You are three American high school psychology teachers who together produce a website called Books for Psychology Class. showcase the best psychology books suitable for teenagers and also for your fellow teachers to use in class.
nancy fenton: laura, jessica, and i teach advanced placement (ap) psychology and have also taught psychology at the level. In addition, Laura has experience teaching IB psychology. we have met professionally through speaking engagements, reading ap psychology, and working collaboratively on books and other projects for psychology-related publishers.
You are reading: Psychology books for high school students
We all love to read, and when we finished a book, we would have an idea to use in class, but then we weren’t really finished. so the site started as a way to read a book and engage with ourselves to create an original class activity based on the book. we also love to share ideas with other professionals and discuss psychology.
For every book we read for the blog, one of the three of us will write a book summary, list related resources (perhaps the author’s website, related ted talks, other websites), and list the main psychological concepts relevant to the book. We also created an original activity that can be used in class. The activities we have created vary widely and include projects and demonstrations for teachers to use in the classroom based on ideas and concepts from the book.
The Psychology Classroom Book Blog is designed for teachers, whether they are high school psychology teachers, ib psychology, ap psychology, or college psychology professors. students interested in psychology can use the blog to find books related to their specific interests. we are working on creating a subsection of the blog aimed directly at students.
laura brandt: We keep this blog as a labor of love. we get nothing from doing that on the blog, except a kind of satisfaction that maybe I’m helping some students and I’m helping some teachers.
Why do you think it is useful for students and teachers to read psychology books like these, that is, general non-fiction books aimed at laymen, rather than, say, scientific journals?
lb: Many students express an interest in reading something outside of class that isn’t their textbook, and this gives us a great resource for us to say, “here’s something I think you’ll really enjoy” and hopefully, that initiates a love for books, a love for reading, a love for psychology. that’s a miracle.
I think we all share this idea that teaching is an art and part of that art is storytelling. And students love stories! if they can engage with psychology because of the stories, I think we’re willing to do it. we hope it will be useful for that human interest.
“Teaching is an art and part of that art is telling stories”
And for teachers, we hope that our articles on these books will give you those stories, and our activities will give you something to do with your students that is truly applicable. we try to mix the activities: some of them are powerpoints, some of them are writing prompts, some of them are interactive activities.
Well, I love the list of psychology books for teenagers that you have compiled. Let’s start with a discussion of moonwalking with Einstein. We interviewed Joshua Foer about the best books on memory at the time this book came out; he said that “although the idea of a disciplined and trained memory seems novel to us today, it was commonplace in ancient history.” why do you recommend it?
lb: The book opens with Josh Foer covering the US Memory Championships as a journalist. when he interviews the winner, he asks: ‘when did you realize you had this great memory?’ and the winner says: ‘no’. well, he just won the championship. for his position that he does. but he says, ‘no, I have the right techniques’. As a hook for students, that’s a great story.
every year i tell my class how josh foer then trains for the memory championships and wins the card placement category. he is a national champion after that. I love the wacky descriptions of him wearing blinders so he doesn’t get distracted and studying in the basement of his parents’ house.
There are limits to mnemonic devices and memory palaces. Josh Foer describes how she went to New York City for dinner after taking first place in one category. he drove to dinner and took the subway home, completely forgetting that he had driven in the first place, so even as a memory champion, he’s not immune to memory errors! It’s not this magic bullet for all aspects of your life, but it can be really great for going to the supermarket. It can be great to remember, I don’t know, what to pack for a trip.
“even as a champion of memory, he is not immune to memory errors”
we can share these tools with students, without overusing the use of mnemonic devices. I think he does a beautiful job with that in his book. Furthermore, for teenagers or even college students, writing is really accessible. it’s so much like a story, and josh foer is such an engaging writer that it really appeals to that age group.
jessica flitter: I start my class with the memory unit and I love this book. Josh Foer’s story is a perfect hook for students and makes psychology accessible to them. while they may not be training for memory championships anytime soon, many feel like they’re preparing for a mini version as they tackle their class load. On the first days of school I create a memory palace for a list of foods in my house that stays with students throughout the year. After they realize the power of the loci method, I use the mnemonic to help them remember famous psychologists associated with locations in their school. they are always surprised when they can remember the material months later.
