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Three seductive ideas

Jerome Kagan

1998232 pagesabout 4–5 hours
1998
first published
  • 1998Harvard University Press · 232 pages · ENGISBN 9780674890336
  • 2000Harvard University Press · 240 pages · ENGISBN 9780674001978

Do the first two years of life really determine a child's future development? Are human beings, like other primates, only motivated by pleasure? And do people actually have stable traits, like intelligence, fear, anxiety, and temperament? This book, the product of a lifetime of research by one of the founders of developmental psychology, takes on the powerful assumptions behind these questions - and proves them mistaken. Ranging with impressive ease from cultural history to philosophy to psychological research literature, Jerome Kagan weaves an argument that will rock the social sciences and the foundations of public policy.

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