Books about Neurobiology from Amazon.com

A cutting-edge handbook for parents, from a pioneer in infant brain development, that bridges the gap between the most current neuroscience and practical parenting techniques

Dr. Jill StammÂ’s daughter was born almost four months premature, and doctors insisted she would never walk or talk. Now, thirty-two years later, her daughter is living proof that nearly every babyÂ’s brain has the potential to adapt and flourish given the right attention. A leading authority in infant brain development, she makes new, remarkable findings accessible to everyone in Bright from the Start. What babies need is as simple as A, B, C:
• ATTENTION: including how to increase a child’s attention span, and how to balance stimulation with down time
• BONDING: illustrating the importance of developing emotional attachment between a child and a consistent caregiver—and why this is key to cognitive development
• COMMUNICATION: with breakthrough advice for tapping the correlation between verbal engagement with parents and higher IQ rates among children

She also discusses what kind of childcare environment to select, why learning toys donÂ’t teach as much as you think, why reading to a baby is critical, and how you can help your child learn how to pay attention. By working with Dr. StammÂ’s ABCs in Bright from the Start, all parents can help to build a radiant future for their precious little ones..
Price: $6.48 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Even smart kids do stupid things. It's a simple fact of life. No one makes it through the teenage years unscathed -- not the teens, not their parents But now there's expert help for both generations in this groundbreaking new guide for surviving the drama of adolescence.

In WHY Do They Act That Way? nationally renowned, award-winning psychologist Dr. David Walsh explains exactly what happens to the human brain on the path from childhood into adolescence and adulthood. Revealing the latest scientific findings in easy-to-understand terms, Dr. Walsh shows why moodiness, quickness to anger and to take risks, miscommunication, fatigue, territoriality, and other familiar teenage behavior problems are so common -- all are linked to physical changes and growth in the adolescent brain.

But WHY Do They Act That Way? goes beyond the well-known issues of hormones and peer pressure. It is the first book to explain the changes in teens' brains and to show parents how to use this information to understand, communicate with, and stay connected to their kids. Dr. Walsh actually likes teenagers and has worked with them and their families for more than thirty years as a parent, teacher, psychologist, coach, and trusted expert. Through real-life stories, he makes sense of their many mystifying, annoying, and even outright dangerous behavioral difficulties and provides realistic solutions for dealing with everyday as well as severe challenges. Dr. Walsh's techniques include, among others: sample dialogues that help teens and parents talk civilly and constructively with each other, behavioral contracts, and Parental Survival Kits that provide practical advice for dealing with issues like curfews, disrespectful language and actions, and bullying. In addition, Dr. Walsh explores the short- and long-term effects of drug and alcohol use on adolescent brain development, the effects of computer games and other activities, the brain differences between the sexes, and how to talk to your teen about sex and the epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases.

With this arsenal of strategies, parents can help their kids learn to control impulses, manage erratic behavior, cope with their changing bodies, and, in effect, develop a second brain. Dr. Walsh's proven tactics will be extremely welcome to frustrated parents trying to help their children through this confusing time of life..
Price: $5.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Proposing a reconciliation between neuroscience and psychotherapy Many forms of psychotherapy, developed in the absence of any understanding of the brain, are now supported by neuroscientific findings. This book argues that the brain is an organ of adaptation, built by interpersonal experiences and capable of change during one's life. Written for anyone interested in the relationship between brain and behavior, it encourages us to consider the brain when attempting to understand others and ourselves..
Price: $24.93 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Most of us who meditate have probably wondered, "Is this really helping me?" On The Mindful Brain, the co-director of UCLA's Mindful Awareness Research Center offers conclusive evidence that it does, and why meditation can become the single greatest source of equilibrium and clarity in your life. Weaving new scientific studies with insights from his direct experience, Daniel J. Siegel presents a four-CD audio course to help listeners understand the profound influence that a focused mind offers for physical, mental, and social well-being. Listeners join this pioneer of the neurobiology of human consciousness to explore: * How mind training and the long-term states it creates radically affect our physiology and inner life * Attunement and mindfulness: how meditation transforms not only you, but your friends, co-workers, and even entire communities * Curiosity, Openness, Acceptance, and Love--the extraordinary effects of experiencing these four essential qualities simultaneously * How to foster greater emotional balance, physical health, body-based empathy, and deeper self-understanding The Mindful Brain is an enlightening program for clinicians, therapists, educators, and anyone interested in the powerful effects of mindful living..
Price: $18.16 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Bridging the gap between cognitive and somatic models.

