SOURCE: "Behaviorism with a Vengeance," in The American Scholar, Vol. 23, No. 1, Winter, 1953-54, pp. 106-110.

In the following review of Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Female, Kardiner finds the work invaluable as a study in social trends, but faults several of his conclusions as too reliant on behaviorism.

Dr. Kinsey and his associates have by now, with their volume on Sexual Behavior in the Human Female, established themselves among the great sexologists of history. This book is a true product of our time, and it carries the popular authority of the opinion poll and the questionnaire method of tracking down social phenomena. It has, therefore, the timely authority of the statistical method that is so prominent in our American ethos, and it has introduced in our American ethos, and it has introduced into the study of sexology the technique of the assembly line. 'If Havelock Ellis was...