Books

YOU: The Owner's Manual: An Insider's Guide to the Body that Will Make You Healthier and Younger

Average customer rating:

Good education and self-care manual.
Great chance to meet Dr. Oz: He really knows what he's talking about
You :The Owners Manual CD
great stuff, esp. on stress
Good book, but I find it ironic...

YOU: The Owner's Manual: An Insider's Guide to the Body that Will Make You Healthier and Younger
Michael F. Roizen , and Mehmet Oz
Manufacturer: Collins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Nutrition | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books

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General | Personal Health | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books

Healthy Living | Personal Health | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books

General | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books

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Accessories:

Tanita BC533 Glass Innerscan Body Composition Monitor

ASIN: 0060765313
Release Date: 2005-05-03

Amazon.com

If there ever was a pair of docs who can make the small intestine seem truly intriguing, here they are. Dr. Mehmet Oz is an alternative-medicine maverick and a cardiologist known to implement acupuncture during open-heart surgery. Dr. Michael Roizen developed the RealAge concept of calculating one's biological, as opposed to chronological, age. Here they've whipped up a witty guide to the workings of the entire body, appropriate not just for those who can't tell their pancreas from their pituitary. Even Cheers' Cliff Claven types who think they know it all will likely be humbled by the 50-question "body-quotient" quiz that starts off the book.

With much sassy humor (they describe the adrenals as similar in shape to Mr. Potato Head's hat), they give a guided tour of the body's anatomy and major systems (hormonal, nervous, digestive, sensory, etc.) including plenty of fascinating trivia along the way. How often should you get your thyroid level checked? How much gas does the average person produce in a day? And, most important, how many times a year do most people have sex?? Drs. Oz and Roizen know. They also reveal plenty of bizarre (and potentially life-saving) facts such as this: If your earlobe has a prominent vertical wrinkle, it's likely that your arteries are aging faster than they ought to be. If only 8th-grade health class had been this fun.

The docs' main goal in presenting all this info is twofold: first, it's your body, so shouldn't you finally learn how it works? And, second, they want to help teach ways of preserving the body's health and youthfulness. To that end, they've included an "Owner's Manual Diet," a 10-day menu plan designed not for weight loss, but to make you feel "years younger." Its simple recipes are each meant to benefit a certain body system, such as Tomato Bruschetta, packed with the antioxidant lycopene, which has been proven to boost immunity. --Erica Jorgensen

Book Description

Between your full-length mirror and high-school biology class, you probably think you know a lot about the human body. While it's true that we live in an age when we're as obsessed with our bodies as we are with celebrity hairstyles, the reality is that most of us know very little about what chugs, churns, and thumps throughout this miraculous, scientific, and artistic system of anatomy. Yes, you've owned your skin-covered shell for decades, but you probably know more about your cell-phone plan than you do about your own body. When it comes to your longevity and quality of life, understanding your internal systems gives you the power, authority, and ability to live a healthier, younger, and better life.

You: The Owner's Manual challenges your preconceived notions about how the human body works and ages, then takes you on a tour through all of the highways, back roads, and landmarks inside of you. After taking a quiz that tests your body of knowledge, you'll learn about all of your blood-pumping, food-digesting, and keys-remembering systems and organs.

Just as important, you'll get the facts and advice you need to keep your body running long and strong. You'll find out how diseases start and how they affect your body -- as well as advice on how to prevent and beat conditions that threaten your quality of life. Complete with exercise tips, nutritional guidelines, simple lifestyle changes, and alternative approaches, You: The Owner's Manual gives you an easy, comprehensive, and life-changing how-to plan for fending off the gremlins of aging. To top it off, you'll also get the great-tasting and calorie-saving Owner's Manual Diet -- a thirty-recipe eating plan that's designed with only one goal in mind: to help you live a younger life.

Welcome to your body. Why don't you come on in and take a look around?

Customer Reviews:

Good education and self-care manual........2007-06-22

In short, just a very informative book that is successful in achieving several goals. For one, it educates the reader in the inner workings of the human body. It does this quite entertainingly through trivia, facts, and interesting pictures (for instance the authors use a lot of elves). Additionally, the book also gives you many helpful tips on self-care and how to keep your body running smoother. While there is a lot information, I really would like to have seen a reference section at the end of the book. All in all though, it's a pretty informative and amusing read that should enhance the well-being of many. Also recommend Treat Your Own Rotator Cuff for readers who might need more specific info on shoulder pain and rotator cuff self-care.

Great chance to meet Dr. Oz: He really knows what he's talking about.......2007-06-19

I've read this book and it has really changed my outlook on my body. You really need to get to know how your system works in order to get the best from it. Through this book, Dr. Oz and Dr. Roizen helped to give me a thorough understanding of the human body. I am a huge fan of their work and am so excited to be attending one of their five special health care workshops this summer. These workshops will offer education on the human body and better weight and health management. The name if the tour is "It's all about you" and that's the frame of mind I'm in right now. I am ready to put myself and my health at the center of my life. I hope you can join me in getting to learn from and possibly meet Dr. Oz.

[...]

You :The Owners Manual CD.......2007-06-01

I really like Dr Oz, and his TV show is very informative. I like listening to him talk rather than read the book. I can listen to it @ work or in my car. Everything is in "layman's terms"

great stuff, esp. on stress.......2007-05-26

I found this book very useful for my personal productivity consulting, mainly their section on stress. In particular, the authors' ideas on Important But Manageable events (IBMs) and Nagging Unfinished Tasks (NUTs) were fascinating, with the latter being what adds most to the aging.

More at "Personal productivity, IBMs (not the company), and NUTs: Some surprises about the brain" [...]

Good book, but I find it ironic..........2007-05-26

...that Dr. Oz himself looks about 7-8 years older than his actual age. (The shoe polish in his hair doesn't help.) He may be younger inside, but with his puffy bags under his eyes, and his droopy eyelids, he looks a lot older than 47.

Nevertheless, the book is full of information which should be especially helpful for those who have relied on theier doctors to solve their health issues, rather than taking some personal accountability and responsibility for their diet and lifestyle choices.