Psychological trauma profoundly affects the body. Drawing on this insight, Pat Ogden and her co-authors present a body-based approach to the psychological and physiological symptoms of trauma. Backed by research in attachment, dissociation, and neuroscience, this mode of psychotherapy integrates cognitive and somatic interventions to form a practical and effective treatment modality suitable for all clinicians..
Price: $29.20 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Linking the science of interpersonal neurobiology to the art of therapy

This book translates current advances in neuroscience into useful clinical applications for the practitioner. Linking science with clinical material, the author persuasively argues for more scientifically based long-term psychotherapy. Written for couples therapists, family therapists, and those working with individuals, it effectively brings neuroscience to the on-the-ground counselor..
Price: $21.56 [Notify me when price goes down.]

A new way of dealing with chronic trauma from leaders in the field.

Life is an ongoing struggle for those who have been severely traumatized. Here, leading trauma experts present a theory and practice for dealing with chronic trauma. Recognizing the structural dissociation (splitting away of part of the self) that often results from trauma and proposing a plan for action that a survivor must implement in order to put his or her haunted past to rest, this book will be of interest to researchers as well as clinicians..
Price: $39.96 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Emily Dickinson wrote "The Brain--is wider than the Sky," and who can argue with that? Quoted by Nobel-winning scientist Gerald M. Edelman and his Neurosciences Institute colleague Giulio Tononi in A Universe of Consciousness, Miss Emily neatly explains the problem of conscious awareness, then ducks out of the way as the two scientists get to work solving it. Testable theories of consciousness are mighty lonely, as even the soberest mind can be driven to tears of madness pondering its own activity. Centuries of work by philosophers and psychologists like James and Freud have made little progress by starting with awareness and working backward to the brain; these days we have a secure enough base to try looking in the other direction and building a theory of the mind out of neurons.

Though Edelman and Tononi do make a good effort to help out the lay reader, ultimately A Universe of Consciousness is aimed at the interdisciplinary gang of scientists and academics trying to understand our shared but invisible experience. The first sections of the book cover the basic philosophical, psychological, and biological elements essential to their theory. Swiftly the authors proceed to define terms and concepts (even the long-abused term complexity gets a reappraisal) and elaborate on these to create a robust, testable theory of the neural basis of consciousness. Following this hard work, they consider some ramifications of the theory and take a close look at language and thinking. This much-needed jump-start is sure to provoke a flurry of experimental and theoretical responses; A Universe of Consciousness might just help us answer some of the greatest questions of science, philosophy, and even poetry. --Rob Lightner.
Price: $8.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Research-Based Strategies to Ignite Student Learning is the first book for educators written by an author who is both a neurologist and a classroom teacher. Dr. Willis used her neurology expertise to examine the past two decades of learning-centered brain research. Using her background and experience as a clinical neurologist and neuroscience researcher, she sifted through the abundance of neuroimaging and brain mapping information. She assessed what information was both valid and relevant to education. She then employed her training and experience as a classroom teacher to provide strategies for implementing the best of this research in the classroom. She brings this knowledge to life in a comprehensive and accessible style.

Teachers will be introduced to strategies that will work in their own classrooms. These strategies will help teachers improve student memory, learning, and test-taking success. Teachers will also learn how to captivate and hold students' attention.

Dr. Willis takes a reader-friendly approach to neuroscience, describing instructional strategies that are adaptable for grades K through 12. Through statistical data, individual student stories, and her own experiences using these strategies with elementary and middle school students, Dr. Willis provides teachers with a wealth of information they will want to start using in their classrooms before finishing the book.

The book includes learning strategies that have come from research about how stress and emotion affect learning. Willis describes assessment techniques that not only assess authentically and with diversity, but also teach while assessing. This book will become one that teachers will return to again and again to pick up new strategies to make their own..
Price: $15.98 [Notify me when price goes down.]

An exploration of the power of the profound but fleeting experiences at the root of interpersonal relationships.

Beginning with the claim that we are psychologically alive only in the now, readers are invited to reconsider their day-to-day experiences. Certain moments of shared immediate experience—such as a knowing glance across a dinner table—are paradigmatic of what Stern shows to be the core of human experience, the three to five seconds he identifies as "the present moment." This book offers a novel response to age-old questions about the passage of time, what the future offers, and how humans change during the course of their lives..
Price: $17.84 [Notify me when price goes down.]