The Person and the Situation: Perspectives of Social Psychology

“All of my books have been, in some sense, intellectual godchildren of The Person and the Situation. This book has been a constant companion over the past 10 years.” Malcolm Gladwell, in his new foreword

How does the situation we’re in influence the way we behave and think? Professors Ross and Nisbett eloquently argue that the context we find ourselves in substantially affects our behaviour.

“The Person and the Situation explores the complex ideas about personal versus situational determinants of behaviour and relates the lessons of our discipline to important political, social, and even philosophical issues. This is the type of book that we have long wished we had available to assign to the serious, critical student who asks, ‘What have we really learned from social psychology?’

We offer this book as a kind of throwback to a golden age and as a tribute to our intellectual forebears. We offer it as a ‘stand tall and be proud’ pep talk for our colleagues in general and for our younger colleagues in particular. We offer it as an olive branch and invitation to more fruitful intellectual dialogue with our friends in personality research (and also to our friends in anthropology and sociology who cluck, with some justification, about our parochialism). We offer it as a slim guide for non-psychologists to the heart and muscle of our enterprise. And last, but not least, we offer it as an invitation to honour the great tradition of Kurt Lewin that links basic theory first to the analysis of socially significant real-world phenomena and ultimately to the task of effective social innovation.” Lee Ross & Richard Nisbett

With a new foreword by Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers and The Tipping Point, and a new afterword by the authors, this timely reissue of one of social psychology’s classic texts is essential reading for anyone with an interest in human behaviour