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Graham Music, Psychology Press, 2011, 311 pp. (paperback)
Hold onto your seats for a rave review.
One of the countless gems in this goldmine of a book (slightly to mix a metaphor) shows how negative and positive appraisals operate as separate bio-behavioural systems. It is not that happy people do not suffer, just that their positive experiences outnumber and outweigh the negative in the sense of feeling stronger and more salient. In addition, our sensitivity to the latter is far greater than to the positive. In his amazing range of reference, Music unearths' studies showing that human taste buds can detect one part in 2 m of bitterness, but only 1:200 sweetness. It is better to be bitterly alive than cheerfully dead, but – this is the virtue of the gift of secure attachment – better still to be happily alive. As an appraiser – or perhaps an app-praise-er – this book succeeds magnificently, both ways. Not only is it enjoyable, uplifting and hugely informative, but also – within its chosen terms of reference, faultless – making life hard for an habitually nit-picking reviewer!
Music's project is to survey the current state of knowledge – theoretical and experimental – in child development from conception through to adolescence. If it is not too clunky a comparison, a good book – and this is a very good book – is like a sturdy tree: firm structure of trunk and branches apposite to their ecological niche/genre; graceful, illuminating leaves; a floral aroma of inspirational overtones; fruit-bearing for the next generation. Music's book has just such qualities, with five sections, each offering a clear structure: early days, mainly about mother–infant interaction; developmental theories, biological, attachment based and sociological; themes, in which he surveys a number of key topics such as play, language and gender; non-maternal care and the role of ‘alloparents’, fathers, siblings, foster parents and finally psychopathology, how and why things go wrong,