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When he spoke to us, he made an interesting comment: that the advent of printed books made it less important for people to have good memories. I feel that today that problem has intensified. personally, i feel like my memory has suffered a lot because i never have to remember anything, i’m always googling everything. Is that a discussion you’ve had with students in your classes?
lb: We recommend a book on the blog called Head in the Cloud which is exactly about that. the influence of technology on cognition was newly integrated into the ib psychology course last year. (I used to live in Switzerland; now I’m back in the US. An effort because you know you can get it back later.
I think that also poses a really interesting ethical dilemma for educators: what can we leave out and what are the non-negotiables? I gave up teaching proper apa citations because they can be done online, and maybe that space could be used to teach something else. but I don’t know what the answer is head in the clouds it made me think. It brought me more questions than answers. it is something that is ongoing and constantly evolving that we will have to continue to deal with.
yes. Let’s talk about the second book on our list of the best psychology books for teenagers. this is shrinks: the untold story of psychiatry.
jf: i was doing a tour of the clark university archives and the g stanley hall office. While sitting in the hall office chair, a psychology professor recommended that I read Psychiatrists: The Untold Story of Psychiatry. is a great read for students interested in clinical psychology. we try to help our students understand the difference between a clinical psychologist and a psychiatrist, the latter has a medical degree and can prescribe medication.
shrinks provides historical insight and acknowledges the field’s challenging past of questionable practices and harsh treatment of patients. The author also expands on recent discoveries by focusing on the brain and the current DSM-5. A timeline addressing diagnosis, treatment, and the renaissance of psychiatry is established so that readers see a more complete picture of psychiatry. the book is full of terms and theories, but woven into a story that is easy to follow. For the social studies/history buff, it’s a great read that delves into psychology’s brief but vivid past. it also leaves the reader wondering where the path of psychiatry is headed and what is just around the corner.
“psychiatry has to recognize the mistakes and ethical issues of its past”
nf: when we choose our five books, we try to be broad, right? we try to have some clinical, some biology, some cognition, some emotion, a social psychology book. the book shrinks is like a piece of history. the author feels that psychiatry has to deal with the mistakes and ethical problems of its past, but that psychology and psychiatry are in this great moment where they are using new research, genetics and diagnostic tests to help more to people.
the book is very much like a story and is divided into three sections: the diagnosis story, the treatment story, and a third section, ‘psychiatry renaissance’: how we can use technology positively to deliver treatment to reach more people. is a really interesting book that offers a more complete picture of psychiatry, past and present. a nice, easy to read and high interest book that gives you an overview.
it’s great. I’m interested in the comment that it’s good for students considering a career in clinical psychology. Is part of your goal to help teens think not only about the subsections of psychology, but about possible careers within it?
nf: many students, when they start taking a psychology class, think that psychology is almost entirely clinical psychology. as a result, they are often surprised that psychology is so much more diverse. I think they’re surprised and excited to see all the ways that psychology connects with health and medicine, how it connects with business, how it connects with education, how it connects with engineering, how it connects with economics and many other fields.
students love how when they take a psychology course and learn things that they can apply right away, maybe it’s memory techniques, like we discussed earlier, or how to improve cognition, or the understanding they gain about interactions social. psychology is a topic of great interest to many high school students. the goal for the teacher, of course, is to guide them on how this relates to both their everyday lives and their potential future careers.
okay, let’s go from a book on psychiatry to one from a patient’s point of view. this is brain on fire: my crazy month by susannah cahalan. this is the story of a woman who suffered from a rare and sudden neurological condition that resulted in psychosis. Why do you recommend it as a psychology book for teenagers?
lb: There are so many books on the biological basis of behavior and disorders, but I think this one is unique in many ways. Number one, this is a young woman who just started her career, so in terms of age, she’s 10 or younger than the students in our classes who are 17 or 18. She is also a writer. so: I’m so sorry this happened to her, but I’m really glad it happened to a writer because it makes it so much easier to read.
shows students what a psychotic break looks like. this is a woman who was incredibly successful as a journalist and then she starts having all these hallucinations about bedbugs. even a thorough cleaning of her apartment is not enough. And as she follows her downward trajectory, she puts a human face on mental illness and, in this case, a truly successful face.
When the books focus solely on the homeless population or the violent schizophrenic population, I think that’s really misrepresented. I don’t know if this is the most representative case, but it is different from what you can hear in movies or TV shows that really emphasize the negative too much.
“the optimal ratio between positive and negative emotions is 80:20”
also raises interesting questions about treatment. susannah is doing relatively well, or her family is, so they can get her the care she needs. so he acknowledges that he was very lucky and that if his financial situation was different, the results in terms of his recovery probably would have been completely different. She has just published a new book called The Great Pretender: The Undercover Mission That Changed Our Understanding of Insanity in which she focuses on the failings of the American mental health system.
