Mental Cognition

Psychologists and neuroscientists struggle with how best to interpret human motivation and decision making. The assumption is that below a mental "surface" of conscious awareness lies a deep and complex set of inner beliefs, values, and desires that govern our thoughts, ideas, and actions, and that to know this depth is to know ourselves. In this profoundly original book, behavioral scientist Nick Chater contends just the opposite: Rather than being the plaything of unconscious currents, the brain generates behaviors in the moment based entirely on our past experiences.

No listener curious about our "little gray cells" will want to pass up Harvard neuroscientist John E. Dowling's brief introduction to the brain. In this up-to-date revision of his 1998 book Creating Mind, Dowling conveys the essence and vitality of the field of neuroscience - examining the progress we've made in understanding how brains work, and shedding light on discoveries having to do with aging, mental illness, and brain health.

Designed to be compatible with virtually every standard textbook in its subject field, Barron's EZ-101 Study Keys gives you a valuable overview of your college-level course. Classroom-style notes emphasize important facts, remind you what you need to remember for term papers and exams, and help guide you through the complexities of lectures and textbooks.

This fresh and exciting approach to science, skepticism, and critical thinking will enlighten and inspire listeners of all ages. With a mix of wit and wisdom, it challenges everyone to think like a scientist, embrace the skeptical life, and improve their critical thinking skills. Think shows you how to better navigate through the maze of biases and traps that are standard features of every human brain.

The Playmaker on any team makes the right decision at the right time, almost every time. Despite the constraints of time, tactics, and rules, the best players combine their vision and skills with razor-sharp decision accuracy for an unstoppable competitive advantage. As a follow-up to The Playmaker’s Advantage, their best-selling guide for athletes, coaches, and parents, Daniel Peterson and Dr. Leonard Zaichkowsky now focus on the split-second decision-making process that produces both clutch plays and mental mistakes.

Daniel L. Schacter, chairman of Harvard University’s Psychology Department and a leading expert on memory, has developed the Trst framework that describes the basic memory miscues we all encounter. Just like the seven deadly sins, the seven memory sins appear routinely in everyday life. Although we may hate these difTculties, as Schacter notes, they’re surprisingly vital to a keen mind.

Is there a right way to study how the brain works? The most common approach involves the study of neural reactions to stimuli presented by an experimenter. György Buzsáki's The Brain from Inside Out examines why the outside-in framework for understanding brain function has become stagnant and points to new directions for understanding neural function. Building upon the success of 2011's Rhythms of the Brain, Professor Buzsáki presents the brain as a foretelling device that interacts with its environment through action and the examination of action's consequence.

The Myth of Mirror Neurons, neuroscientist Gregory Hickok reexamines the mirror neuron story and finds that it is built on a tenuous foundation - a pair of codependent assumptions about mirror neuron activity and human understanding. Drawing on a broad range of observations from work on animal behavior, modern neuroimaging, neurological disorders, and more, Hickok argues that the foundational assumptions fall flat in light of the facts.

Taking a cognitive approach to musical meaning, Arnie Cox explores embodied experiences of hearing music as those that move us both consciously and unconsciously. In this pioneering study that draws on neuroscience and music theory, phenomenology and cognitive science, Cox advances his theory of the "mimetic hypothesis", the notion that a large part of our experience and understanding of music involves an embodied imitation in the listener of bodily motions and exertions that are involved in producing music.

How Do We Know Ourselves? is a compendium of the most wondrous verities that Myers has found: a thought-provoking audiobook about psychological science’s insights into our everyday lives. His astute observations and sharp-witted wisdom enable audiences to think smarter and live happier.

Between what can be learned from evolutionary psychology and cognitive science a picture emerges. In Sex, Murder, and the Meaning of Life, social psychologist Douglas Kenrick fuses these two fields to create a coherent story of human nature. In his analysis, many ingrained, apparently irrational behaviors—one-night stands, prejudice, conspicuous consumption, even art and religious devotion—are quite explicable and (when desired) avoidable.

With more than 41 million Americans over the age of 65 in the United States, the question becomes how much (or, perhaps, what type) of memory loss is to be expected as one gets older and what should trigger a visit to the doctor. Seven Steps to Managing Your Memory addresses these key concerns and more. Accessible yet comprehensive, this book features clinical vignettes and character-based stories that provide real-life examples of how to successfully manage age-related memory loss.

This serves as an entry level approach to popular topics such as amnesia, artificial intelligence, and language use. The audiobook is created in simple language. It uses examples from the media and pop culture that the listener can easily relate and understand the concepts and topics.

Daniel Amen, M.D., one of the world’s foremost authorities on the brain, has news for you: Your brain is involved in everything you do—learn to care for it properly, and you will be smarter, healthier, and happier in as little as 15 days!

“There is no good reason why human societies should not be described and explained with the same precision and success as the rest of nature.” Thus argues evolutionary psychologist Pascal Boyer in this uniquely innovative book. Integrating recent insights from evolutionary biology, genetics, psychology, economics, and other fields, Boyer offers precise models of why humans engage in social behaviors such as forming families, tribes, and nations, or creating gender roles.

Introduction to Ecological Psychology is a highly accessible book that offers an overview of the fundamental theoretical foundations of Ecological Psychology. The authors, Julia J. C. Blau and Jeffrey B. Wagman, provide a broad coverage of the topic, including discussion of perception-action as well as development, cognition, social interaction, and application to real world problems.

Memory: A Very Short Introduction explores the fascinating intricacies of human memory. Is it one thing or many? How does memory change as we age? And what about so-called recovered memories - can they be relied upon as a record of what actually happened in our personal past? This book brings together our most recent knowledge to address (in a scientifically rigorous but highly accessible way) these and many other important questions about how memory works, and why we can't live without it.