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Bartlett's thinking about thinking, buttressed by laboratory experiments which antedate World War I, results in a peculiarly discursive book which seems ill-suited both for professional psychologists and the laity.
Taking a narrower view of cognitive processes than that held, for example, by Hebb, the author divides thought into two main types: formal or 'closed-system' thinking and 'adventurous' thinking. The
latter, which is treated most superficially, is further subdivided into experimental (i.e., scientific), everyday, and artistic thinking. The categories, though valid, are neither especially rigorous nor penetrating; and the entire approach is marked by an obsolescent, if rather individualistic, mixture of associationism and gestalt. However, neither of these two currents of psychological theory is acknowledged by Bartlett, whose laboratory appears to be well-insulated; and, apart from the obvious influences of late nineteenth-century Denkpsychologie, his major insights derive (apparently by transfer) from Haddon, Head, and Rivers, whose major work lay outside of psychology.
Since Bartlett has not attempted a systematic treatise on thinking, or even a critical appraisal of the important work done in this area by contemporary and earlier psychologists, he is not subject to criticism for these serious deficiencies. But the reader is entitled to wonder how prefatory and pedestrian an academic specialization can become after almost half a century of intensive practice. At any rate, this book will neither intensify nor obstruct the revival of interest in problems of cognition.