Book review

Michael D. Matthews is Professor of Engineering Psychology at the United States Military Academy at West Point. From 2007 to 2008 he headed the American Psychological Association’s (19th Division of Military Psychology). Collectively, his research interests center on soldier performance in combat.

Considering today’s abundance of psychology books, from reprints of timeless classic works through scholarly editions to popular literature, it is hard to expect a new book to become a big event in psychology. However, a book entitled The Phenomenon of Envy is hard to overlook: as observed by the author, very few people are unaffected by envy. Besides, the name of the author, Aleksander I. Dontsov, former head of the Faculty of Psychology at Moscow State University and of the Russian Psychological Society, is well known among Russian scholars.

First, a disclaimer: the book I am about to review is written by my mentor. Call me biased. I was fortunate enough to attend the lectures presented in this book. It was 35 years ago. I vividly remember how sought after was a good set of lecture notes from these lectures. Now this call has been answered by the author himself. It’s been a long wait, and the new generations of Russian-speaking psychology students — and instructors alike — are so much better off for it...

Janna Glozman’s book provides a comprehensive information on both Russian and Western developmental neuropsychology. The reader, especially form the West, may find fist hand information on Vygotsky and Luria’s collaboration with emphasis put on social aspects of child development. At the same time the reader can learn about principles of Luria’s syndromological (qualitative) approach and Vygotsky’s zone of proximal development. Two important notions that had a great impact both on the neuropsychological and developmental studies...