# Is Modern Self-Help Just a Massive Money-Making Scam?



## David Baxter PhD (Jan 11, 2008)

Is Modern Self-Help Just a Massive Money-Making Scam?
By Jeremy, _PsyBlog_ 
Wed, Jan 9 2008

From humble beginnings, self-help books have now colonized huge and ever-growing areas of bookshops. Best-selling titles like _Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus_, or _Don't Worry, Make Money_, promise to teach us how to fix our relationships and live 'more fully'. But are these, and other come-ons, just empty assurances designed to sell a product?

While the advice of philosophers like Epicurus and Schopenhauer, comes to us with the lustre of intellectual achievement, modern self-help books often don't. Worse, they can seem tacky, opportunistic and filled with psychobabble. 

Of course self-help books vary considerably, in both quality and popularity - but are the most popular also the highest quality? In an article to be published in the _Journal of Happiness Studies_, Ad Bergsma looks at the most popular self-help books and asks whether their advice can really help us (Bergsma, in press).

*Reasons to be skeptical*
Despite their huge sales and continuing popularity, self-help books have faced fierce criticism over the years. Respected psychologists like Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi have argued that self-help books will clearly not help people to become thin, rich and well-adjusted; indeed they will probably have no effect whatsoever. 

Worse, some have claimed self-help books are actually bad for us by promoting 'false hope syndrome'. More radically, Steve Salerno, author of _Sham: How the Self-Help Movement Made America Helpless_, claims self-help is responsible for the high divorce rate, increasing drug abuse and the end of romance. 

While claims like Salerno's are hard to justify, there's no doubt that self-help is a massive industry. Salerno's estimate is $8 billion a year in the US alone. That's a lot of cash and all the more reason to take a closer look at what self-help books actually contain and whether it is useful.

Is this cynicism unfounded, merely motivated by jealousy or is there some substance to it? 

*What are self-help books about?*
The first problem is deciding exactly what self-help is given the number of different books on the market. Bergsma (in press) contacted a local publisher for the highest selling self-help books in a variety of bookstores. 

Broadly speaking here is what these books covered:


_Personal growth_: these were mainly focused on improving the self.
_Relationships_: giving advice on communication skills and how to improve our personal relations.
_Coping_: how to deal with difficult events and situations. These often concentrated on dealing with stress at work.
_Identity_: about gaining personal insight, although some overlap with the personal growth category.
*What self-help books get wrong*
Comparing the advice given in self-help books with psychological research about the conditions of happiness reveals two sides to the story. Let's start with the negative. There is evidence from previous studies that self-help books sometimes perpetuate psychological myths. Paul (2001) points out some common ones:


_Venting your anger is good_. Wrong. Research shows that expressing your anger helps maintain it.
_When depressed, think happy thoughts_. Wrong. Research shows that trying to think happy thoughts when we're depressed can actually make our current unhappiness even more obvious.
_Visualize your goals_. Not the whole story: in order to achieve a goal we need to focus on the problems that stand between us and reaching our goal.
_Use self-affirmation_: "I'm a tiger!" Doesn't work, it seems we don't believe our own praise. What we really need is praise from others to raise our self-esteem.
_Use active listening to communicate with your partner_. No luck here either. Loving couples don't seem to use this technique. [1]
*What self-help books get right*
On the other hand, when Bergsma compared the advice given in his sample of self-help books, most of it corresponded with findings from happiness research. For example, self-help books pointed out the importance of our families, friendships, intimacy and love-lives, all of which are highly correlated with happiness. 

Even if self-help books contain the right advice, though, there's still the question of whether reading a book will make any difference to people's lives. In other words: is there any evidence that after reading the advice, that people actually put it into practice, resulting in an improvement.

*Do self-help books work?*
To answer this question Bergsma argues we have to make a distinction between two different types of self-help books. The first focus on the idea of personal growth and the second tackle a particular problem, for example depression or anxiety.