The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More

Average customer rating:

Hope for the little guy
Already recommended it to 10 friends
New consumer behavior...
Interesting and well presented observations
Thought Provoking

The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More
Chris Anderson
Manufacturer: Hyperion
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Economic Conditions | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 1401302378

Book Description

"The Long Tail" is a powerful new force in our economy: the rise of the niche. As the cost of reaching consumers drops dramatically, our markets are shifting from a one-size-fits-all model of mass appeal to one of unlimited variety for unique tastes. From supermarket shelves to advertising agencies, the ability to offer vast choice is changing everything, and causing us to rethink where our markets lie and how to get to them. Unlimited selection is revealing truths about what consumers want and how they want to get it, from DVDs at Netflix to songs on iTunes to advertising on Google. However, this is not just a virtue of online marketplaces; it is an example of an entirely new economic model for business, one that is just beginning to show its power. After a century of obsessing over the few products at the head of the demand curve, the new economics of distribution allow us to turn our focus to the many more products in the tail, which collectively can create a new market as big as the one we already know. The Long Tail is really about the economics of abundance. New efficiencies in distribution, manufacturing, and marketing are essentially resetting the definition of whats commercially viable across the board. If the 20th century was about hits, the 21st will be equally about niches.

Customer Reviews:

Hope for the little guy.......2007-06-23

It may seem like we live in a cultural world dominated by big chains and blockbusters - wrong. Or, at least, we do, explains Chris Anderson in this thought provoking and compelling business book, but beyond the big hits - the bestsellers, the chart toppers - there is a very long tail, with demand snaking right down many thousands of products along. The vast majority of these albums, movies, juicing machines, rice pudding varieties or whatever you won't see in the shops - there just isn't space, but just because they aren't on the high street doesn't mean there isn't a demand for them.

Anderson traces the rise and fall of the hit across many cultural media, but focusing mainly on television and music where the long tail is hitting hardest. It used to be that we sat down and watched or listened to what was brought to us - by the filters of the record labels and tv studios. Now, fuelled massively by the internet, a much wider range of cultural participation can emerge as the tools of production have become democratised. Smaller bands can get a song or album out there - and guess what, it gets listened to! No matter how small you are, there is a demand for what you have to offer - for the endless choice of the digital age is also leading to unlimited demand. Welcome to the age of the niche.

Anderson explains how this can lead to a wide cross pollinisation of cultural phenomena - he writes brilliantly about the DJs across countries who have taken songs, mashed them up, and created a plethora of versions of a song with a creative remix often being preferred to the original song. Tiny home movies can generate massive audiences through word of mouth if they feature on the web (this is where Long Tail theory meets up with 'Tipping Point' theory, as expostulated by Malcolm Gladwell), dominant websites are not always amazon or bbc news - blogs run by individuals with something interesting to say can generate thousands of hits per day as well. And tying it all up, of course, is the mighty google which can filter through all of this information bringing forth cultural flotsam and ads from right down the tail.

On balance, I think this is an invigorating and ennobling theory, the best thing I have read that makes a positive cultural case for internet. One thing bothers me though. Anderson explains that with everything now able to come to market, the existing 'cultural filters' such as film studios and record labels will have less power - I am a book editor, so maybe I will have to seek other employment before long.

Already recommended it to 10 friends.......2007-06-17

If you run a business and want to remain in business the next 4 years, you must read this book. The world as we once knew it is being flipped over right before our eyes (and it's all good).

New consumer behavior..........2007-06-16

In his book "The Long Tail," Chris Anderson insightfully presents the foundation of some new-age (mostly ecommerce) companies whose businesses are designed (intentionally or accidentally) to more deeply penetrate the consumer base. The expansion of product and content due to "unlimited shelf space" allows companies to service a greater number of consumers and harvest a larger portion of revenue from smaller and niche markets. This is Anderson's basic premise of The Long Tail. He paints very broad strokes at first, but his theories become extremely clear as he applies them to companies like eBay, iTunes and Google.

It's a good and important read for any businessman and it will definitely provoke your thoughts. How can my company better penetrate these niche markets? How can my company take advantage of digital distribution? How can my company integrate many of the cost saving advantages of the internet? How can I adapt my business and protect it from progressive consumerism (see entertainment industry).

Buy it, read it, learn it. These are principles that are going to be a bigger part of our lives as consumer behavior continues to march toward an online world.

Have fun,

David Tobias
Redondo Beach, CA

Interesting and well presented observations.......2007-06-10

This is great book full of observations of trends pertaining to how the Internet has changed the scope and depth of what we buy, listen to, etc. If you are a user of [...] you probably participate in this new world. I highly recommend this book. My only issue was that the same material could have been covered in the length of a magazine article (see other reviews) but transforming and gathering these ideas and observations in a book was probably the vehicle to present it to a wider audience. This is a must read for anyone who is trying to gather material in order to figure out if this "Internet thing" will lead to the salvation of our culture or hasten its decline.

Thought Provoking.......2007-06-08

Mr. Anderson's book is well thought-out and articulate. His research is impeccable. Employing solid statistics and numerous examples, he explains the current direction of our overall economy. It's very insightful and encouraging for forward thinking entrepenuers and consumers alike. NOTE: There are places where the information is rather monotonous - it's not all fun and games - but, all-in-all, this is a very interesting read.

Average customer rating:

A Superbly Written Book
Brilliantly-written...if you're 12.
Verbose
To those unfamilar with neurobiology
Some ideas are dangerous....

Stumbling on Happiness
Daniel Gilbert
Manufacturer: Vintage
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Happiness | Self-Help | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 1400077427
Release Date: 2007-03-20

Amazon.com

Do you know what makes you happy? Daniel Gilbert would bet that you think you do, but you are most likely wrong. In his witty and engaging new book, Harvard professor Gilbert reveals his take on how our minds work, and how the limitations of our imaginations may be getting in the way of our ability to know what happiness is. Sound quirky and interesting? It is! But just to be sure, we asked bestselling author (and master of the quirky and interesting) Malcolm Gladwell to read Stumbling on Happiness, and give us his take. Check out his review below. --Daphne Durham

Guest Reviewer: Malcolm Gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell is the author of bestselling books Blink and The Tipping Point, and is a staff writer for The New Yorker.

Several years ago, on a flight from New York to California, I had the good fortune to sit next to a psychologist named Dan Gilbert. He had a shiny bald head, an irrepressible good humor, and we talked (or, more accurately, he talked) from at least the Hudson to the Rockies--and I was completely charmed. He had the wonderful quality many academics have--which is that he was interested in the kinds of questions that all of us care about but never have the time or opportunity to explore. He had also had a quality that is rare among academics. He had the ability to translate his work for people who were outside his world.

Now Gilbert has written a book about his psychological research. It is called Stumbling on Happiness, and reading it reminded me of that plane ride long ago. It is a delight to read. Gilbert is charming and funny and has a rare gift for making very complicated ideas come alive.

