University of New England

Bowdoin author Barbara Held to discuss the virtues and vice of positive psycholgy Sept. 28th

Bowdoin scholar Barbara S. Held, Ph.D., will speak on "Positive Psychology:Virtue and Vice" at 6 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 28, 2006 in the St. Francis Room of the Ketchum Library at the University of New England in Biddeford.

The lecture is sponsored by the UNE New England Institute for Cognitive Science and Evolutionary Psychology. It is free and open to the public.

Background
Held explains that spokespersons for the positive psychology movement urge psychologists to conduct empirical research to determine the routes to and benefits of virtuous behavior.  They also see their movement itself as virtuous by claiming it to be a corrective to mainstream or so-called "negative psychology" (now also called "psychology as usual"). 

However, Held believes their rhetoric and mission are fraught with problems, if not bona-fide vice, nonetheless.  In this colloquium Held will consider whether positive psychology is indeed just what the doctor ordered to cure psychological science of its alleged shortcomings.  She will also consider whether the way in which virtue is construed in positive psychology circles allows for a science of virtue that is, as founder and leader of the movement Martin Seligman claims, descriptive and not prescriptive.  The vices of movements in general will be discussed.

Barbara S. Held, Ph.D. 
Held is the Barry N. Wish Professor of Psychology and Social Studies at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. She is the author of Back to Reality: A Critique of Postmodern Theory in Psychotherapy (Norton, 1995), in which she provides theoretical and philosophical analysis of the postmodern/linguistic turn in psychotherapy. She is currently at work on its sequel, in which she extends her philosophical critique to interpretive trends in psychology.

She has served on several editorial boards, including the Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology. Her popular book Stop Smiling, Start Kvetching: A 5-Step Guide to Creative Complaining (St. Martin's, 2001), in which she challenges what she calls the "tyranny of the positive attitude in America," has garnered worldwide media attention, including features in the New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, and People magazine, and appearances on National Public Radio's "Talk of the Nation" as well as ABC, NBC, and CBS TV News.  A clinical psychologist, she practiced psychotherapy for many years. She lives with her husband on the coast of Maine, although she escapes as often as possible to New York City, where her kvetching is seen in a positive light.

(Press release issued June 8, 2006)