Piet Vroon (1939–1998)

Reading Toestanden was like a stroll down memory lane. Piet Vroon published these essays about psychology in 1993. The essays are extended articles about a number of phenomena current at that time. The essays are grouped in nine sections, sometimes consisting of different essays or articles, or long contributions of multiple parts. Each section is about 30 pages long. The first section contains a number of observations on the field of psychology. The next section of about 30 pages is about show more communication and the senses. It contains observations and essays on "Looking", "Visions", "Smelling", "Paranormal phenomena", "Advertising and videoclips" and "Relations", as wel as "Hearing: consciously and unconsciously". The next section is only about "Sick Building Syndrome", a phenomenon first described in the late 80s, when this book was written.

The other sections contain essays on a variety of other interests in the field of psychology that were often in the media at that time, such as the discovery of Alzheimer, thought about cancer and aids, the criminalisation of illness and disease, distance working and carpooling. In fact, the book is very, very diverse, but obviously all dated, as it was published more than 30 years ago. show less

Dr. Vroon, a Dutch psychologist, wrote this book described on the endpapers as, 'odd and surprising'. That is a very generous blurb. Dr. Vroon, in his very quirky, personal way, takes the reader through everything possible to do with smell, whether it is a chemical notation at the molecular level, or its evolutionary connection with ovulation to why we shouldn't buy cheap perfumes - they smell nasty after a minute or two. (Don't they just?)

The only really interesting fact I learned from this show more book is that 'a Nose', the perfumer's expert who actually puts together those high-priced little bottles of scent that are the essence of the unnecessary, the luxurious, actually can't smell fine distinctions outside of his speciality. That is, he isn't actually more gifted at identifying the fine gradations of odours, but is trained to do so with certain fragrances. Send him to a whisky distillery and he would not able to distinguish all the complex flavours and aromas any better than anyone else who had a sensitive nose but no training.

What is slightly odd about all this, is that women have a much more sensitive sense of smell than me, but all the perfumers' Noses are men. Still. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Final verdict: totally boring, but not unreadable. Two stars. show less

Na herlezing van dit boekje, dat ik meer dan tien jaar eerder gelezen heb, valt me op hoe interressant de korte verzameling verhaaltjes zijn, die eerder als column verschenen in de Volkskrant, en een hele berg informatie bevatten over allerlei psycholgische effecten. In, ook voor leken leesbare taal, doet Piet Vroon uit de doeken hoe we waarnemen, voelen en denken. Vooral de opsomming van diverse (schijn)waarnemingen en de beschreven proefjes hierover maken het tot toegangelijke overzicht show more van de psychologie. En door met een kritische blik diverse tegenstrijdigheden te tonen, laat hij ook zien dat we veel nog niet weten. show less

Naar aanleiding van een schrijven van de Consultatiebureau arts De Bliek (het stuk is achter bovengenoemde geschrift gezet) geeft de hoogleraar psychologie Vroon (in die tijd welbekend) een verklaring voor het missen van afwijkingen op de thoraxfoto.