Stumbling on Happiness is a book about a very simple but powerful idea. What distinguishes us as human beings from other animals is our ability to predict the future--or rather, our interest in predicting the future. We spend a great deal of our waking life imagining what it would be like to be this way or that way, or to do this or that, or taste or buy or experience some state or feeling or thing. We do that for good reasons: it is what allows us to shape our life. And it is by trying to exert some control over our futures that we attempt to be happy. But by any objective measure, we are really bad at that predictive function. We're terrible at knowing how we will feel a day or a month or year from now, and even worse at knowing what will and will not bring us that cherished happiness. Gilbert sets out to figure what that's so: why we are so terrible at something that would seem to be so extraordinarily important?

In making his case, Gilbert walks us through a series of fascinating--and in some ways troubling--facts about the way our minds work. In particular, Gilbert is interested in delineating the shortcomings of imagination. We're far too accepting of the conclusions of our imaginations. Our imaginations aren't particularly imaginative. Our imaginations are really bad at telling us how we will think when the future finally comes. And our personal experiences aren't nearly as good at correcting these errors as we might think.

I suppose that I really should go on at this point, and talk in more detail about what Gilbert means by that--and how his argument unfolds. But I feel like that might ruin the experience of reading Stumbling on Happiness. This is a psychological detective story about one of the great mysteries of our lives. If you have even the slightest curiosity about the human condition, you ought to read it. Trust me. --Malcolm Gladwell

Book Description

• Why are lovers quicker to forgive their partners for infidelity than for leaving dirty dishes in the sink?

• Why will sighted people pay more to avoid going blind than blind people will pay to regain their sight?

• Why do dining companions insist on ordering different meals instead of getting what they really want?

• Why do pigeons seem to have such excellent aim; why can’t we remember one song while listening to another; and why does the line at the grocery store always slow down the moment we join it?

In this brilliant, witty, and accessible book, renowned Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert describes the foibles of imagination and illusions of foresight that cause each of us to misconceive our tomorrows and misestimate our satisfactions. Vividly bringing to life the latest scientific research in psychology, cognitive neuroscience, philosophy, and behavioral economics, Gilbert reveals what scientists have discovered about the uniquely human ability to imagine the future, and about our capacity to predict how much we will like it when we get there. With penetrating insight and sparkling prose, Gilbert explains why we seem to know so little about the hearts and minds of the people we are about to become.

Customer Reviews:

A Superbly Written Book.......2007-06-22

The book is about affective forecasting. A lot of psychological researches are cross-referenced in the book in a way to support the author's stance. At one point or another, the author does overgeneralize on a topic. Apart from this, this book is one of the best I've read in recent years.

Brilliantly-written...if you're 12........2007-06-21

I literally stumbled on this book, appropriately enough, while searching on Amazon for something totally unrelated. On a whim I bought it. It promised to answer some interesting questions about why people are the way they are.

Things started out well enough, with interesting material and promise of a fascinating journey, but the writer's chit-chatty style soon grew grating. The jokes, puns and snappy asides wear thin after two chapters. They are also obviously being used to pad the book out. I don't disagree with his approach or his conclusion. What he has is a good magazine idea. He's just stretched it to a book to cash in. Academics are so selfless that way.

If the jokes weren't bad enough, the cases he cites to buttress his arguments are numerous and redundant. For just one example, on p. 111 he talks about imagining future events and gives an example. Clear enough. Then on the next page, he starts the first paragraph by saying, "To illustrate this point..." which he'd already done. A few paragraphs later, "This fact was illustrated by..." The next page, another illustration, then another, then another--all of a very obvious point, that we tend to leave out numerous details when we imagine ourselves in future events. Something I think anyone who's sentient knows already anyway.

I don't know if most people are just incredibly stupid and unimaginative and need to be spoon-fed this information as though they have cognitive problems, but I certainly don't need to be addressed like a fifth-grader who's been dropped on my head repeatedly. Yet this book is aimed, they tell me, at college-educated adults. Is this what colleges are turning out these days? No wonder American Idol is the nation's most popular TV show, and the average American ranks up with the average British 8th grader in education, according to studies by The Economist.

By the time you're halfway into a chapter--at the most--you've figured out the author's point. I found myself skipping ahead in each chapter to get to the end, then eventually skipping whole chapters. The end was what I'd lept ahead and figured out after about page 80. This guy comes from Harvard? I guess Harvard, like everyone else, is dumbing down in the race to chase more bucks. Save your money and buy a good recording of Mahler's 5th symphony instead and you'll learn more about happiness, both real and imagined. Sadness too.

Verbose.......2007-06-21

The "Publishers Weekly" review for this book on Amazon provides a succinct and very accurate synopsis of the book...that's all you need to read. The book is a laundry-list of examples that support the less than novel or astute conclusions by the author. Verbose and self-congratulatory.

His anthrophocentric views are cliche, not to mention offensive. His easy dismissal of animal intelligence, denigrating their limited "nexting" capacity when compared to the grandeur of the human imagination , indicates that he is very ignorant of animal behavior...and failed to use his much touted human imagination to perceive their intelligence. He needs only to study a cat for a week to see that animals have the capacity to feel what we do. Cats can hold personal grudges that exemplify intelligence and imagination beyond his dismissive "nexting."

To those unfamilar with neurobiology.......2007-06-20

The newest knowledge in neuroscience shows us that happiness is associated with excessive amounts of neurotransmitters in nerve cells - dopamine (the pleasure molecule) and serotonin (which controls our mood and creates a sense of ease)Anything which raises those chemicals will produce "feelings of happiness". The greatest happiness humans can produce comes from delayed rewards - goal oriented behavior.

Whatever the goal is (getting an A on a test, being a philosopher who writes a book and is clueless about biology, or simply doing a hand stand) - all will produce similar degress of happiness.

Gilbert's book is the direct result of his knowledge based on the situations his genes have been put in. He is unfamilar with biology, so this isn't his fault persay, but as a result he is truly confused about how the world works and how humans actually are. His book therefore does not tell us what happiness is.

Fortunately our children will be raised with the idea that happiness is chemical, not philosophical, many generations from now and take it as a given. Gilbert's book will be long forgotten by then.

Some ideas are dangerous...........2007-06-20

.... including beliefs or misconceptions that if "I just figure it out" I will be happy.

This book is a delightful jaunt into limitations of the human thinking device (aka the brain). It will amuse you and offer lucid, new insights.

Enjoy it, I did

Average customer rating:

Mixed feelings
Interesting, entertaining...but ultimately unconvincing
I was told to read this, and am glad I did.
Down another rabbit hole!
Great insight, and great qualifications

The Wisdom of Crowds
James Surowiecki
Manufacturer: Anchor
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Economic History | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More

ASIN: 0385721706
Release Date: 2005-08-16

Book Description

In this fascinating book, New Yorker business columnist James Surowiecki explores a deceptively simple idea: Large groups of people are smarter than an elite few, no matter how brilliant–better at solving problems, fostering innovation, coming to wise decisions, even predicting the future.

