The case made here is that context has largely been neglected in psychology. Mesquita (cultural and social psychology, U. of Leuven, Belgium) introduces what the editors term the "essentialist error," i.e., confusing terms about mental processes with the phenomena they describe. Following historical background on the context principle in psychology (e.g., espoused by John Dewey, Jerome Bruner), contributors to 16 chapters seek to overcome this dualistic, egocentric thinking by showing how cognition, emotion, and personality are contingent upon contextual neurological, genetic, environmental, social/normative, and temporal factors. For example, they examine research on cultural differences in emoting, and why learning and memory aren't always context-specific. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)