Search Results

This introductory chapter sets out the purpose of the book, which is to bring together a diverse group of experts in comparative psychology, neurobiology, and the evolution of animal vision to provide a snapshot of the current state of knowledge in these fields. An overview of the subsequent chapters is then presented.

This concluding chapter suggests that for the human sciences, there is nothing to fear in the rise to prominence of neurobiological attempt to understand and account for human behavior. It is important to point out the many weaknesses in the experimental setups and procedures, for example, in the uses of animal models and in the interpretations of brain imaging data generated in the highly artificial social situations of the laboratory. In the necessity for this criticism, there is also opportunity. There are many opportunities for a more positive role for the social and human sciences that engages directly with these truth claims, that seizes on the new openness provided by conceptions of the neuromolecular, plastic, and social brain to find some rapprochement.

This chapter examines the association between brain development, trauma onset, memory, and neurobiological consequences of childhood trauma. It proposes a model of how stress-induced changes in the brain systems involved in stress and memory mediate changes in traumatic memories in patients with childhood abuse-related disorders. The relevance of the model to current controversies regarding the delayed recall of childhood abuse is discussed.

The problem that is addressed by this book is given in the form of the question: ‘If humans are physical systems, and if it is their brains that allow them to think, how can it not be the case that all of their thoughts and behaviors are simply the product of neurobiology?’ The book's approach to this problem is described in terms of a reformulation of philosophical views based on neuroscience, most particularly the views of causal reduction and the mental as ‘inner’. Tangled terminology is sorted out (preliminarily) with respect to the meaning of ideas, such as physicalism, emergence, and downward causation. Finally, an overview of the progression of arguments of the book is given in the form of chapter summaries.

This chapter examines the alternative, behavioral economic models of evaluation. These models include diagnostic elements (differences in response to risk vs. ambiguity, attention to the chances of a positive or negative event, sensitivity to changes in probability as well as optimism or pessimism), elements related to management (expectancy-related and goal-related utilities), as well as outcome evaluations (disappointment, elation, and regret, as well as the experienced disutility of waiting for outcomes to occur). In addition, these models considered other factors that can change evaluations, such as learning and context. The investigation of the neural correlates of these behavioral economic parameters of choice clarified why some irrational violations of the axioms or reasons may occur or even be justified. The chapter also describes other forms of inconsistency in evaluation, beyond mere inconsistency with the economic axioms. These include conflicts between remembered, experienced, predictive, expectancy-related, and goal-related utility.

This chapter describes recent studies designed to generate data not only on the localization of reading-related brain activation, but also to examine patterns of interactions and dynamic trade-offs among these distributed reading-related systems. It begins with a review of relevant behavioral studies of component processing in fluent reading, with particular emphasis on the role of early (sublexical) phonology. It then discusses the current literature on the neurobiology of skilled and disabled reading, along with consideration of a series of recent studies that aim to capture brain correlates of component processing, again with an emphasis on phonological processing, adaptive learning, and complex trade-offs and interactions. Finally, it takes stock of what is considered to be crucial next steps (both technical and theoretical) in the emerging cognitive neuroscience of reading and its disorders.

This chapter presents the text of the conversion between a roboticist and a theoretical neurobiologist about the issue of emotion. The roboticist suggested that it would be useful to have a list of definitions of key terms on the subject of emotion that takes into account logical alternative views. The theoretical neurobiologist argued that there is a linguistic risk in defining terms such as emotions, and that even if definitions were established there would still be possible problems in achieving consensus.

This chapter investigates the structural aspects of the avian brain, and how this can influence spatial memory. Using cross-species comparisons within the Paridae and comparing Parids to other species, general spatial abilities of chickadees in food storing and other contexts are reviewed. The ability to form spatial memories is related to the structure, gene expression, and neurogenesis within the hippocampus. Chickadees and tits have made an unexpected contribution to our understanding of spatial ability and the hippocampus because of their specialized food storing behaviour. The jury is still out on the question of whether spatial ability or spatial cognition is specialized in chickadees and tits. Some properties of spatial ability and spatial memory in food-storing birds are very similar to those of other species. One notable pattern is that food-storing birds may tend to solve foraging tasks spatially to a degree not found in other birds.

Research in perception and cognition in music has seen tremendous growth over the last two decades. In the wake of recent advances in neurobiology, trying to separate perception and cognition has become less appropriate and useful. In order to be of maximal use for music educators, the work here tries to understand cognition in its broader sense, namely, how it applies in the context of experience, training, development, and culture. The first five chapters of this book proceed from the basic neurological and cognitive processes to a panoramic view of musical development and the theories behind research on learning. The last two chapters concentrate on music performance skills, musical expression, and the audience.

The first-ever Department of Neurobiology was launched in 1966, with Kuffler as the chairman. In the 1960s and 1970s, the main problem between Torsten and David concerned the question of continuing collaboration. Kuffler was puzzled over how to justify two senior appointments to the rest of the faculty, especially two people working in the same field. Around the time the new department was being formed, the dean of the medical school offered David the position as chairman of the Department of Physiology. He accepted because it offered an opportunity to build his own group. Certain awkward aspects of the arrangement soon became evident for his and Torsten's backgrounds were neurology and psychiatry, not physiology. He later recognized that he made a mistake, and resigned the job before doing the Department of Physiology and his research any irreparable harm.

It is believed that science is at its best when it attempts to understand a phenomenon from multiple disciplines, multiple levels, and multiple systems. Thus, it is hoped that this belief was evident in the pages of this book. Due to the manifestation of animal analogs used to understand fear and anxiety and advances in neuroimaging techniques and molecular neurobiology, it is right to apply the knowledge established by the new theories and techniques to more fully understand the origins and developmental course of extreme fear and shyness in humans than ever before. Moreover, there are many positive qualities to some aspects of shyness and these should be emphasized. It is now the objective of future research to determine how the knowledge established by basic research can be most effectively employed.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has rapidly emerged as an important tool for understanding the neural correlates of myriad cognitive and emotional processes. By offering a direct window into brain activity, fMRI promised to usher in a new era of psychiatry, in which clinical decisions would be based on objective neurobiological measures rather than often-contentious symptom classifications. However, research conducted over the past two decades has failed to realise this goal, and fMRI remains an unutilized tool in the psychiatric clinic. In this chapter, we consider reasons why fMRI has failed to fulfill its promise as a clinically useful tool for psychiatrists and consider recent progress towards this goal in three key clinical domains: diagnosis, prediction and treatment monitoring. In particular, we focus on moving away from using traditional case-control comparisons of mean differences in brain activation to more sophisticated statistical techniques using brain activity patterns to classify individual participants to key clinical outcome variables, such as diagnosis or treatment response.

This chapter discusses the potential for personalized medicine as it applies to schizophrenia, one of the most severe mental disorders. The first half of this chapter will address the genetics of schizophrenia, and in particular what is known about the pharmacogenomics of treatment response and side effects. The second half will focus on the neurobiology and physical abnormalities of schizophrenia, and discuss these in the context of endophenotypes and biomarkers of the illness. Finally, this chapter will conclude with a synthesis of the previously discussed genetic and neurobiological findings in schizophrenia and ideas on how this knowledge can be translated into the framework of personalized medicine.