Health Sociology

Spontaneous remission, the placebo effect, and energy healing — these phenomena have baffled the medical community for decades. What do all these marvels tell us? “Our current models of medicine fall short of understanding the depths of our human healing potential,” says Dr. Shamini Jain. “We are on the cusp of finally becoming awake to our human healing potential. A growing number of scientists are exploring a new path — a true expansion of science joined with understandings from ancient concepts of spirituality.”

Every day we speak to ourselves and to each other, about ourselves and about others. Whether ruminating on a past event alone or gossiping with a group of friends, we move through life in a state of near-constant chatter - even during those moments we profess to wanting nothing more than some peace and quiet. So, why do we do it, and what purpose does talking serve? In this paean to conversation, neuroscientist Shane O'Mara encourages us to marvel at our brains distinct mechanisms for communicating.

With inspiring stories from the ranks of both the famous and the unheralded, seasoned with wit, and even an occasional tone of sarcasm, chapter after chapter grabs the attention, energizes the intellect, fortifies the will, enlivens the confidence, and elevates the listener’s personal vision, ultimately leading them to a profound conviction of the transforming power of thinking about one’s thinking.

How is it possible to have vivid memories of something that never happened? How can siblings remember the same event from their childhoods so differently? Do the selections and distortions of memory reveal a truth about the self? Why are certain memories tied to specific places? Does your memory really get worse as you get older? A new consensus is emerging among cognitive scientists: Rather than possessing fixed, unchanging memories, we create recollections anew each time we are called upon to remember.

Psychologists often paint a picture of human mating as visceral, instinctual. But that's not the whole story. In courtship and display, sexual competition and rivalry, we are also guided by what Glenn Geher and Scott Barry Kaufman call Mating Intelligence - a range of mental abilities that have evolved to help us find the right partner. Mating Intelligence is at work in our efforts to form, maintain, and end relationships. It guides us in flirtation, foreplay, copulation, finding and choosing a mate, and many other behaviors.

Two hours to cover 26 miles and 385 yards. Its running's Everest, a feat once seen as impossible for the human body. Now we can glimpse the mountaintop. The sub-two-hour marathon requires an exceptional feat of speed, mental strength, and endurance. The pioneer will have to endure more, live braver, plan better, and be luckier than any who has run before. Ed Caesar takes us into the world of elite runners: the greatest marathoners on Earth.

Americans are in the midst of a world-historic drug binge. Opiates, amphetamines, benzodiazepines, marijuana, antidepressants, antipsychotics—across the board, consumption has shot up in the twenty-first century. At the same time, the United States is home to the largest prison system in the world, justified in part by a now zombified "war" on drugs. How did we get here?

Among the people Bateson engages in open-ended, in-depth conversations about aging are a retired Maine boatyard worker who has become a silversmith and maker of fine jewelry; an African American woman who explores the importance of grandmothering; two gay men finding contentment in mutual caring; the retired dean of a cathedral in New York City who exemplifies how a multiplicity of interests and connections lead to deeper unity; and Jane Fonda, who shares her ways of dealing with change and spiritual growth.

Considered the definitive history of the American healthcare system, The Social Transformation of American Medicine examines how the roles of doctors, hospitals, health plans, and government programs have evolved over the last two and a half centuries. Updated with a new preface and an epilogue analyzing developments since the early 1980s, this new edition is a must-listen for anyone concerned about the future of our fraught healthcare system.

The healthcare industry says that the cause of 70 percent of all breast cancer is unknown. Dressed to Kill helps solve this mystery, explaining how one of the greatest threats to breast health is something that women do to themselves every day. This book has its roots in a personal crisis in the authors’ lives, when Soma Grismaijer was shocked to find a lump in her breast while pregnant.

The Foot Health Practitioner audiobook provides great insight into the health, conditions, and treatments of the feet. It will help you take better care of your feet as well as recognise some of the signs and symptoms of the various conditions that can affect them. If you work with feet in the holistic health (reflexology and massage in particular) or beauty industries, this audiobook will help you to provide information to your clients regarding their foot health.

How did human societies scale up from small, tight-knit groups of hunter-gatherers to the large, anonymous, cooperative societies of today - even though anonymity is the enemy of cooperation? How did organized religions with "Big Gods" - the great monotheistic and polytheistic faiths - spread to colonize most minds in the world? In Big Gods, Ara Norenzayan makes the surprising and provocative argument that these fundamental puzzles about the origins of civilization are one and the same, and answer each other.

Award-winning author Michael Harris examines why our experience of solitude has become so impoverished and how we may grow to love it again in the frenzy of our digital landscape. Solitude is an optimistic and encouraging story about discovering true quiet inside the city, inside the crowd, inside our busy and urbane lives. Harris guides listeners away from a life of ceaseless pings toward a state of measured connectivity, one that balances solitude and companionship.

Asserting that the body is the main site of oppression in Western society, the contributors to this pioneering volume explore the complex issue of embodiment and how it relates to social inclusion and marginalization. In a culture where bodies of people who are brown, black, female, transgender, disabled, fat, or queer are often shamed, sexualized, ignored, and oppressed, what does it mean to live in a marginalized body? This anthology explores how power, privilege, oppression, and attempted disembodiment play out on the bodies of disparaged individuals.

This audiobook is a compendium of information gleaned from several sources similar to a meta-analysis in the literature. There are test-taking tips, study tips, and reinforcement information about psychiatric mental health nursing practice. Sound interesting? The author thinks so too! Listen to Supplemental Information for Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioners, and learn about medical nonfiction.

Liza was a healthy 34-year-old when she discovered she could not carry a baby. Like the one of every six women who hears this news, Liza and her husband, David, despaired that they would never be parents. They both had careers. Life would go on...in other ways.Then the unpredictable happened. Liza's cousin, Jennifer, offered to be the gestational carrier for Liza and David. This is the story of how two women and their husbands came to the incredible decision to put their faith, their lifelong friendship, and their hearts into the rigorous, uncharted and emotional science of creating new life.

In a narrative that combines the intensely personal with social, economic, and historical analysis, Susan Jacoby turns an unsparing eye on the marketers of longevity - pharmaceutical companies, lifestyle gurus, and scientific businessmen who suggest that there will soon be a "cure" for the "disease" of aging.

Christine Montross was a nervous first-year medical student, standing outside the anatomy lab on her first day of class, preparing herself for what was to come. Entering a room with stainless-steel tables topped by corpses in body bags is shocking, no matter how long you've prepared yourself, but a strange thing happened when Montross met her cadaver.

Our obsession with praise and blame begins soon after birth. Totally dependent on others, rapidly we learn to value praise and to fear the consequences of blame. Despite outgrowing an infant's dependence, we continue to monitor others' judgments of us - and develop what relational psychologist Terri Apter calls a "judgment meter", which constantly scans people and our interactions with them, registering a positive or negative opinion.

Since serving as President Jimmy Carter's chief of staff in the late 1970s, Hamilton Jordan has survived three forms of cancer: non-Hodgkins lymphoma, melanoma, and prostate cancer. In this remarkable memoir, Jordan recounts his tumultuous adventures in the political arena and his successful journeys through the world of modern cancer treatment.