With boundless erudition and in delightfully clear prose, Surowiecki ranges across fields as diverse as popular culture, psychology, ant biology, behavioral economics, artificial intelligence, military history, and politics to show how this simple idea offers important lessons for how we live our lives, select our leaders, run our companies, and think about our world.

Download Description

The Wisdom of Crowds

I

If, years hence, people remember anything about the TV game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, they will probably remember the contestants' panicked phone calls to friends and relatives. Or they may have a faint memory of that short-lived moment when Regis Philbin became a fashion icon for his willingness to wear a dark blue tie with a dark blue shirt. What people probably won't remember is that every week Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? pitted group intelligence against individual intelligence, and that every week, group intelligence won.

Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? was a simple show in terms of structure: a contestant was asked multiple-choice questions, which got successively more difficult, and if she answered fifteen questions in a row correctly, she walked away with $1 million. The show's gimmick was that if a contestant got stumped by a question, she could pursue three avenues of assistance. First, she could have two of the four multiple-choice answers removed (so she'd have at least a fifty-fifty shot at the right response). Second, she could place a call to a friend or relative, a person whom, before the show, she had singled out as one of the smartest people she knew, and ask him or her for the answer. And third, she could poll the studio audience, which would immediately cast its votes by computer. Everything we think we know about intelligence suggests that the smart individual would offer the most help. And, in fact, the "experts" did okay, offering the right answer--under pressure--almost 65 percent of the time. But they paled in comparison to the audiences. Those random crowds of people with nothing better to do on a weekday afternoon than sit in a TV studio picked the right answer 91 percent of the time.

Now, the results of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? would never stand up to scientific scrutiny. We don't know how smart the experts were, so we don't know how impressive outperforming them was. And since the experts and the audiences didn't always answer the same questions, it's possible, though not likely, that the audiences were asked easier questions. Even so, it's hard to resist the thought that the success of the Millionaire audience was a modern example of the same phenomenon that Francis Galton caught a glimpse of a century ago.

As it happens, the possibilities of group intelligence, at least when it came to judging questions of fact, were demonstrated by a host of experiments conducted by American sociologists and psychologists between 1920 and the mid-1950s, the heyday of research into group dynamics. Although in general, as we'll see, the bigger the crowd the better, the groups in most of these early

experiments--which for some reason remained relatively unknown outside of academia--were relatively small. Yet they nonetheless performed very well. The Columbia sociologist Hazel Knight kicked things off with a series of studies in the early 1920s, the first of which had the virtue of simplicity. In that study Knight asked the students in her class to estimate the room's temperature, and then took a simple average of the estimates. The group guessed 72.4 degrees, while the actual temperature was 72 degrees. This was not, to be sure, the most auspicious beginning, since classroom temperatures are so stable that it's hard to imagine a class's estimate being too far off base. But in the years that followed, far more convincing evidence emerged, as students and soldiers across America were subjected to a barrage of puzzles, intelligence tests, and word games. The sociologist Kate H. Gordon asked two hundred students to rank items by weight, and found that the group's "estimate" was 94 percent accurate, which was better than all but five of the individual guesses. In another experiment students were asked to look at ten piles of buckshot--each a slightly different size than the

Customer Reviews:

Mixed feelings.......2007-06-12

Why four stars? Because the book is entertaining and I discovered some things I did not know before reading the book. Why mixed feelings? Because there is no "aha!" moment while reading the book.

Lenin knew that town hall meetings could be manipulated and he did so by placing a few collaborators in strategic places. When the crowd heard the same opinion from all four corners of the hall, they were often swayed. Hitler and Churchill did wonders swaying crowds for evil or for glory. C. Northcote Parkinson told us in "Parkinson's Law" about how meetings run and it is not strange that a forceful leader will, indeed, lead not only the discussion but will to the desired conclusion.

From my screen name, "Individual Investor," you would correctly conclude that my main interest had to do with the stock market "crowd," a.k.a. Mr. Market. I have determined that, left to his own devices, Mr. Market gets stock prices just about right and at those times it does not make sense to buy a stock because the best you can hope for, on average, is an average result. The Wisdom of Crowds tells us that Mr. Market can be unreasonably swayed into being too bullish or too bearish and when the crowd gets bearish, that is usually a good time to buy. Some of you might remember the Tylenol slayings back in 1983. That was a great opportunity to buy Johnson & Johnson because Mr. Market went overboard on the bear side. The company managed the public relations superbly and soon afterwards the stock started to climb back to a more normal valuation. Similarly the Vioxx recall gave you the opportunity to buy Merck in 2004/5 at bargain basement prices.

In conclusion, crowds are wise except when they are not and, if you can judge the crowd correctly, you have an advantage.

Interesting, entertaining...but ultimately unconvincing.......2007-06-08

I listened to the audio version of the book, so I don't know if there was a bibliography or any graphics or tables in the printed version to support the author's thesis. However, just on the basis of the unabridged audio, I found the book interesting, if somewhat overstated. I came away considering it management-fad marketing talk, as opposed to real analysis.

First, the examples are selective; the author cherry-picks his case studies - and has to, to fit them in the book - but also arbitrarily decides when to declare the outcome and call it "wisdom". Crowds of people bought Enron and WorldCom stock. Presumably the "wisdom of the crowd" came when everybody eventually sold out - or lost out. But when the bubble hadn't burst, the "wisdom" was to buy, buy, buy. At what point do you make the call? Was that really wisdom, or just self-preservation? What if fifty years from now all those stock certificates become collector's items worth millions? Is that when we score the wisdom?

Second, the book completely ignores historical or current examples when hysteria was the wisdom of the crowd - the tulip bubble, the rise of fascism, religious fundamentalism, witch burnings,... The list is long, and as relevant today as in the past. Declaring crowds to be wise, while ignoring the relation of crowds to mobs, isn't a balanced argument. If the book had taken into account the extraordinary nature of "wise" crowds - and considered things that trigger the "wisdom" - it would have been at least a little convincing.
I did find the book interesting and entertaining, but there's just no mention of the rest of the story. Nowhere did I see any serious treatment of the old adage "just because everybody believes it doesn't make it true."

I'd recommend reading the other side in "Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds" by Charles MacKay along with this one.

I was told to read this, and am glad I did........2007-05-23

My CEO recommended that several of us candidating for a promotion read this book. At the time I started reading it, I was skeptical that there would be any value to it. I was wrong. While this book may not be the most lively treatise on the subject of 'group think' it does an admirable job of keeping one's attention. Jelly beans... or peanut M&M's - your call.

