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Experiential learning and change
416
BOOK REVIEWS
over-identification with the paedophile. He aiso suggests that paedophiie attraction is no more significant than a particular attraction m any aduIt relationship and that is plainly nonsense. While Righton attempts to show the lack of pathology in the paedophile. Fraser in his chapter on the child sees pathology everywhere. in the child and the family. Powell and Chalkley on the chapter on consequences. present complicated data in an attractive way, but the results seem inconclusive and though the authors draw the conclusion that paedophiie reiationships on the whoie are not traumatic to chtldren. it seems the same data can. if twisted slightly. prove the opposite. Yaffe in his chapter on treatment gives a sketchy review of behavioural treatments. and if one washes to put the treatments into practtce a more comprehensive book would need to be studied. After a rather vague chapter by Hart on social work involvement with paedophtles. comes. like the wine at the marriage of Cannan. the best chapter, by Plummer. who at last does what I have not seen attempted before in the literature; which is, write from the point of the paedophiles and puts the present publicity about paedophilia into context. Overall a good book for anyone who is interested in the subject, made essential reading by Plummer’s view ‘from below’. T. J. ROLFE
G. A. WALTERand S. E. MARKS: ~.~peri~~ltiffl L rarning uttd Chmrye. Wiley. New York (1981). xii + 333 pp. f15.40. Experiential learning is most explicitly defined in terms of its ‘central methods’ (stimulations. exercises. role playing etc.). The book also discusses classical methods (e.g. the case method) and supportmg methods (e.g. audio-visual). One of the central efforts of this book is to present an analysis of such methods m terms of a list of twelve change processes (feedback. conditioning, coercion. identification, persuasion. support. restructuring. channeling. recognition. activatton. commitment and action). Clearly. this range of change processes draws on many areas of psychology. and the first part of the book is devoted to a scholarly presentatton of them. The second part of the book is more practical and focuses on methods. relating them back to these change processes. In general this book offers as scholarly and scientific a presentation of its subject as one is likely to find at the present time. There has been a particular effort to introduce clear conceptual frameworks’ into the field. Nevertheless. much of the analysis of methods, though plaustble, is speculative and there is a notable lack of attention to the empirical evaluation of their effects. Behaviour therapists may be disappointed not to find their work better integrated mto the book. A number of behavioural methods are described in the section on conditioning, but behaviour therapy involves other change processes. and makes more direct use of the methods of ‘experimental’ learning than the authors seem to realize. indeed the conceptual framework of this book would offer a good basis for a broad based analysis of behaviour therapy processes. In turn the empirical behaviour therapy literature could have enriched its method sections. Nevertheless. psychologists wtth a broad interest in change will find this book worth reading. Many behaviour therapists would also find much of value regarding methods of professional training in behaviour therapy. FRASER WATTS
BOOK REVIEWS
over-identification with the paedophile. He aiso suggests that paedophiie attraction is no more significant than a particular attraction m any aduIt relationship and that is plainly nonsense. While Righton attempts to show the lack of pathology in the paedophile. Fraser in his chapter on the child sees pathology everywhere. in the child and the family. Powell and Chalkley on the chapter on consequences. present complicated data in an attractive way, but the results seem inconclusive and though the authors draw the conclusion that paedophiie reiationships on the whoie are not traumatic to chtldren. it seems the same data can. if twisted slightly. prove the opposite. Yaffe in his chapter on treatment gives a sketchy review of behavioural treatments. and if one washes to put the treatments into practtce a more comprehensive book would need to be studied. After a rather vague chapter by Hart on social work involvement with paedophtles. comes. like the wine at the marriage of Cannan. the best chapter, by Plummer. who at last does what I have not seen attempted before in the literature; which is, write from the point of the paedophiles and puts the present publicity about paedophilia into context. Overall a good book for anyone who is interested in the subject, made essential reading by Plummer’s view ‘from below’. T. J. ROLFE
G. A. WALTERand S. E. MARKS: ~.~peri~~ltiffl L rarning uttd Chmrye. Wiley. New York (1981). xii + 333 pp. f15.40. Experiential learning is most explicitly defined in terms of its ‘central methods’ (stimulations. exercises. role playing etc.). The book also discusses classical methods (e.g. the case method) and supportmg methods (e.g. audio-visual). One of the central efforts of this book is to present an analysis of such methods m terms of a list of twelve change processes (feedback. conditioning, coercion. identification, persuasion. support. restructuring. channeling. recognition. activatton. commitment and action). Clearly. this range of change processes draws on many areas of psychology. and the first part of the book is devoted to a scholarly presentatton of them. The second part of the book is more practical and focuses on methods. relating them back to these change processes. In general this book offers as scholarly and scientific a presentation of its subject as one is likely to find at the present time. There has been a particular effort to introduce clear conceptual frameworks’ into the field. Nevertheless. much of the analysis of methods, though plaustble, is speculative and there is a notable lack of attention to the empirical evaluation of their effects. Behaviour therapists may be disappointed not to find their work better integrated mto the book. A number of behavioural methods are described in the section on conditioning, but behaviour therapy involves other change processes. and makes more direct use of the methods of ‘experimental’ learning than the authors seem to realize. indeed the conceptual framework of this book would offer a good basis for a broad based analysis of behaviour therapy processes. In turn the empirical behaviour therapy literature could have enriched its method sections. Nevertheless. psychologists wtth a broad interest in change will find this book worth reading. Many behaviour therapists would also find much of value regarding methods of professional training in behaviour therapy. FRASER WATTS