Book Review: Assumptions about Human Nature

The basic thesis of this book is that beliefs about human nature (assumption) are coherently organized (as constructs) and that these constructs (as interpersonal attitudes) form a central core in each individual's orientation toward the world. By knowing what beliefs and individual holds, one should be able to predict his or her attitudes toward other variables.

The book is divided into 11 chapters. Chapter 1 introduces the reader to the author's propositions and objectives. Some personal remarks about the importance of studying assumptions and some general remarks about the role assumptions play in people's behaviours are followed by the author's claim that psychology and sociology have promoted certain assumptions while overlooking or neglecting others. The aim of the book is to "alleviate this neglect".

In chapter 2, the author reviews the predominant assumptions help by philosophers and (later) psychologists in the history of Western civilization and focuses on four types of assumptions ("constructs") evident in different schools of psychology (behaviourism, psychoanalysis, humanistic psychology, and George Kelly's personal construct theory).

Chapter 3 presents an attempt to identify the theory underlying these constructs by defining them as interpersonal attitudes ("attitudes about people in general"). Six clusters of these attitudes ("substantial beliefs") are identified by the author: simplicity versus complexity, similarity versus variability, trustworthiness versus untrustworthy, strength of will and rationality versus external control and irrationality, altruism versus selfishness, independence versus conformity to group pressures.

A method of measuring these attitudes, based on the Likert-Scale, is introduced and explained in chapter 4, while in chapter 5 the author discusses some group differences found after applying these scales in tests (gender-, racial-, age-, and occupational differences). In chapter 6, the author explores the relationship of these attitudes to individual - difference variables such as attitude, personality-, and aptitude variables. Chapter 7 presents some evidence of the influence of these attitudes on certain interpersonal behaviours: student's evaluation of instructors, behaviour of teachers in classrooms, "mixed-motive-game" situations, and racial discrimination.

Chapter 8 (co-authored by L. Stack, C.E. Young, and L.S. Wrightsman) explores how assumptions about human nature develop in children and adolescents, while in chapter 9 (co-authored by N.J. Baker and L.S. Wrightsman) the authors attempt to reveal the influence of the "Zeitgeist" on the formation of these beliefs. Chapter 10 (co-authored by G.W. Baxter, R.N. Claxton, and L.S. Wrightsman) reviews attempts to charge these basic assumptions (attitude change). In chapter 11, finally, the author discusses some "novel approaches" to the study of assumptions focusing on assumptions held by members of some communal groups.

For practitioners the book may prove to be somewhat disappointing. The results obtained by administering the "Philosophies of Human Nature Scale" to various subject populations reveal little that is new or surprising as far as inter-personal attitudes are concerned. The finding that "occupational differences are consistent with the values and orientation of each occupation" my serve as an example. The conclusions reached at the end of chapter 10 ("How much change is possible?") may sound unduly pessimistic to many practitioners: "It seems likely that philosophies of human nature do not change much after a person reaches adolescence" and "Everyday experiences have very little influence once attitudes have been established". What are the "implications for practitioners" if this view is accepted?

Peter Stehle