Eco-Neurobiology, and How the Environment Shapes Our Brains

Eco-Neurobiology, and How the Environment Shapes Our Brains PDF

Author: Andreas M. Grabrucker

Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Published: 2019-10-23

Total Pages: 156

ISBN-13: 1527542068

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Eco-neurobiology is a field of neuroscience that investigates how environmental factors impact the brain through development and aging. This book takes the reader on a journey through the most recent findings in this field, covering how non-genetic factors influence our brain and may contribute to the development of disorders, as well as the everyday function of our minds. The things we eat, the stressfulness of our lives, and traumatic events all have effects on our brains that we are just beginning to understand.

Neurobiology of "Umwelt"

Neurobiology of

Author: Alain Berthoz

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2008-11-14

Total Pages: 161

ISBN-13: 3540858970

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At the beginning of the 20th century, German biologist Jakob von Uexküll created the concept of "Umwelt" to denote the environment as experienced by a subject. This concept of environment differs from the idea of passive surroundings and is defined not just by physical surroundings, but is rather a "subjective universe", a space weighted with meaning. Today, neuroscience provides a new way to look at the brain’s capability to create a representation of the world. At the same time behavioural specialists are demonstrating that animals have a richer mental universe than previously known. Philosophical reflection thus finds itself with more experimental and objective data as well. Nearly a century after the publication of von Uexküll’s founding work ("Umwelt und Innenwelt der Tiere" was published in 1909), neurobiologists, psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, ethologists, and philosophers revisit his mail concept at the light of modern science

How Our Brain Became Human

How Our Brain Became Human PDF

Author: Yanko A. Yankov

Publisher: Trafford Publishing

Published: 2022-10-18

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781698713106

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The human brain growth and evolution have been subjects of many genetic, environmental or social studies separately. Additionally, there are very few available sources on the complex role of our microbiome and the recently discovered hormones VIP and PACAP. The book author also describes some of his cases seen during his long clinical experience to illustrate different points of his extensive literature review. The book is divided into seven chapters, condensing the author's scientific opinion on the growth and evolution of the human brain, the organ that differentiates us from all other species. He does not dismiss any other opinions or beliefs. The author challenges scientists and clinicians to continue researching the brain without prejudice. At the end he gives his opinion on how our BIG brains can help us live better together.

Enriched and Impoverished Environments

Enriched and Impoverished Environments PDF

Author: Michael J. Renner

Publisher: Springer

Published: 1987-05-13

Total Pages: 154

ISBN-13:

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Enriched and Impoverished Environments: Effects on Brain and Behaviour is the most recent review of the active area of neuronal plasticity. The question of how experience is recorded is fundamental to psychology; speculations and investigations concerning the role of the brain in this process have entered a particularly exciting phase as of the late 1980's. Manipulations of environmental complexity is one of the earliest methods utilized in the study of neural plasticity. This monograph organizes the evidence to date concerning the responsiveness of neural and behavioural systems to external manipulation of the environment. Further consideration is given to the issues of causation of the general effects of environment on brain and behaviour.

Population Neuroscience

Population Neuroscience PDF

Author: Tomas Paus

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2015-04-16

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9783642437762

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Is Newton’s brain different from Rembrandt’s? Does a mother’s diet during pregnancy impact brain growth? Do adolescent peers leave a signature in the social brain? Does the way we live in our middle years affect how our brains age? To answer these and many other questions, we can now turn to population neuroscience. Population neuroscience endeavors to identify environmental and genetic factors that shape the function and structure of the human brain; it uses the tools and knowledge of genetics (and the “omics” sciences), epidemiology and neuroscience. This text attempts to provide a bridge spanning these three disciplines so that their practitioners can communicate easily with each other when working together on large-scale imaging studies of the developing, mature and aging brain. By understanding the processes driving variations in brain function and structure across individuals, we will also be able to predict an individual’s risk of (or resilience against) developing a brain disorder. In the long term, the hope is that population neuroscience will lay the foundation for personalized preventive medicine and, in turn, reduce the burden associated with complex, chronic disorders of brain and body.

Child Psychology

Child Psychology PDF

Author: Usha C. Goswami

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 153

ISBN-13: 0199646597

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This volume tracks child development from birth to early adolescence. Exploring the process of attachment and psychological relationships, as well as methods of active learning, including language and reasoning, Usha Goshwami explains how children develop as they do and how we can understand developmental differences.

Psychotherapy in an Age of Neuroscience

Psychotherapy in an Age of Neuroscience PDF

Author: Joel Paris

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2017

Total Pages: 217

ISBN-13: 0190601019

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Psychiatry, once proud of its biopsychosocial model, has now adopted a neuroscience-based approach that strongly favors psychopharmacological treatments and downplays the role of psychotherapies (or social interventions). This kind of practice can be sufficient for the psychoses, but it is neither evidence-based nor beneficial for patients with common mental disorders such as depression, anxiety, substance use, and personality disorders. Current practice derives from a theoretical model in which psychiatry is viewed primarily as an application of neuroscience, with little reference to the vast literature on psychology, social sciences, and psychotherapy. This work reviews research bearing on these issues, and it shows why existing data support a different set of conclusions from those held by many experts and most practitioners

What Should We Do with Our Brain?

