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To have possessions: A handbook on ownership and property
958
BOOK
REVIEWS
contributors often refer to some “theory” to be tested. But there is no theory; we are told that in preparation for SDM-3 some 20 well-known psychometrists got together to prepare a submission on defence mechanism, but broke up after several hours, unable to agree. If “experts” cannot agree on a definition of the theory, how can we test it? In one of the few sensible articles in the book, Kline reveals some of the difficulties and criticisms which beset this work. Questionnaire studies address conscious attitudes, and are out; how can they serve to measure unconscious processes? Projective techniques are out, being unreliable and of unknown validity. Tests using subliminal perception, like Silverman or Kragh, fail to give evidence of validity, which is usually assumed; Kline fails to mention that experts in the experimental field have heavily criticized these studies for violating every rule in the book about how such experiments should be conducted. Most of the studies recounted in fact concern the DMT (defence mechanism test) of Kragh for which impossibly high correlations were claimed in the selection of Swedish pilots, but when tested in England quite insignificant results were found in similar circumstances. The test is based on the “perceptgenetic” hypothesis, according to which reaction to pictures or words of emotional meaning are elicited first by very short exposures (subliminal), then increasingly longer exposures until fully conscious. It is assumed that subliminal evocation will bring to light unconscious defence mechanisms, but no evidence is brought forward to link responses with (non-existent) criteria. There are lots of tables of correlations with sets of criteria of doubtful relevance, but these are often based on very small numbers, and fall into the usual error of applying significance tests appropriate to a single correlation to the highest correlation in a very large group, then capitalizing on chance errors. There is no consideration of alternative hypotheses; could it not be that highly anxious people show typical reaction to threatening pictures or words, and are also likely to be bad risks in pilot training? Why postulate the separate existence of a whole series of defence mechanisms? There seems little theoretical connection between the test and what may underly Freudian Theory, other than the writers’ assumptions. But why should a person who has activated defence mechanisms against unconscious threats not be able to deal with the very conscious dangers of a pilot’s h/e? Why should a threatening fact, glimpsed subliminally, evoke unconscious threats and the appropriate defence mechanisms? And how do we know that such evocation has taken place? The many articles in the book simply take answers for granted, and never stop to argue the case. There has been a good deal of work on stress and defence mechanisms which is experimental, and does not start at the wrong end, namely a theory which is so ambiguous as to make no testable predictions whatever. There are experimental studies, like those of Temoshok, which test proper theories linking defence mechanisms, such as suppression of emotional reaction, with cancer, the success of which enlarges our understanding. Clearly proper scientific study is possible; why were these methods not used here? The Preface of the book says that “The QuantiJication of Human Defence Mechanisms ” is to be welcomed both for its scientific merit, and as an example of interactional collaboration and co-operation between psychoanalysts and clinicians from many countries. It is difficult to discern any scientific merit, and if collaboration and co-operation results in such a desperately poor product, perhaps the Commission of the European Community’s Medical and Health Research Programme, which apparently stimulated it, ought to think again. Nothing emerges from all these endeavours but the realization that these theories are too vague and woolly to be testable, that the methods used are inappropriate, and that the statistical treatment is for the most part faulty. It need hardly be said that the book cannot be recommended, except as an example of how not to do research. H.J. EYSENCK
FLOYD RUCHMIN: To Have Possessions: A Handbook on Ownership and Property. Behaviour and Personality, 6(6) (1991). 496 pp. $20.00. ISBN 0886-1641.
Special issue of the Journal of Social
Psychological research, particularly that brand found in North America, has been accused of being parochial, faddish, ethnocentric and capricious. Some aspects of human behaviour are neglected and ignored while others are over-researched by investigators using the currently in-vogue methodology and statistical analysis. It is therefore not surprising that it takes a lawyer (from the Faculty of Law at Queen’s University, Canada) to edit a special issue in a self-confessedly radical journal on the psychology of ownership and possession; a conspicuously neglected topic. The Journal of Social Behaviour and Personality is exceptionally good value for money. As part of the highly modest annual personal subscription of US $25 (about a quarter to a third of the price of more “establishment” journals) one gets whole edited books out of special issues. This volume is nearly 500 pages and contains 25 chapters that are arranged under seven headings: challenging traditional theory; social aspects of owning; personality and possessions; life-space changes; acquisition motivations; coping with loss; critiques of materialism. There are contributors from amongst other management scientists, lawyers, psychologists and sociologists. It is a handbook; not a book you read cover-to-cover but consult as a handy, comprehensive and up-to-date handbook. I enjoyed the chapter by Belk on the ‘ineluctable mysteries of possessions’ though I could have hoped that indeed the purpose of the volume would have been to reduce the ineluctable nature of the topic. Personality variables do not feature much in the book and the social identity theorists and constructionists seem to predominate. We are also “treated” to the perspectives of Buddhist, Psychoanalytic and Phenomenological perspectives, but Marx is only mentioned in passing. Clearly this topic of research is only just beginning, and while some chapters probably represent milestones others will no doubt end up as millstones or indeed tombstones. There is an attempt by Furby and Etzioni at the end to draw out some of the more important themes but neither do a very satisfactory job. I would have liked the editor to provide an after-word with perhaps both a summary and a blue-print for further theorizing and research in this field. But possibly the field is not yet coherent enough to do that. The editor indeed admits that accepted papers (all were peer reviewed) were organised into post-hoc groupings which is a matter of convenience rather than theoretical taxonimization. Nevertheless, this volume will no doubt help stimulate research into the psychology of ownership, possessions and property. A. FURNHAM
