Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for The Social Animal:
1. What is David Brooks's over-arching argument in this book? What does he point to as the determinants of individual success or failure? Do you agree...or disagree with him?
2. Brooks writes that he wants to "counteract the bias in our culture":
The conscious mind writes the autobiography of our species. Unaware of what is going on deep down inside, the conscious mind assigns itself the starring role. It gives itself credit for performing all sorts of tasks it doesn’t really control.
Talk about that statement. First, what does Brooks mean? Second, how does he define the difference between the unconscious and the conscious? In what ways is the former more important than the latter? Finally, how would you write your own narrative—and would it be truly descriptive of your life—inner and outer?
3. What does Brooks mean when he says "the adult personality—including political views—is forever defined in opposition to one’s natural enemies in high school"? Does his statement have relevance to your own experience?
4. What does Brooks mean by his term, the "underdebates" in American politics?
5. To what does Brooks attribute the class divide? Given the Congressional Budget Office's 2011 findings regarding the top one percent of the income tier vs. the lower 99%, do his theories hold up? Can an economic view and a cultural-behavioral view both be correct? Or does one have precedence over the other?
6. What does Brooks point to as examples of our social policy failures? Why have so many well-meaning initiatives failed? What are his solutions? Are they workable?
7. Describe some of the findings by cognitive scientists, such as priming ... or framing? Have you experienced, or used, either mental phenomena?
8. Is this book funny? What does Brooks poke fun at? Does the book's satire capture the way we live and what we value as a society? Or is Brooks off base? Talk about his coinage of new words and phrases: "composure class," "sanctimommies," "extracurricular sluts," and "misbagged."
9. Do Erica and Harold work as fictional characters? Do they come alive for you? Do you care about them? Do they work well as the fictional embodiment of Brooks's theories? Or do they come off as clumsy and unworkable? (Critics are all over the map on this...so there is no "correct" answer.)
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
top of page (summary)