The premise of psychologist Richard Wiseman‘s book “:59 seconds” is that he sets out to review published (scientific) literature on a range of topics that are normally the fare of self-help books in the hope that he can reveal what has been proven to be correct and then distill this down into a few very quick actions that people can take. I’ve been reading it on and off for a few months now and, finding myself in between books, I’ve just polished off the last few sections (decision making, parenting, personality). I found the book a bit frustrating – it’s like a quick glimpse at topics which might be more interesting if looked at in a bit more detail – but some of the material covered is quite neat and some of the findings a little surprising given conventional wisdom (e.g. group brainstorming does not produce a bigger range of ideas). Wiseman finishes the book by presenting 10 quick pieces of “advice” all of which are pretty obvious but there’s no harm in being reminded of them – time to get a pot plant for my office I think.
Tim O'Hare 