This blog post has some very intriguing arguments to think about while reading Carnegie, or any self-help book for that matter.

But there is a distinct difference between reading about a thing and actually practicing it.

IMHO most people skim with skepticism or try to absorb a feel-good attitude but don't do the work every day. It's a daunting commitment to actually help yourself, when the insanity of doing the same things over and over is so much easier.

contentgrrl

And of course, we both know "well being" may capture a component of "personal growth," but certainly is not the whole picture (or perhaps even the best part of the picture).

Keep up the great writing!

Thanks for your comment. First about the your personal growth question, I think the author is suggesting people would be given books categorised as personal growth and then their well-being could be measured before and after reading them. Same method as for the problem-oriented books.

Second, about your criticisms of the Paul (2001) article - I'd agree this is not a very nuanced description, but the basic points (mostly) hold true. The author of the Psychology Today article does rely on solid academic references. For example on 'think happy thoughts', she has consulted Dan Wegner, and on self-affirmation William Swan.

You can read the article here.

The "think happy thoughts" summary is a really simplistic interpretation of the research in this area. The research actually shows that trying to suppress negative thoughts (mostly in undergraduate students -- very little in way of real-world research in this area) can lead to a more depressed mood. That's very different than saying "happy thoughts don't work." Optimistic thinking and answering cognitive distortions are two self-help techniques that have a lot of empirical support for helping with a depressed mood.

Self-affirmation research also has produced more complex results than "self-affirmation doesn't work" or "self-affirmation has no effect on mood." That's simply not a very nuanced reading of the literature, which suggests there are positive effects of self-affirmation.

Furthermore, these suggestions about what "self-help books get wrong" comes from, ironically, a self-help magazine (Psychology Today) article, written not by a psychology researcher, but by a health journalist for a lay-person audience. I believe the article greatly simplified the research in these (and other) areas in order to make simple, strong points that made for a good article (but not necessarily a wholly accurate one).

Kyle, yes, I'd definitely agree that there's considerable variation.

On the other hand, I consider books such as Dale Carnegie's How to win friends and influence people to be very useful. I remember reading a similar book by Barbara Walters about how to talk to anyone. I think these types of books are very useful because communicating effectively is one of those things that can be very hard to learn without some tips.

I also put Caldini's Influence in this category as well. It helped me explain some of the behaviors I was seeing around me from other people. After reading his explanation of how small rewards can permanently change people's behavior more effectively than large ones my eyes were opened to a great deal of phenomena that had been inexplicable to me previously.