That’s Basil Rathbone, of course, portraying Sherlock Holmes, in one of the many reruns of the Holmes’ movies I used to watch as a kid on Sunday mornings on our non-flat screen, non-color TV set.
Little did I know that years later he would add to the growing research on expert behavior. It’s an important issue for fiduciaries who must select service providers to help manage their retirement plans. Tim Burns, writing in his Fiduciary Investor Blog, provides us some excellent direction in his post, Selecting Investment Experts-I. (Tim promises us a further post on the markers of investment expertise).
Sherlock Holmes fits into the search for excellence in an article in the February, 2008 issue of the British Journal of Psychology (Didierjean, André; Fernand, Gobet), Sherlock Holmes – an expert’s view of expertise. The researchers use the Sherlock Holmes character to illustrate expert processes as described by current research and theories, and then discuss a number of issues that current research on expertise has barely addressed. They conclude that “although nearly 120-year-old, Conan Doyle’s books show remarkable illustrations of expert behaviour, including the coverage of themes that have mostly been overlooked by current research.” Here is a link to the Abstract with the full text available for purchase.
See Mom, all that time watching TV wasn’t wasted.
More on Basil Rathbone: Here is a link to information on the 14 films in the Sherlock Holmes’ series featuring Basil Rathbone. Also, here is a link to a wonderful video montage of Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes, made by Julie, the Ravin’ Maven of Classic Film.
Hat tip to our friend, Christian Jarrett, the Writer and Editor of the British Psychological Society’s Research Digest Blog, "Cutting edge reports on the latest psychology research".