Research into the use of problem-focused self-help books - sometimes called 'bibliotherapy' - has found that they can be effective for less severe problems, like mild depression and anxiety. As for growth-oriented books, there's no evidence for whether they work or not, although people do claim, when asked, to find them useful. Unfortunately we have to be skeptical about these sorts of reports - see my series on the hidden workings of the mind.

It's notable, though, that in the sample Bergsma examined, the vast majority of books were growth-oriented, not problem-oriented. This doesn't mean the growth-oriented ones are no good, just that we don't know whether they're effective or not.

*The hope factor*
If self-help books do work, and there's evidence that some do, why are they effective? Bergsma argues that it may have less to do with the specific advice they contain, and more to do with a factor common to all self-help books: hope.

To explain this point, let's draw an analogy with psychotherapy and the research into its effectiveness. Psychotherapists operate using a variety of different techniques, e.g., cognitive-behavioral, psychodynamic, person-centered and so on. Research into the effectiveness of these different types of psychotherapy has suggested there is a common factor in all of them. This common factor is probably the beneficial effect of having someone listening to you and providing support. The actual techniques used may be less important.

Perhaps the same is also true of self-help books. One thing that all self-help books have in common is that they all tell us that change is possible. In other words they give us hope. Exposing ourselves to a hefty dose of hope probably helps us cope better with life, even if it can't really make us all thin, rich and ecstatically happy. 

*False hope*
The dark side of hope is that claims about potential improvement can, and are, grossly exaggerated, in order to prise open our wallets. Similarly a bright and breezy approach to potential change may lead us to believe that changing ourselves is easy, when often it requires considerable, sometimes monumental, effort.

*References*
Bergsma, A. (In press, 2008) Do self-help books help? _Journal of Happiness Studies_, 1-20.

Paul, A.M. (2001). Self-Help: Shattering the Myths. _Psychology Today_, March.


_[1] Perhaps "loving couples" are already doing their own form of active listening. When two people are truly connected, they tend to also be truly interested in each other and what the other has to say. Distressed couples tend not to listen and as a consequence tend to confuse pr misinterpret what is said. (comment from D. Baxter)_


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## seeking33 (Jan 17, 2008)

Interesting. Some of the popular ideas self-help gurus try to sell ring hollow with me. If self-help books were so effective, everybody would have perfect mental health. But it seems we're more screwed up than ever in this country!


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## Mangopork (Jan 27, 2008)

seeking33 said:


> Interesting. Some of the popular ideas self-help gurus try to sell ring hollow with me. If self-help books were so effective, everybody would have perfect mental health. But it seems we're more screwed up than ever in this country!



Interperative.


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## David Baxter PhD (Jan 27, 2008)

Mangopork said:


> Interperative.



 What do you mean?


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## David Mowry (Feb 26, 2008)

Various self-help books are informative. Counseling Therapist sometimes recommend their clients to read self-help books approved by the A.P.A as homework between sessions, to help the client understand different alternatives to their issues. Also within different academic institutes self-help articles are theorized. I will reiterate A.P.A. approved self-help books can be therapeutic.


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## rosedragon (Feb 26, 2008)

I think....

Read more, widen your perspectives, don't swallow everything, discuss what you belief are true from books, accept other's opinions.

Effective or ineffective a self-help books more like depends on how much you trust yourself you can do it.


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## moonriver (Feb 26, 2008)

I liked the article Dr Baxter, there are a few books that I have read though that I have been very helpful and some were recomended by a therapist.  Sometimes a book just isnt enough though, you need the support of other people. Still, it can be good way to get perspectives from other people that have gone through similar things. For me personally, the trick is being able to do the assignments in the books sometimes, I find I need the motivation or assistance of a real person to get me through them sometimes, some one cheering you on so to speak. Does that make sense?


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## lallieth (Feb 26, 2008)

rosedragon said:


> I think....
> 
> Read more, widen your perspectives, don't swallow everything, discuss what you belief are true from books, accept other's opinions.
> 
> Effective or ineffective a self-help books more like depends on how much you trust yourself you can do it.


Well said


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