Neuroscience at the Intersection of Mind and Brain (PDF)

Neuroscience, the study of the structure and function of the brain, has captured our imaginations. Breakthrough technologies permit neuroscientists to probe how the human brain works in ever-more fascinating detail, revealing what happens when we think, move, love, hate, and fear. We know more than ever before about what goes wrong in the brain when we develop psychiatric and neurological illnesses like depression, dementia, epilepsy, panic attacks, and schizophrenia. We also now have clues about how treatments for those disorders change the way our brains look and function.

Neuroscience at the Intersection of Mind and Brain has three main purposes. First, it makes complicated concepts and findings in modern neuroscience accessible to anyone with an interest in how the brain works. Second, it explains in detail how every experience we have from the moment we are conceived changes our brains. Third, it advances the idea that psychotherapy is a type of life experience that alters brain function and corrects aberrant brain connections.

Among the topics covered are: what makes our brains different from those of other primates, our nearest genetic neighbors? How do life's experiences affect genetic expression of the brain and the way neurons connect with each other? Why are connections between different parts of the brain important in both health and disease? What happens in the brains of animals and humans when we are suddenly afraid of something, get depressed, or fall in love? How do medications and psychotherapies work? The information in this book is based on cutting-edge research in neuroscience, psychiatry, and psychology. Written by an author who studied human behavior and brain function for three decades, it is presented in a highly accessible manner, full of personal anecdotes and observations, and touches on many of the controversies in contemporary mental health practice.