Book Review: The Psychology of Harry Potter

Book Review: The Psychology of Harry Potter

Edited by Neil Mulholland, PhD

7+ years of Pottermania left traces everywhere, even in psychology. Neil Mulholland, a senior psychologist in child and family psychiatry collected over twenty psychological essays that study Life of The Chosen One, his friends and enemies or explain behavior in real world by giving examples from Hogwarts.

What Kind of School Is Hogwarts?

Nicely organized book starts with analysis of Hogwarts school. Lack of curiosity (except Harry and Hermione), memorizing at the expense of problem solving and creativity, intergroup conflicts; is that a school that any responsible parent would send kids to? Well, it seems that parents with magically-powered kids have no other choice. However, despite of all what was said, school at Hogwarts remains attractive, at least for us, muggles, since it represents high standard of morale, like a lighthouse in the ocean of today's instability.


This chapter also provoke me to thing about Krystof, my son and his school. Do they support creativity or rather memorizing?

And how about me? Do I support his free exploration of the world or do I rather pave the road for him? How much is the experience shareable? Does everyone must go through same mistakes?
Tons of questions in my mind flying around, exactly what I love, when reading inspiring books.

Conflicts @ Hogwarts

How easy is to create a competitive atmosphere? Is it a slippery slope to a continuous conflict? Can competition help to motivate people? The believe is that light competition is good, but think twice. Especially if you're a manager. Competition and cooperation  in the same time within the same team is unlikely. So what do you support, what kind of behavior do you provoke?

Will Harry  be OK?

That's actually interesting and thoughtful chapter too. Harry's orphaned childhood is not the kind you'd like to live, though his values remains intact by the derogation from his uncle. On the other hand, his difficulty to start dating is worrisome, psychologists say. Admired by his fanclub, hated later on, not able to keep long term engagement.
Well, I'm on Harry's side in this case, he's an introvert, so what.

Is the Book Readable by Non-Psychologits?

Yes. These essays, although written by different authors, are quite readable. Cooked in very informal language, with flavors of magix language, you can eat them all at once or pick what most interests you. Nice extension to J.K. Rowling's bestselling saga for adult Muggles that like to think about the life.

Posted at 10:18PM Mar 03, 2008 by Pavel Suk in Books  |  Comments[2]