Introduction
The late Professor Barry Beyerstein (May 19, 1947 - June 25, 2007), features twice in these articles, once - here - on his own, and once as joint author of the introduction to Tall Tales about the Mind and Brain: Separating fact from fiction (2007).
In this case he made what amounts to little more than a passing reference to whatever it was he thought of as "NLP" - barely eight lines of an 8 page article (not including references). Indeed, his remarks were so brief that I have quoted them in full in the section headed Nature of criticism, which in other evaluations contains a brief summary of the erstwhile criticism.
By the way, although this article is regularly cited by "trolls" on the Internet (as though they had actually read it), in practice copies are hard to find. I would like to thank those who made it possible for me to access a copy of Beyerstein's article.
*** The Short Version ***
Critic(s):
(academic role at the time of publication)
Dr. Barry L. Beyerstein: Professor of Psychology in the Brain Behavior Laboratory, Department of Psychology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada.
Critical Material:
Beyerstein, B.L. (1990), Brainscams: Neuromythologies of the New Age. In International Journal of Mental Health Vol. 19, Number 3: pages 27-36. See page 28.
Nature of criticism:
The brain trainers
Neurolinguistic programming (NLP) is one of many riders on neurology's coattails. NLP purports to enhance trainees' interpersonal influence and skilled performance by manipulating mental "representational systems." Though it claims neuroscience in its pedigree, NLP's outmoded view of the relationship between cognitive style and brain function ultimately boils down to crude analogies. NLP basks in effusive testimonials, but the NRC committee could unearth no hard evidence in its favor, or even a succinct statement of its underlying theory [4. Ch. 8].
Original/derivative:
Totally derivative. Beyerstein seems to have based his whole notion of "NLP" on his reading of the Druckman and Swets report (see below), which was it turn based on Sharpley's article of 1984.
Flaw(s):
There is no evidence that Beyerstein did any research into authoritative accounts of the genuine FoNLP. The claim that NLP "claims neuroscience in its pedigree" is a complete fabrication, as demonstrated by this comment made in the course of a training seminar as far back as 1988:
As modelers, we're not interested in whether what we offer you is true or not, whether its accurate or whether it can be neurologically proven to be accurate, an actual representation of the world. We're only interested in what works.
(Bandler & Grinder, 1979. page 18).
This impression of Beyerstein's lack of knowledge is further compounded by the fact that he does not mention a single authoritative text on the subject in the References section of this article. Instead he seems he preferred to uncritically regurgitate comments made by previous critics, such as the members of the NRC Subcommittee on Influence (in Druckman and Swets, 1988).
This was a particularly ill-judged action since:
- When contacted by e-mail, all but one of the subcommittee members couldn't remember having anything to do with writing the report, which
- Was apparently written by the subcommittee chair, Dr. Jerome Singer (deceased), and
- Singer, in turn, seems to have depended to a very large extent on the deeply flawed review by Sharpley (1984), along with two background papers which also depended on the validity, or otherwise, of Sharpley's first review.
Not surprisingly, then, the subcommittee report, replicated a number of Sharpley's key errors (see Sharpley1, but very little that was true of the genuine FoNLP. Indeed, the section of Chapter 8 that deals with NLP couldn't even get the correct spelling of the name right:
"Neurolinguistic programming [sic] is a system of procedures and models ..."
(Druckman and Swets, 1988. Page 138)
In practice, however, the labels "NLP" and "Neuro-Linguistic Programming" refer to a specific modelling procedure and nothing else - though, to be fair, it is good to see that the report writer at least recognised that this field of study is built around models based around observed procedures.
Conclusions:
Beyerstein appears to have known little or nothing about either genuine NLP (i.e. the modelling process), or about the FoNLP as a whole. Indeed, he gives the appearance, in his dealings with "NLP" of thinking that any research on the subject was a waste of time. The accuracy of his comments reflected the almost non-existant research on which they were based.
To put it quite bluntly, the brief comments in Beyerstein's 1990 article are ill-informed, ill-considered, and in the final analysis, useless as far as an accurate assessment of any aspect of the genuine FoNLP is concerned.
*** End of Short Version ***
There is no "long version"
References
Beyerstein, B.L. (1990), Brainscams: Neuromythologies of the New Age. In International Journal of Mental Health Vol. 19, No. 3: pages 27-36. See page 28.
Della Sala, S. and Beyerstein, B.L. (2007), Introduction: The tale of the 10% Myth and other Tall Tales about the mind and brain. In Tall Tales about the Mind and Brain: Separating fact from fiction, Della Sala (ed.), Oxford University Press. Pages xvii-xxxvii (see especially page xxii).
Druckman, D., & Swets, J.A. (eds.) (1988) Enhancing human performance: Issues, theories and techniques. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. Pages 138-149.
Platt, G. (2001), NLP - No Longer Plausible. In Training Journal, May 2001:accessed online at http://www.sueknight.co.uk/Archives/Publications/Articles/NLP_Plausible.htm, April 10, 2010.
Andy Bradbury can be contacted at: bradburyac@hotmail.com