The discussions on the usefulness of group decision making are interesting. I have been using them in my new position, and Surowiecki's premises seem to be fairly accurate. The decisions made/recommended by the group for cost savings have been successful. The danger of course, is in relying completely on the group decision and not being aware of why the decision was made. If things go really really wrong, you're still responsible. (It's good to have a back-up plan... Mexico anyone?).

Down another rabbit hole!.......2007-05-16

I have read over 1,000 business books "at large", and James' The Wisdom of Crowds is among the few that has made me go WOW multiple times, making sense of real life experiences and observations, extrapolations from other disciplines, other books/readings, common sense, as well as common and uncommon non-sense.

Teamwork, brainstorming, committees are indeed tools, and like any other tools must be handled with care, used and not misused, and The Wisdom of Crowd is the closest to a User's Manual for anyone involved in dealing with teams of individuals; and for those who want to harness the power of crowds leveraging the internet.

So, THANK YOU James, you made sense to many observations, solved quite a few puzzles and opened new questions in me.

Great insight, and great qualifications.......2007-05-15

In this important book, Surowiecki makes a good case for the startling proposal that large anonymous groups of people can often be smarter than even their most expert members. The book has had a huge impact, especially among people developing new, more socially oriented internet sites. Claims have been overblown, with many people saying that a crowd is always smarter than its smartest members. But this is where Surowiecki shines above other cultural interpreters like Gladwell. Because in "Wisdom of Crowds", he is both more thoughtful and more humble about his arguments. He lays out exactly the conditions under which the "crowd" effect occurs: all participants make independent judgements, there is a high possibility that they have access to different sources of information, and they don't communicate. I don't remember if he included this, but I would add "there is usually no 'truth of the matter' avaiable before the issue in question has been decided". This is why most of the examples that bear out the thesis are preference-based, or the outcome of independent aggregate decision making, such as elections, stock prices, betting pools, etc. By both revealing a very interesting social phenomenon, and also carefully characterizing how and when it arises, Surowiecki has done us all a great service.

Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion (Collins Business Essentials)

Average customer rating:

Wish I'd read this 20 years ago
This Book is Dangerous
Humanity; How we abdicate choice and get taken
Great Book
Thought provoking and useful

Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion (Collins Business Essentials)
Robert B. Cialdini
Manufacturer: Collins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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The Psychology of Persuasion: How to Persuade Others to Your Way of Thinking
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The 48 Laws of Power

ASIN: 006124189X
Release Date: 2006-12-26

Amazon.com

Arguably the best book ever on what is increasingly becoming the science of persuasion. Whether you're a mere consumer or someone weaving the web of persuasion to urge others to buy or vote for your product, this is an essential book for understanding the psychological foundations of marketing. Recommended.

Book Description

Influence, the classic book on persuasion, explains the psychology of why people say "yes"—and how to apply these understandings. Dr. Robert Cialdini is the seminal expert in the rapidly expanding field of influence and persuasion. His thirty-five years of rigorous, evidence-based research along with a three-year program of study on what moves people to change behavior has resulted in this highly acclaimed book.

You'll learn the six universal principles, how to use them to become a skilled persuader—and how to defend yourself against them. Perfect for people in all walks of life, the principles of Influence will move you toward profound personal change and act as a driving force for your success.

Customer Reviews:

Wish I'd read this 20 years ago.......2007-06-16

VERY interesting read. Throughout the text, Cialdini writes as if his target audience were normal people trying to learn how to defend themselves from "compliance professionals," but let's be honest here... the real market for this book is marketers and salespeople. Even the review blurb on the cover says the book is for marketers.

I've had sales jobs before, but never once have I been very good. Having read this book, now I know why. I was taking my advice from successful salepeople who weren't sharing their real secrets. How many times did I listen to improve-your-sales audiobooks without ever learning something as basic as the psychology behind reciprocation?

I hope never to have to sell or market anything myself, ever again. If the success of my business ever relies upon my ability to convince and persuade strangers to part with their money, then my company is doomed. But, having read Influence, my company is at least slightly less doomed than it was before. If I ever hire sales people, Influence will be part of their week 1 training.

The great thing about this book is that it does, in fact, teach you step-by-step how people are persuading and convincing you to part with your money. Even if, like me, you have little interest in being in sales or marketing, you might learn how to spot devious sales techniques with much more precision than before. I also learned a little about child psychology (social proof) that I'm going to use with my own kids.

This Book is Dangerous.......2007-06-10

This book in the wrong hands could be dangerous! This one of those rare books that will change the way you look at the world forever. Take action today and put this one in your library.

Jeb Blount
Author, PowerPrinciples: Do You Have The Winning Edge?

Humanity; How we abdicate choice and get taken.......2007-05-22

First, this is a great book, I wish I had read it at age 15, 25, and 35. Although, even revised, you can tell it was written in the 70's; it detracts nothing from the book - it only shows that it is as relevent today as it was 35 years ago, and that it will be relevent in an other 35 years.

Cialdini makes a strong case on how we streamline our mental load by making automated decisions, and in doing so, allow ourselves to be easily manipulated by add men, con artists, group think, authority figures and ourselves.

The book is well written. To me that means, a pleasant, easy read, where you do not have to reread paragraphs multiple times to make sense out of mangled sentences.
The weakness in the book is that most of the counter measures he recommends will do little. We are not going to change the advertising industry by complaining that thier ads are successful. The real counter measure is to understand why we are susceptable, and live thoughtfully. There is a counter measure in the book that might save your life, and that is worth knowing and teaching to your children. (In a few words: in a crowd, if you need help, point to an individual and ask that person for help, or else herd mentality will take over and no-one will help).

This in not a book on marketing (even though it is advertised as one and its information may be used for this). It is more a book on behavior, and informative of how to liberate yourself from automaticity

Great Book.......2007-05-11

Showed me how I have been hooked so often and how to recognize it in the future. Highly recommend. It will stay in my library for future reference. The price of the book will be recouped by not being snookered again.

Thought provoking and useful.......2007-05-08

Although a bit dry at times, this is the best book on Influencing people I've ever read. It uses great academic and real world examples to demonstrate how people can influence others and how you can avoid being influenced by someone utilizing influencing strategies on you. The book can be dry at times, but that is mainly because this is not a gimmick book about 7 steps to better influence or some framework. It is steeped in information and data and therefore, it offers a rigorous understanding of this topic. Highly recommended.

Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole

Average customer rating:

Stop Capitalism Now
Try something else.
5 Stars, but only for one reason....
An Ethos of Infantilism
Flawed from the get-go, not worth finishing

Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole
Benjamin R. Barber
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Macroeconomics | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Superpower

ASIN: 0393049612

Book Description

A piercing and vital look at how capitalism is consuming U.S. society.

