese) typically do. The observations of this book dovetail rather nicely with Bart Kosko's 'Fuzzy Thinking' in that it seems that western minds typically are categorizing (after Aristotle) whereas eastern ones are relationship oriented. This is by conditioning obviously, not any result of genetics. Fascinating and raises many more questions than it answers.