BOOK
REVIEWS
contributors often refer to some “theory” to be tested. But there is no theory; we are told that in preparation for SDM-3 some 20 well-known psychometrists got together to prepare a submission on defence mechanism, but broke up after several hours, unable to agree. If “experts” cannot agree on a definition of the theory, how can we test it? In one of the few sensible articles in the book, Kline reveals some of the difficulties and criticisms which beset this work. Questionnaire studies address conscious attitudes, and are out; how can they serve to measure unconscious processes? Projective techniques are out, being unreliable and of unknown validity. Tests using subliminal perception, like Silverman or Kragh, fail to give evidence of validity, which is usually assumed; Kline fails to mention that experts in the experimental field have heavily criticized these studies for violating every rule in the book about how such experiments should be conducted. Most of the studies recounted in fact concern the DMT (defence mechanism test) of Kragh for which impossibly high correlations were claimed in the selection of Swedish pilots, but when tested in England quite insignificant results were found in similar circumstances. The test is based on the “perceptgenetic” hypothesis, according to which reaction to pictures or words of emotional meaning are elicited first by very short exposures (subliminal), then increasingly longer exposures until fully conscious. It is assumed that subliminal evocation will bring to light unconscious defence mechanisms, but no evidence is brought forward to link responses with (non-existent) criteria. There are lots of tables of correlations with sets of criteria of doubtful relevance, but these are often based on very small numbers, and fall into the usual error of applying significance tests appropriate to a single correlation to the highest correlation in a very large group, then capitalizing on chance errors. There is no consideration of alternative hypotheses; could it not be that highly anxious people show typical reaction to threatening pictures or words, and are also likely to be bad risks in pilot training? Why postulate the separate existence of a whole series of defence mechanisms? There seems little theoretical connection between the test and what may underly Freudian Theory, other than the writers’ assumptions. But why should a person who has activated defence mechanisms against unconscious threats not be able to deal with the very conscious dangers of a pilot’s h/e? Why should a threatening fact, glimpsed subliminally, evoke unconscious threats and the appropriate defence mechanisms? And how do we know that such evocation has taken place? The many articles in the book simply take answers for granted, and never stop to argue the case. There has been a good deal of work on stress and defence mechanisms which is experimental, and does not start at the wrong end, namely a theory which is so ambiguous as to make no testable predictions whatever. There are experimental studies, like those of Temoshok, which test proper theories linking defence mechanisms, such as suppression of emotional reaction, with cancer, the success of which enlarges our understanding. Clearly proper scientific study is possible; why were these methods not used here? The Preface of the book says that “The QuantiJication of Human Defence Mechanisms ” is to be welcomed both for its scientific merit, and as an example of interactional collaboration and co-operation between psychoanalysts and clinicians from many countries. It is difficult to discern any scientific merit, and if collaboration and co-operation results in such a desperately poor product, perhaps the Commission of the European Community’s Medical and Health Research Programme, which apparently stimulated it, ought to think again. Nothing emerges from all these endeavours but the realization that these theories are too vague and woolly to be testable, that the methods used are inappropriate, and that the statistical treatment is for the most part faulty. It need hardly be said that the book cannot be recommended, except as an example of how not to do research. H.J. EYSENCK
FLOYD RUCHMIN: To Have Possessions: A Handbook on Ownership and Property. Behaviour and Personality, 6(6) (1991). 496 pp. $20.00. ISBN 0886-1641.
Special issue of the Journal of Social
Psychological research, particularly that brand found in North America, has been accused of being parochial, faddish, ethnocentric and capricious. Some aspects of human behaviour are neglected and ignored while others are over-researched by investigators using the currently in-vogue methodology and statistical analysis. It is therefore not surprising that it takes a lawyer (from the Faculty of Law at Queen’s University, Canada) to edit a special issue in a self-confessedly radical journal on the psychology of ownership and possession; a conspicuously neglected topic. The Journal of Social Behaviour and Personality is exceptionally good value for money. As part of the highly modest annual personal subscription of US $25 (about a quarter to a third of the price of more “establishment” journals) one gets whole edited books out of special issues. This volume is nearly 500 pages and contains 25 chapters that are arranged under seven headings: challenging traditional theory; social aspects of owning; personality and possessions; life-space changes; acquisition motivations; coping with loss; critiques of materialism. There are contributors from amongst other management scientists, lawyers, psychologists and sociologists. It is a handbook; not a book you read cover-to-cover but consult as a handy, comprehensive and up-to-date handbook. I enjoyed the chapter by Belk on the ‘ineluctable mysteries of possessions’ though I could have hoped that indeed the purpose of the volume would have been to reduce the ineluctable nature of the topic. Personality variables do not feature much in the book and the social identity theorists and constructionists seem to predominate. We are also “treated” to the perspectives of Buddhist, Psychoanalytic and Phenomenological perspectives, but Marx is only mentioned in passing. Clearly this topic of research is only just beginning, and while some chapters probably represent milestones others will no doubt end up as millstones or indeed tombstones. There is an attempt by Furby and Etzioni at the end to draw out some of the more important themes but neither do a very satisfactory job. I would have liked the editor to provide an after-word with perhaps both a summary and a blue-print for further theorizing and research in this field. But possibly the field is not yet coherent enough to do that. The editor indeed admits that accepted papers (all were peer reviewed) were organised into post-hoc groupings which is a matter of convenience rather than theoretical taxonimization. Nevertheless, this volume will no doubt help stimulate research into the psychology of ownership, possessions and property. A. FURNHAM