Oh, how I wish I had a book like this when I began teaching psychology. From a visual learner's point of view, this book hits the jackpot. It begins with a history of studying the brain, landmarks in neuroscience and photos of a series of brain scans. You know all those pesky little questions that your students ask, but you're not sure of the answer because your neuroscience course was 20+ years ago and the images (I mean drawings) were in black and white? This book has those answers. There are 70+ pages of pictures and explanations of brain anatomy (all the parts, not just the ones in our texts), brain zones, neurons, and research to satisfy the best of us.
This book has a chapter on the senses, one on movement and control, emotions and feelings, the social brain, language and communication, memory, thinking, consciousness, the individual brain, development and aging, and concludes with diseases and disorders.
Although I have not read every word on every page, just for the illustrations, I am giving this book my highest recommendation. It is a must for every psychology class. Order by clicking below. You will not be disappointed.
Posted by Chuck Schallhorn
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I've been reading from Smithsonian magazine for a number of years, but had never thought to visit their website due to the relatively few directly psych-related articles in the paper-version. In their most recent issue (May 2010) there is an excellent article on memory and how memory works.
Articles on the Brain
Articles on Psychological Issues/Topics
Thought Innovation & Behavior--which could have some articles of interest
Overall, if you like to read quality writing on any topic, I recommend the magazine/website. Great stuff there.
Posted by Chuck Schallhorn
This New York Times profile of endurance athlete Jure Robic describes his amazing athletic feats and his (and his supporters) claim that his "madness" during races help him continue and often win. Mr. Robic was also featured on a recent episode of Radio Lab about "Limits", and both the article and the podcast do a great job explaining the "central governor theory": the idea that our brain holds some energy/resources in reserve for emergencies, and some athletes may trick the brain into releasing these resources. The Radio Lab podcast includes interviews with Mr. Robic and other endurance athletes. Athletes in your class may be very interested to hear about how these people push and break their own "limits."
(The other stories on this same podcast about the "Limits of the Mind" and the "Limits of Science" are also fascinating - listen to the researchers talk about their "Erequa machine" and prepare to have your mind blown . . .)
Posted by Rob McEntarffer
This post may not be especially useful for instruction, but I thought I'd share it in case anyone needs a smile from a good (in my opinion) quote today. Terry Pratchett is one of my favorite authors, and he often comments on scientific topics in the midst of his creative, chaotic, and VERY funny fiction novels. In the quote below, Pratchet comments on the "we only use 10% of our brain" myth:
"It is a popular fact that nine-tenths of the brain is not used and, like most popular facts, it is wrong. No one would go to the trouble of making the human head carry around several pounds of unnecessary gray goo . . . It is used. And one of the functions is to make the miraculous seem ordinary and turn the unusual into the usual. Because if this were not the case, then human beings, faced with the daily wondrousness of everything, would go around wearing big stupid grins, similar to those worn by certain people who occasionally get raided by the authorities to have the contents of their plastic greenhouses very seriously inspected. They'd say 'Wow!' a lot. And no one would do much work." (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods)
Posted by Rob McEntarffer
Intriguing findings from this Science article about possible connections between social fear, genetics, and racist responses. The authors theorize that racist responses are more closely tied to an in-born social fear (out group bias) than they are to specific learned responses to race, and they use a group of children born with Williams Syndrome to try to test the idea. Kids with Williams Syndrome lack a few genes that are related to social fear, causing them to ber very sociable and have no fear of strangers (sometimes called "cocktail party personality").
This research could be a good place to start discussions about several topics: how creative researchers have get when studying complex behaviors (such as racist responses), how tough it is to operationalize some variables (the researchers in this study have to work hard to carefully measure "racist responses" - it sounds like they used something similar to the implicit associations test), and the links between genetics and, well, everything!
To me this study is a good example of the interconnectedness of psychology - our "chapters" are in many ways artificial boundaries between sets of ideas. The AP Psych. free-response questions always try to break down these barriers (requiring students to use knowledge from more than one chapter to answer a single essay question) and this research makes that reality evident.
Posted by Rob McEntarffer
Autism Speaks.Org Site that assists families with their children who have autism. They also provide information about autism along with links related to research, how to support, and how to become involved in the fight against autism.Cafepress Site for Autism Awareness
The Autism Society
Autism Speaks.Org Site that assists families with their children who have autism. They also provide information about autism along with links related to research, how to support, and how to become involved in the fight against autism.Cafepress Site for Autism Awareness
The Autism Society
This is your brain on Donkey Kong (looks pretty good, actually!)
Another great post from the Mind Hacks blog, this time describing a good example of a respectful, scholarly debate between two researchers regarding the impact of video games on learning and the brain. The author of the post, Vaughn Bell, talks about being inspired by another researcher, Susan Greenfield, when he was an undergraduate. He was invited to a conference to co-speak with her about the impact of video games on learning, and he writes about the experience of admiring her AND disagreeing with her scholarly position on the topic (must have been a lively talk!). This topic might be interesting to high school students, and this is a good description of how scientists both work together through disagreeing about important topics.
Link to Vaughn's blog post about all this:
http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2010/03/lords_ladies_and_vi.html
Another great post from the Mind Hacks blog, this time describing a good example of a respectful, scholarly debate between two researchers regarding the impact of video games on learning and the brain. The author of the post, Vaughn Bell, talks about being inspired by another researcher, Susan Greenfield, when he was an undergraduate. He was invited to a conference to co-speak with her about the impact of video games on learning, and he writes about the experience of admiring her AND disagreeing with her scholarly position on the topic (must have been a lively talk!). This topic might be interesting to high school students, and this is a good description of how scientists both work together through disagreeing about important topics.
Link to Vaughn's blog post about all this:
http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2010/03/lords_ladies_and_vi.html
The Dana Brain Foundation Website on Brain Week
As their website says,
Welcome to the Official Web Site of the Global Brain Awareness Week (BAW) Campaign.
Celebrating 15 Years of Education and Outreach about the Brain
Brain Awareness Week (BAW) is the global campaign to increase public awareness about the progress and benefits of brain research. Every March BAW unites the efforts of universities, hospitals, patient groups, government agencies, schools, service organizations, and professional associations worldwide in a week-long celebration of the brain. Founded and coordinated by the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives and European Dana Alliance for the Brain, BAW is celebrating its fifteenth anniversary campaign in 2010.
The Society for Neuroscience page on BAW Neuroscience for Kids CafePress site for shopping.
As for ideas, I am planning to include factoids in our daily bulletin (for which I also happen to record an audio version and post to our website). The first two sites include ideas for promoting the event.
For ideas that you've planned and/or successfully used in the past, please leave us your comments.
