Congratulations to the winners of the 2023 Book Award
We are delighted to be able to announce the 2023 winners of the BPS Book Award, which recognises exceptional published works in psychology.
15 December 2023
Winners have been chosen across three categories this year – academic monograph, popular science, and textbook.
Stephen Frosh, recently retired Professor of Psychology in the Department of Psychosocial Studies at Birkbeck, University of London, has been awarded in the academic monograph category for his book 'Those Who Come After: Postmemory, Acknowledgement and Forgiveness'.
I am very pleased and grateful to the BPS for naming my book as the winner of the 2023 book award in the academic monograph category. The book is a psychosocial study of the transgenerational impact of personal and social trauma that ranges across psychoanalysis, social theory, music, art and philosophy. It explores the legacies of suffering in relation to ‘those who come after’ - the descendants of victims, survivors and perpetrators of terrible events. I hope this book offers some insights into how we might relate sensitively to personal and social suffering, acknowledging the poignancy and ethical force of trauma testimonies.
Two winners have been chosen in the popular science category. Firstly, Ben Alderson-Day, Associate Professor in Psychology and a Fellow of the Institute for Medical Humanities at Durham University, was successful with his book 'Presence: The strange science and true stories of the unseen other'.
It’s a real honour to receive this award. As a student I was inspired to work in psychology by reading previous BPS winners like ‘Madness Explained’ by Richard Bentall and ‘Consciousness: Creeping up on the Hard Problem’ by Jeffrey Gray. I am delighted that Presence is in such illustrious company, and I hope it can have the same effect for psychologists of the future.
He is joined by Sander van der Linden, Professor of Social Psychology in Society and Director of the Cambridge Social Decision-Making Lab in the Department of Psychology at the University of Cambridge, for 'FOOLPROOF: Why We Fall for Misinformation and How to Build Immunity'. Sander said:
Misinformation is one of the defining challenges of our time. With ‘Foolproof’, my goal was to bring to life decades of robust psychological research to help explain why our brains are so susceptible to falsehoods, how and why misinformation spreads in society, and above all, to share insights from our research in a way that empowers citizens around the globe to spot misleading information in daily life. It’s a tremendous honour for me to receive this recognition from the BPS and I am tremendously grateful.
Two titles have also been chosen in the textbook category, including Val Wilson of the University of Kent, for 'Psychology in Diabetes care and practice'.
Routledge are delighted that Val Wilson’s book has won the BPS Book Award textbook category. This book is a fantastic guide to diabetes care and practice, enabling readers to learn more about how best to manage the condition, reduce psychological distress and improve diabetes self-management. We are thrilled with this quality recognition.
Also winning the textbook category is 'A Feminist Companion to Social Psychology' by Madeleine Pownall and Wendy Stainton Rogers.
We are so pleased that the book has been recognised by the BPS in this way. ‘A Feminist Companion to Social Psychology’ is like having a feminist friend who sits beside you as you study, somewhat cynical but also a bit giggly, whispering things like ’actually there’s a very different way of looking at that’, and every now and again hissing ’That’s a load of patriarchal clap-trap’. It will show you how creative feminist theory and research can be, but also shock you with social psychology’s ‘horrible histories’ of sexual harassment. It may anger and challenge you, but we hope it will bring you wisdom, insight and joy. Maddi remembers learning about feminist scholarship ‘on the side’ as a student and wishing that there was a way of connecting this to the core social psychology content she was learning. This book makes that happen!
Congratulations to all of the winners of this year's award – nominations for 2024 will open in March. Keep an eye out in The Psychologist for more in-depth interviews with the winners and features on their successful books.