What Should We Do with Our Brain? PDF

Author: Catherine Malabou

Publisher: Fordham Univ Press

Published: 2009-08-25

Total Pages: 119

ISBN-13: 0823229548

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Recent neuroscience, in replacing the old model of the brain as a single centralized source of control, has emphasized plasticity,the quality by which our brains develop and change throughout the course of our lives. Our brains exist as historical products, developing in interaction with themselves and with their surroundings.Hence there is a thin line between the organization of the nervous system and the political and social organization that both conditions and is conditioned by human experience. Looking carefully at contemporary neuroscience, it is hard not to notice that the new way of talking about the brain mirrors the management discourse of the neo-liberal capitalist world in which we now live, with its talk of decentralization, networks, and flexibility. Consciously or unconsciously, science cannot but echo the world in which it takes place.In the neo-liberal world, plasticitycan be equated with flexibility-a term that has become a buzzword in economics and management theory. The plastic brain would thus represent just another style of power, which, although less centralized, is still a means of control. In this book, Catherine Malabou develops a second, more radical meaning for plasticity. Not only does plasticity allow our brains to adapt to existing circumstances, it opens a margin of freedom to intervene, to change those very circumstances. Such an understanding opens up a newly transformative aspect of the neurosciences.In insisting on this proximity between the neurosciences and the social sciences, Malabou applies to the brain Marx's well-known phrase about history: people make their own brains, but they do not know it. This book is a summons to such knowledge.

Neuroeconomics

Neuroeconomics PDF

Author: Paul W. Glimcher

Publisher: Academic Press

Published: 2013-08-13

Total Pages: 560

ISBN-13: 0123914698

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In the years since it first published, Neuroeconomics: Decision Making and the Brain has become the standard reference and textbook in the burgeoning field of neuroeconomics. The second edition, a nearly complete revision of this landmark book, will set a new standard. This new edition features five sections designed to serve as both classroom-friendly introductions to each of the major subareas in neuroeconomics, and as advanced synopses of all that has been accomplished in the last two decades in this rapidly expanding academic discipline. The first of these sections provides useful introductions to the disciplines of microeconomics, the psychology of judgment and decision, computational neuroscience, and anthropology for scholars and students seeking interdisciplinary breadth. The second section provides an overview of how human and animal preferences are represented in the mammalian nervous systems. Chapters on risk, time preferences, social preferences, emotion, pharmacology, and common neural currencies—each written by leading experts—lay out the foundations of neuroeconomic thought. The third section contains both overview and in-depth chapters on the fundamentals of reinforcement learning, value learning, and value representation. The fourth section, “The Neural Mechanisms for Choice, integrates what is known about the decision-making architecture into state-of-the-art models of how we make choices. The final section embeds these mechanisms in a larger social context, showing how these mechanisms function during social decision-making in both humans and animals. The book provides a historically rich exposition in each of its chapters and emphasizes both the accomplishments and the controversies in the field. A clear explanatory style and a single expository voice characterize all chapters, making core issues in economics, psychology, and neuroscience accessible to scholars from all disciplines. The volume is essential reading for anyone interested in neuroeconomics in particular or decision making in general. Editors and contributing authors are among the acknowledged experts and founders in the field, making this the authoritative reference for neuroeconomics Suitable as an advanced undergraduate or graduate textbook as well as a thorough reference for active researchers Introductory chapters on economics, psychology, neuroscience, and anthropology provide students and scholars from any discipline with the keys to understanding this interdisciplinary field Detailed chapters on subjects that include reinforcement learning, risk, inter-temporal choice, drift-diffusion models, game theory, and prospect theory make this an invaluable reference Published in association with the Society for Neuroeconomics—www.neuroeconomics.org Full-color presentation throughout with numerous carefully selected illustrations to highlight key concepts

The Man with the Compound Eyes

The Man with the Compound Eyes PDF

Author: Wu Ming-Yi

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2014-05-20

Total Pages: 294

ISBN-13: 030790797X

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When a tsunami sends a massive island made entirely of trash crashing into the Taiwanese coast, two very different people—an outcast from a mythical island and a woman on the verge of suicide—are united in ways they never could have imagined. Here is the English-language debut of a new and exciting award-winning voice from Taiwan, who has written an “astonishing” novel (The Independent) that is at once fantasy, reality, and dystopian environmental saga. Fifteen-year-old Atile’i—a native of Wayo Wayo, an island somewhere in the Pacific—has come of age. Following the custom of his people, he is set adrift as a sacrifice to the Sea God but, unlike those who have gone before him, Atile’i is determined to defy precedent and survive. His chances seem slim, but just as it appears that hope is lost, Atile’i comes across a sprawling trash vortex floating in the ocean and climbs onto it. Meanwhile, on the east coast of Taiwan, Alice, a college professor, is overcome with grief. Her husband and son are missing, having disappeared while hiking in the mountains near their home. Alice is so distraught that she decides to end her own life. But her plans are interrupted by a violent storm that causes the trash vortex to collide with the Taiwanese coast, bringing Atile’i along with it. Alice and Atile’i subsequently form an unlikely friendship that helps each of them come to terms with what they have lost. Together they set out to uncover the mystery of Alice’s lost family, following their footsteps into the mountains. Intertwined with Alice and Atile’i’s story are the lives of others affected by the tsunami, from environmentalists to Taiwan’s indigenous peoples—and, of course, the mysterious man with the compound eyes. A work of lyrical beauty that combines magical realism and environmental fable, The Man with the Compound Eyes is an incredible story about the bonds of family, the meaning of love, and the lasting effects of human destruction.