An apt sequel to Benjamin R. Barber's best-selling Jihad vs. McWorld, Consumed offers a wrenching portrait of how adult consumers are infantilized in a global economy that overproduces goods and targets children as consumers in a market where there are never enough shoppers. Driven by a frantic imperative to sell, consumer capitalism specializes today in the manufacture not of goods but of needs.

This provocative culmination of Barber's lifelong study of democracy and capitalism shows how the infantilist ethos deprives society of responsible citizens and displaces public goods with private commodities. Traditional liberal democratic society is colonized by an all-pervasive market imperative. Public space is privatized. Identity is branded. Our world, homogenized. With brilliance and depth, Barber confronts the likely consequences for our children, our liberty, and our citizenship, and shows finally how citizens can resist and transcend the civic schizophrenia with which consumerism has infected them.

Customer Reviews:

Stop Capitalism Now.......2007-06-22

Capitalism forces writers to keep making books, which society doesn't "need" but corporations force on us anyway.

Sell a book, and you're also selling bookmarks, chairs, bookshelves, and once consumers finish the book they need another. It's built-in obsolescence.

Do the right thing, stop capitalism this very moment and refuse to buy Consumed.

Try something else........2007-06-19

I confess, I didn't read the whole book. A friend gave it to me, and I parked it on the shelf after reading half and skimming the rest. Jeez-Louise! I'd hate to spend a week on an expedition cruise with this guy! He'd be the first one trying to feed the animals and then monopolizing the talk at dinner till everyone wanted to jump overboard. I didn't realize corporate America had captured everyone's free-will. The evil Bill Gates and Steve Jobs must be supressed along with Rupert Murdoch and the Walton family! I suggest reading Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville. He still rings true today. You'll sleep better at night. You want an entertaining picture of rampant consumption in America today, seen through the lens of 1840's when the all-corrupting market swallowed the entire continent of North America...and yes, is still swallowing it...There's a lot to eat out there, bunky! Read Heyday by Kurt Andersen. We may not be perfect but there must be some attraction if 12 million people will risk life and limb to get here one way or another. Mr. Barber and his book would probably be better fare in Venezuala or Cuba.

5 Stars, but only for one reason...........2007-06-17

...which is that, hey, is that a Bomb Pop on the cover!!??? Boy, that thing is gorgeous, and what a funny thing to choose for the cover--at least in my view because it was MY DAD THAT INVENTED THE BOMB POP!! I can still remember us all sitting around the tv set with lumps of clay in our hands trying out different shapes for popsicles which my dad would make (the good ones) at his ice cream factory in Kansas City, Missouri. So, I am always glad to see a Bomb Pop anywhere, even if the author is using its image to show what crap is being forced upon us all to make us $$ spending zombie losers.

Ah, wrong.

An Ethos of Infantilism.......2007-06-06

In "Jihad vs McWorld," an earlier work published in 1995, Benjamin Barber made some prescient observations about the threats that Islamic fundamentalism and consumer capitalism posed for liberal democracy. The warnings went largely unnoticed until 9/11. At which point the book was republished for its insightfulness as to why Islamic fundamentalists were bent on destroying the McWorld created by consumer capitalism. Now Barber has written a follow-up: Not only does Jihad pose a threat to McWorld, McWorld is actually in the process of undermining itself as well as liberal democracy.

There is nothing new about fulminating against the excesses of consumer capitalism. Critics from Thorstein Veblen, to John Kenneth Galbraith, to Daniel Bell have done as much. Barber extols the productivist capitalism of an earlier era, characterized by hard work, discipline, and deferred gratification. This type of capitalism met "the real needs of real people." Today in the era of consumer capitalism basic needs are met rather quickly, leaving the consumer with lots of disposable income and many options of spending it foolishly.

It has long been known by marketing executives that the purpose of advertising is to make people buy what they don't really need. One wonders about the long term consequences of a lifetime of this kind of brainwashing. Barber breaks the process down into two stages. The first is the "consumerization of the child." This is done by inculcating shopping-centered behavior in children, training them to become habitual shoppers and even developing brand consciousness. The second stage is not to have the child develop into an adult. Marketing executives seek to infantilize adults, so that they have no deeper understanding of themselves than the brand names that define them. Even though this critique of consumer culture sounds harsh, there is some truth in it.

There is also some truth to the claim that it is undermining the public sphere. A society of adolescents or infantilized adults focusing primarily on their private needs has, according to Barber, led to a decline in public participation in democracy as well as a decline in public institutions. He fears that the increasing privatization of the the public sphere that has been going on for the past decades will be the undoing of democracy.

Although Barber proposes some "remedies" to "redirect capitalism," they're not even worth mentioning because they are futile. When the excesses of consumer capitalism reach a point where they are no longer sustainable, capitlaism will redirect itself. When infantilized adults find that their quality of life is not improving with the consumption of more useless goods they will then decide to grow up.

Flawed from the get-go, not worth finishing.......2007-05-31

I was initially intrigued by the premise of this book. Like the author, I believe much of our popular culture panders to the lowest common denominator, and I looked forward to reading an analysis of how and why this came about. However, 23 pages in, I have already found problems with his logic and data. Here are just a few examples.

On page 6, Barber bemoans the existence of "adult fiction readers flocking to Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings". Harry Potter may be for young adults, but Tolkien? As a friend of mine remarked, "Yes, it's a pity that adults are regressing to the level of an Oxford professor."

On page 20, he describes the rise of advertising targeted to children this way: "Exit Peter Pan. Exit sensitive writers like Barrie and Lewis Carroll who capture children in literature to free the imagination of the young everywhere." Writers like Rowling and Tolkien, whose popularity he surely knows is not limited to adults?

Perhaps he is not the best judge of popularity. On page 6, he lists such films as "Terminator, Spider-Man, Catwoman, and Shrek dominating the entertainment market". I don't know about you, but Catwoman flopped where I come from. Just its existence is enough for Barber, I guess.

Just one more example. The thing that made me decide to give this book one star, and write a review, which I've never done before, is on pages 22 through 23. Barber lists "top ten" Google queries as evidence of cultural infantilization. But is this data specifically adults? Nowhere in the book (or on Google's website, for that matter) is this explained. Barber even messes up the 2004 data. Google gave lists of "the top ten men/women searched for", but Barber reports it as "the top ten searches made by men/women". Hmm, funny how men searched for Orlando Bloom and women searched for Pamela Anderson, but not vice versa. You'd think he might have noticed it - it took me about three minutes to figure it out.

In short, skip this. He may be completely right about our culture, but he hasn't argued the point here with any credibility.

