Did the experts practice what they preached?
Does it make you a better parent if you have pioneered scientific theories of child development? In a unique study, Great Psychologists as Parents compares what great psychologists have said about raising children and the way they did it themselves.
Using an eclectic variety of sources, from letters, diaries, autobiographies, biographies, as well as material from interviews, each chapter focuses on a key figure in historical context. There are many surprises. Was Piaget, the greatest child psychologist of the 20th century, the only man to try to psychoanalyse his mother? How many sons of great gurus have had to rescue their father from a police station as R.D Laing's son did? And why did Melanie Klein's daughter wear red shoes the day her mother died?
"Being a parent is the most important of all tasks. Psychologists start with the apparent advantage of knowing about human behaviour but just as the bishop may sin, the psychologist may not turn out to be a wise parent. I discovered many really were not so brilliant – and there is no evidence Freud ever changed a nappy!” states the author, David Cohen.
Covering early scientists such as Darwin, psychoanalysists such as Freud and Jung, to founders of developmental psychology including Piaget and Bowlby as well as Dr Spock, Great Psychologists as Parents gives a vivid, dramatic and often entertaining insight into the family lives of these great psychologists. It highlights their ideas and theories alongside their behaviour as parents, and reveals the impact of their parenting on their children.
“To those who think psychology is at best common sense and at worst an excuse for drinking deep into psychobabble, I have to say yes – and no,” says David. “Few of those I studied were careless or callous parents. They all tried, even R.D.Laing, but few were faultless parents but then who is? The details of their successes and failures reveals these great psychologists as all too human. The question is did they love their kids more than their theories?”
Great Psychologists as Parents is a parenting book with a difference. It gives a vivid, dramatic and often entertaining insight into the family lives of these great psychologists. Close bonds, fraught relationships and family drama are described against a backdrop of scientific development as the discipline of psychology evolves.
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If you would like any further information, or to arrange an interview, please get in touch.
About the Author:
David Cohen’s books include the best seller Diana, Death of a Goddess, Body Language, The Escape of Sigmund Freud and How the Child’s Mind Develops. His ITV film on Soham, When Holly Went Missing, was nominated for the Baftas. His doctoral thesis was on what makes children laugh and he is currently finishing a film, Shakespeare and all that Jazz, with Cleo Laine and Jacqui Dankworth. He founded Psychology News in 1979.
NOTES FOR EDITORS
For more information, or to request a review copy or to interview the author please contact: Natalie Turner, Associate Marketing Manager, Routledge
Tel: +44 (0) 207 017 74309 | Email: Natalie.Turner@tandf.co.uk
When referencing the book, please include: Great Psychologists as Parents by David Cohen, published by Routledge (Taylor & Francis Group).
*Learn more about Great Psychologists as Parents at: https://www.routledge.com/9781138899919
Follow us on Twitter @tandfnewsroom and @routledgepsych
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