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This well-designed and well-reported piece of educational research will remain an authoritative source of information in this field for many years.
Early in their book, the authors face the possibility of reaching only very 'obvious' conclusions after prolonged and elaborate investigations. With some justification, they point out that what is obvious is not necessarily true, and that what is obvious to one person may be obscure to another. The critic, thus disarmed, is now in the mood to consider means as well as ends. It is as an interesting venture in psycho-social methodology that the work holds the attention. It is to be hoped that many other problems of public importance will receive the same admirable treatment. The questionnaire method has its critics, but it is one of the few available ways for measuring attitudes in large-enough samples. The authors employ both ranking and rating techniques, and results are made easily accessible in tabulated form. At times the classificatory presentation is carried to excess, and stomachs habituated to free associative assimilation may find it a little indigestible.
The original frame of reference was somewhat wide, covering the large questions of rewards and deterrents. Although these are dealt with in many sections of the book, the main topic centres around the emotionally-charged problem of corporal punishment. This has aroused as much passionate and biased argument as the related one of capital