Average customer rating:

Why We Buy is a must buy for retailers.
Interesting Findings
A Must Read
Not why but how!
Misnamed

Why We Buy: The Science Of Shopping
Paco Underhill
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0684849143

Amazon.com

In an effort to determine why people buy, Paco Underhill and his detailed-oriented band of retail researchers have camped out in stores over the course of 20 years, dedicating their lives to the "science of shopping." Armed with an array of video equipment, store maps, and customer-profile sheets, Underhill and his consulting firm, Envirosell, have observed over 900 aspects of interaction between shopper and store. They've discovered that men who take jeans into fitting rooms are more likely to buy than females (65 percent vs. 25 percent). They've learned how the "butt-brush factor" (bumped from behind, shoppers become irritated and move elsewhere) makes women avoid narrow aisles. They've quantified the importance of shopping baskets; contact between employees and shoppers; the "transition zone" (the area just inside the store's entrance); and "circulation patterns" (how shoppers move throughout a store). And they've explored the relationship between a customer's amenability and profitability, learning how good stores capitalize on a shopper's unspoken inclinations and desires.

Underhill, whose clients include McDonald's, Starbucks, Estée Lauder, and Blockbuster, stocks Why We Buy with a wealth of retail insights, showing how men are beginning to shop like women, and how women have changed the way supermarkets are laid out. He also looks to the future, projecting massive retail opportunities with an aging baby-boom population and predicting how online retailing will affect shopping malls. This lighthearted look at shopping is highly recommended to anyone who buys or sells. --Rob McDonald

Book Description

Is there a method to our madness when it comes to shopping? Hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as "a Sherlock Holmes for retailers," author and research company CEO Paco Underhill answers with a definitive "yes" in this witty, eye-opening report on our ever-evolving consumer culture. Why We Buy is based on hard data gleaned from thousands of hours of field research -- in shopping malls, department stores, and supermarkets across America. With his team of sleuths tracking our every move, from sweater displays at the mall to the beverage cooler at the drugstore, Paco Underhill lays bare the struggle among merchants, marketers, and increasingly knowledgeable consumers for control.

In his quest to discover what makes the contemporary consumer tick, Underhill explains the shopping phenomena that often go unnoticed by retailers and shoppers alike, including:

For those in retailing and marketing, Why We Buy is a remarkably fresh guide, offering creative and insightful tips on how to adapt to the changing customer. For the general public, Why We Buy is a funny and sometimes disconcerting look at our favorite pastime.

Customer Reviews:

Why We Buy is a must buy for retailers........2007-05-24

This book gives you concrete suggestions for increasing sales.

Interesting Findings.......2007-05-14

It was a really easy book to read and it gives you insides on strategies to set a retailing space, having a lot of things in mind, that might seem obvious when you read it, but they really aren't. It was a great; I highly recommend it for people on the retiling industry.

A Must Read.......2007-05-06

If you are in the marketing/communications/advertising/design business (or in any business for that matter) you must read this. It is full of insight and valuable information. I highly recommend this book.

Not why but how!.......2007-05-06

From a laymens view, it seems like Paco Underhill's methods have merit. Because this book reads like a how-to for retailers, it makes me wonder why more companies don't use or at least study Mr. Underhills findings. The information in the first few chapters is fun, after that it's a little redundant.

Misnamed.......2007-05-02

Underhill is a consultant who conducts field work for retailers. His book consists of a great many anecdotes drawn from years of experience, many of them fascinating and revealing. However the book is misnamed: it should be titled "How We Shop: the Art of Retail Persuasion" or something like that. It largely fails to discuss why we, as shoppers, buy the things we buy and concentrates instead on how we can be lured into considering new purchases as we browse.

Underhill clearly has lots more ideas left in him--the book is littered with suggestions for retail strategies that, it would seem, he hasn't yet been able to convince any of his clients to try. The structure is loose and largely arbitrary. He gently derides academics for a reluctance to but theory into practice yet his book fails to construct helpful theory from his practice and is weaker for. Because the text is largely anecdotal it's harder for the reader to draw out principals that might apply to their own circumstances.

An interesting book but not quite what it purports to be.

Ethical Theory and Business, Seventh Edition

Average customer rating:

Biased, but a good primer on business ethics
A Critical Compendium
A Good Anthology
In Defense of Beauchamp and Bowie
This Book is Whack!!!

Ethical Theory and Business, Seventh Edition
Tom L. Beauchamp , and Norman E. Bowie
Manufacturer: Prentice Hall
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0131116320

Book Description

This book presents a comprehensive anthology of readings, legal perspectives, and cases in ethics in business. Contrasting business ethics approaches, Regulation of business, Performance Monitoring. Genetic testing and screening. Third world issues. Federal sentencing guidelines. Ideal for business professionals interested in reviewing ethical issues in business.

Customer Reviews:

Biased, but a good primer on business ethics.......2006-02-24

This book is a good primer on business ethics, and it would be even better if the writer / editors hadn't shown their bias with their selections of included material.

Business ethics theories evolve, just like any other social phenomenon; however, just because a theory is new doesn't make it right. Especially in an ethics book! The authors are clearly biased against big business, against small government, and against "shareholder management" theory.

Does this make them right or wrong? No. The only "wrong" committed is the bias itself.

As you read this book, just keep your critical thinking skills sharp and your eyes open.

A Critical Compendium.......2002-07-20

This book is a critical reader, and it's probably the most highly used text in business ethics today. Those who reviewed this book negatively sound like people looking for a fun, non-academic overview of the field. If so, this book isn't it. These are articles published in top academic journals, edited for readability, by scholars who are addressing the fundamental issues in a wide range of topics. It's meant to expose the span of the field and still give students (not light readers) exposure to contemporary literature that touches on the most salient points. It's meant to be a starting point to deeper research in any given topic. As such, the book is a complete success. B & B do a great job (here as in other ethics compendiums) of providing a framework that makes it easy for a professor to expose her students to the field in one swoop. They do a fine editorial job, stripping the articles of padding, and they work hard to keep the offerings up to date (passing on older articles that are superceded by fresh insights that touch on contemporary challenges and technologies; look for something relating to the corporate scandals of this last year in the next edition). If you are a student looking for an overview on business ethics, this book is the correct starting point. If you are someone looking for light reading about corporate corruption, with illustrations and full-color photos, stick to People magazine.

A Good Anthology.......2001-06-23

I really enjoyed this anthology, especially the section on sexual harassment. Some of the subjects were hard going, but, it was a good introduction to business ethics.

