The Psychology of Money
Abstract
Journal of Social Distress and the Homeless, Vol. 2, No. 4, 1993 Book Review John R. Jacobs Money and Mind. Edited by Sheila Klebanow and Eugene L. Lowenkopf. New York: Plenum Press, 1991, 273 pp. The Psychology of Money. By Henry Lindgren. Malabar, FL: Kreiger Press, 1991, 324 pp. Traditionally, the inordinate love of money has been seen as the root of all evil. More recently, the lack of money is viewed as the source of much social distress. However, the psychology of money is probably the most sig nificantly under-researched topic in the social sciences. Two reasons probably account for the dearth of attention to money: the surprisingly taboo nature of the topic and the symbolic complexity of money, which rivals that of lan guage itself. The difficulties arising from the aversive reactions to the subject of money may well supersede its complexities. Books and research activities concerning money generally consider methods of accumulating it, fantasies about obtaining it, justifications of the privileged status it brings, or anach ronistic critiques of capitalism. This contemporary attitude is not much of an improvement on turn of the century psychoanalytic speculation compar ing money-related behavior to feces management. The metaphoric meaning