Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking (edition 2012)

This was a very interesting read. I myself am an introvert and it helped me a lot to understand myself and why I am the way I am. Very helpful. ( )

I decided to read this after it caught my eye/ear several times. I related to this book since I'm an introvert, and I spotted some of my coping mechanisms. It reminded me that introversion and shyness aren't the same thing, though many people assume so, and they certainly do go hand in hand in many cases. As with many things, finding a balance in interactions of work and play is important. ( )

http://books.moonsoar.com/archives/2013/05/29/quiet-the-power-of-introverts-in-a... ( )

Six-word review: Let's just say I wasn't impressed.

Extended review:

I appreciate the author's drawing attention to a topic that is probably underattended. I also found some of the anecdotes and alleged statistics interesting.

However, I was repeatedly bothered by what sounded to me like faulty logic and misattributions of causality, although I couldn't tell whether the specious reasoning lay in the cited studies themselves, in the conclusions the author drew from them, or simply in the incomplete and possibly lopsided reporting of them. For instance, members of Asian cultures were described as being more typically introverted than Westerners, but the behaviors described tended to sound (to me) more like the result of enculturation in a collectivist society than an introverted society. Similarly, I noted what often seemed to me like a failure to distinguish between shyness or fearfulness and introversion.

I was also irritated by what struck me as a preachy or moralizing tone in a number of places, and I found the chapter about parenting and teaching introverted youngsters especially hard to swallow. For example, a parent is advised to consider whether her child is more comfortable playing with older or younger children and find the child an agreeable, friendly, nurturing play group that meets that criterion. Are the other children not to be regarded as real people? Are they just toys to be supplied and arranged to one child's liking? What if my little retiring flower is too insecure to play with older kids and wants younger playmates, but your younger child doesn't particularly want to be recruited as a manageable plaything for my kid's entertainment?

The most valuable portions of the book, it seems to me, are those that point out how American culture in particular encourages and rewards extroverted behavior in educational, social, and professional settings and how so many have adopted protective coloration as pseudo-extroverts that the introverted population appears to be much smaller than it is. The recognition that some of us are just not well suited to learning groups, team projects, and presentations before audiences is something that I would like to be able to go back and hammer home to my children's teachers and my own workplace managers.

Nonetheless, I have to give the book a low overall rating as shallow, verbose, and scientifically weak. Its greatest effect, in my opinion, has been to raise consciousness of the subject matter; but I think it remains for another author to do it justice. ( )

The earlier chapters provide a decent discussion on the introvert/extrovert axis.
But then the book gets overlong with a descriptions of schooling scenarios, which are US focused. Which is sort of acceptable as the author is American, but its as if the rest of the world does not exist, that other teaching styles do not exist, that her only audience is American, & so on.