In Defense of Beauchamp and Bowie.......2001-06-17

I teach business ethics at the college level, and have found Ethical Theory and Business to be very helpful. Basically, B and B attempt to do three things, or so it seems to me. First, they offer an introductory essay, covering some of the main distinctions in both meta-ethics (e. g. whether morality is objective or subjective) and normative ethics. This essay is the weakest part of the book, I think, because they seem to offer caracatures of most relativist leaning views (e. g. egoism), and do not adequately criticize Kantian moral philosophy. But even so, the essay does explain many useful distinctions in philosophical ethical thought. Second, B and B offer both classic readings in Business Ethics (e. g. Milton Friedman), as well as really up to date readings, by many of the leaders in the field (e. g. R. Edward Freeman). This is quite a good selection of readings, although they have omitted a few classic essays (like Galbraith's 'The Dependence Effect'), and a few subjects which might have been useful, such as the question of whether one can attribute moral agency to corporations at all. Even so, B and B include more than any course in Business Ethics could cover. Third, B and B provide a Web site with excersizes and instructor aids. Depending on how much one uses the Web, this may be helpful too. So generally speaking, although no anthology is perfect, Beauchamp and Bowie have put together an admirable collection. There is a seventh edition coming out soon. Perhaps that one will be as good as this one.

This Book is Whack!!!.......2001-05-11

Ethical Theory and Business by Beauchamp & Bowie is the worst academic book I have ever been required to read. I agree with the reader from Minnesota that this book is very dry and boring and if I could give this book zero stars I would. All of the chapters in the book do not flow together very well since this book is very unorganized and is nothing more than a collection of narrative articles. The book does not have an index or any illustrations in it and the companion website to the book [stinks]. I do not think I learned anything about business ethics from reading this book nor did I find the information in it helpful for me in my life. After I finished reading this book, I felt like throwing it away, but instead I sold mine back to the bookstore. So if you want to learn about business ethics and are not required to purchase this book for a class, do not purchase this book.

Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think

Average customer rating:

Great Book
The Last Diet Book You'll Need
Great Diet Book
Excellent general reference and consumer guide
nvt951@yahoo.com

Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think
Brian Wansink
Manufacturer: Bantam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0553804340
Release Date: 2006-10-17

Book Description

In this illuminating and groundbreaking new book, food psychologist Brian Wansink shows why you may not realize how much you’re eating, what you’re eating–or why you’re even eating at all.

• Does food with a brand name really taste better?
• Do you hate brussels sprouts because your mother did?
• Does the size of your plate determine how hungry you feel?
• How much would you eat if your soup bowl secretly refilled itself?
• What does your favorite comfort food really say about you?
• Why do you overeat so much at healthy restaurants?

Brian Wansink is a Stanford Ph.D. and the director of the Cornell University Food and Brand Lab. He’s spent a lifetime studying what we don’t notice: the hidden cues that determine how much and why people eat. Using ingenious, fun, and sometimes downright fiendishly clever experiments like the “bottomless soup bowl,” Wansink takes us on a fascinating tour of the secret dynamics behind our dietary habits. How does packaging influence how much we eat? Which movies make us eat faster? How does music or the color of the room influence how much we eat? How can we recognize the “hidden persuaders” used by restaurants and supermarkets to get us to mindlessly eat? What are the real reasons most diets are doomed to fail? And how can we use the “mindless margin” to lose–instead of gain–ten to twenty pounds in the coming year?

Mindless Eating will change the way you look at food, and it will give you the facts you need to easily make smarter, healthier, more mindful and enjoyable choices at the dinner table, in the supermarket, in restaurants, at the office–even at a vending machine–wherever you decide to satisfy your appetite.

Customer Reviews:

Great Book.......2007-06-27

This book will really open your eyes to why, when, where, and how we eat the way we do! NOW, I try real hard to recognize certain things in my surroundings before I stick something in my mouth!

This book will also make you feel really stupid, when you read how gullible we are with advertising!

I reccomend this book to everyone, whether you are trying to diet or not. Read it!

The Last Diet Book You'll Need.......2007-06-17

If every overweight person read and followed the instructions in this book, they'd never have to diet again. And that is exactly Wansink's point -- that eating to lose weight doesn't have to be about self-punishment and self-flagellation. Instead, through a series of well-researched and -documented scientific experiments, Wanskink shows readers who to fool themselves into losing weight.

I really enjoyed the social science part of the book -- reading about how Wansink and other researchers structured the experiments to measure the causality of certain behaviors. But just as thrwoing all the jellybeans into one container makes you think there's more than there is, I felt a bit overwhelmed by the tons of research and new ideas. i ended the book not knowing exactly what I could do, RIGHT NOW, to make a difference in my life. I think a short tip sheet with all the appropriate information on it would be much appreciated.

In the meantime, read Wansink's book. Something's sure to take root and change your behavior and attitudes toward food.

Great Diet Book.......2007-05-30

This book gives practical stratgeies for weight reduction in a very humorour way. It is awesome for anyone interested in weight loss. It is awesome for anyone who wants a laugh!!

Excellent general reference and consumer guide.......2007-05-24

In this book Marion Nestle combines her usual wit, insight and healthy scepticism with her awesome familiarity with nutrition, food marketing and food production to produce a readable, interesting and useful general reference to USA food, which doubles as a handy consumer guide for people wanting to make the best choices when shopping for their food.

Recommended for anyone interested in how USA food is made, how it is sold, why people get sick from food, which foods they should eat and which types/brands/labels of those foods they should seek out or avoid.

Given the trans-national scope of the world's food industry, this book is also interesting and useful to people from other parts of the world (I've never been to the USA).

nvt951@yahoo.com.......2007-05-23

I found these CD's very helpful. It helped me in many ways understand more about something I do several times a day (eating). It also helped me lose weight. I got more out of the CD's than the book (mostly unread). I listen to it when I walk.

Average customer rating:

Good Read
Very interesting textbook, one of the best I've seen!

Consumer Behavior (7th Edition)
Michael Solomon
Manufacturer: Prentice Hall
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0132186942

Book Description

Communicating a fascination for the everyday activities of people, this leading book on consumer behavior examines how our world is influenced by the action of marketers, and considers how products, services, and consumption contribute to the broader social world we experience. Its incredibly interesting and dynamic content proves hip and engaging, while reflecting the latest research.

A four-part organization looks at consumers as individuals, consumers as decision makers, consumers and subcultures, and consumers and culture.

For brand managers, marketing research analysts, and account executives.

Customer Reviews:

Good Read.......2007-03-22

Useful book, includes thinking on both consumer behavior and relevant market strategies. Good read for marketing beginners.

Very interesting textbook, one of the best I've seen!.......2007-02-08

As a marketing major, this consumer behavior textbook has been an asset to my learning so far. Very descriptive with many graphic examples. Uses outside knowledge from today that help the reader to stay alert and interested.

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