Self Help Books - Do They Really Help?

I once saw a study somewhere that suggested self help books don't really help people. It looked at financial self help books specifically. Checking back at whatever time periods after they read the books, the readers were generally making more money, but so was everyone else that didn't read the books - at least on average. Researchers seemed to conclude that the books were therefore ineffective.

Talk about jumping to conclusions too quickly! The researchers assumed that those who didn't read the books did nothing at all. Unlikely, to say the least. We might wonder if most people really want to work on general self development, but we also can see that almost everyone regularly tries to improve their financial state.

People in the control group were probably doing things other than reading self help books, and those efforts may have gotten them further ahead financially. Consider this for a moment. It certainly doesn't show that the books didn't help, anymore than you can "prove" that a car can't get you across town because walking and biking and taking a bus can also get you there. They are just different ways to the same goal!

The books may have helped (on average), just like the other things people did, and perhaps people choose the things that work best for them. Starting with this hypothesis, a better test might be to have one group choose their self help methods while another is forced to use methods chosen randomly. Then if the first group shows more improvement, it suggests that many methods work, and that each person intuitively knows which will be more helpful for them.

Of course, it could show the opposite. After all, it is difficult to design research like this. It's tough to have a proper "control," and to start with the best hypothesis even. From this we might learn to be skeptical of research where things are hard to define and measure.

Self Help Books Obviously Help

Some of us don't need research to prove that a good book can help us. Many people recall a book that changed the course of their lives, or that obviously helped in their relationships, or even increased their income. Of course self help books can help us.

What about the question of why they don't always help us? Maybe you have a friend who has told you all about a great new self help book or theory, yet doesn't seem to be much affected by it for very long. Or maybe you've read some books yourself that got you excited, but didn't "stick" in your mind or change your subsequent behavior.

What is the reason for this apparent ineffectiveness? A possibility is that the effects of such books can be powerful, yet too subtle to notice immediately. More likely, it may be that you need to read each book more than once, and that self help books in general help most if they are read regularly.

I remember some research on eating I read about. People ate a meal. Researchers then concluded that eating didn't increase the odds of survival, since everyone died of starvation just three months afterwards. I made that up, by the way, but do you see the point? You have to eat regularly to get the maximum survival benefit, so perhaps you need to get those self help books out again and feed your mind from time to time to get the most out of them as well.

My own self help book:

Secrets Of Lucky People - You know that some people have more good things happen to them than others, right? This book/course shows you how to be one of those people.