I like the end of the book; she can make a full recovery, knowing that this may happen again in the future, but that it is not a lost cause, that there is hope.
For me, readability is probably the key element for students, and maybe for teachers as well, because it’s a book you really can’t put down. if that’s what we need for students to become readers, I totally agree.
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Okay, let’s move on to book number four on our teen psychology reading list. this is your dark side advantage: why being your whole self, not just your “good” self, drives success and fulfillment. Does this sound like a different take on positive psychology?
nf: authors todd kashdan and robert biswas-diener are positive psychologists. positive psychology is the scientific study of human strengths, but in this book they show that negative emotions were naturally selected because they have value, help people cope and thrive. suggest that the optimal ratio of positive to negative emotions is 80:20. this is a truly unique book that challenges students to see negative emotions in a different light.
Obviously, an anxiety disorder isn’t helpful to anyone, but the authors argue that anxiety can be a wake-up call that can keep you safe. the authors discuss guilt as a motivator for growth and improvement. fear protects you, makes you slow down and be more cautious. selfishness can lead to bravery. So, there are positive things that come out of negative emotions.
nf: students will experience stress. teenagers experience stress, adults experience stress. The book looks at cognitive restructuring, or how the act of reframing how we think about stress can help us understand, accept, and deal with negative emotions. teachers can help students understand how cognitive restructuring can help people reframe their interpretation of stress to create more positive outcomes.
The positive psychology movement is important because we don’t want psychology to be just the study of illness and mental problems. we want to study human strengths but we need to have this balance. I think this is a really readable book, and it includes some excellent studies that perhaps students preparing for a science fair could replicate. exposes students to biological psychology, evolutionary psychology, motivation and emotion theories. There’s a lot of exciting material in this book based on what we’d love to teach in class but often don’t have time for.
It also sounds like a book that, in addition to helping with the academic side of things and developing a passion for psychology as a subject, could also be useful purely in terms of a teenager’s personal growth. do you agree?
nf: I would. I would like to. I think it’s important for you to think about how feelings of insecurity and anger in small doses can be useful and help improve your life. and that is just a part of life: there will be frustration and negative emotions. how we interpret and respond to our emotions is important.
great. That brings us to the last title on our list of psychology books for teens: You’re Not So Smart by David McRaney.
lb: I would primarily label this as a social psychology book. it’s in a bit of a different category and it’s structured a lot differently than anything we’ve talked about so far. mcraney also wrote a follow-up called now you’re less of a fool.
ha!
lb: So he’s good with punchy titles. but I really think, and I wrote this in the article on our site, that this book could replace our teaching of the entire social psychology unit. In almost every introductory psychology textbook, social psychology comes last, but I like to teach it first, because every day in a social psychology unit, students come to me and say, ‘Miss Brandt. I saw the bystander effect. there is one thing every student in our class should do: take psychology out of the classroom and see how it applies to their everyday lives.
Even for the student who never takes another psychology class, I am well aware of how this class can help you lead a better life. because psychology as a discipline is a helping science. So how can we help them better manage stress? How can we help them to interact with their peers, their parents and their future children in a more effective way?
“psychology is not something that theoretically exists in the classroom. exists every day”
What this book does is give students a concept. it is the confirmation bias, the bystander effect. You give them a short paragraph description of the term that you might get from a textbook, but then you give them two or three real-life examples. “this is the self-fulfilling prophecy experiment, and this is how it applies to your life.”
Honestly, almost every major topic we cover in an introductory chapter on social psychology is covered in the book. makes psychology real: this is not something that theoretically exists in the classroom. exists every day. That’s why I love this book.
that sounds great. That leads us nicely to my final question. why do you think psychology is a good subject for teenagers to study, either in school or in books like these?
lb: Psychology will apply regardless of what field they might end up in. being exposed to it helps them focus their interest and view an app.
how can you take what we know about psychology with, say, moonwalking with einstein, to help you become a better student? How can the aspects of you that are not so intelligent help you to be a more compassionate person, or to be aware of the fundamental attribution error and prevent you from making it? how can you take some of the brain on fire and reduce the stigma around mental illness? how can they be defenders?
I believe this is a course in which all students can be successful. all students can use it in their everyday life and career and it is also a fantastic way to get students really interested in science and develop their understanding of research, by presenting it in such an engaging way.
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