Identity Transformation and Posttraumatic Growth Following Traumatic Brain Injury and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder provides an autoethnographic qualitative study that portrays the author's recovery from a devastating life changing event - a car crash resulting in the hybrid diagnosis of TBI and PTSD, leading to PTG and identity transformation over a ten-year recovery period. In so doing, the text offers a comprehensive literature review on TBI, PTSD, PTG, and disability culture. Throughout, the author explores whether growth (PTG) and distress (PTSD), and whether TBI and PTSD can co-exist. Having lost her ability to read and write, the author had to learn how to learn, to heal and to have faith again. As a licensed trauma therapist and researcher, she collected self-observational data by writing her actual behaviors, thoughts and emotions in real time, both in a field and a process journal, even before she could write in full sentences. The many symptoms and co-morbidities of TBI, PTSD and the tenets of PTG are portrayed as they evolved in recovery showing the behavior and characteristics of each. The text refers to actual journal entries, medical records, and clinical notes from rehabilitation specialists, alternating between her clinical analysis and interpretation. The findings show that tragedy and suffering can lead to growth and positive change (PTG) after TBI, even though the precipitating trauma and psychological distress (PTSD) may persist for years. Changes are seen in self-perception, interpersonal relationships, and philosophies of life. This chronicled account of the author's emergent recovery from patient to doctor is intended to benefit neuro-rehabilitation service providers (neuropsychologists, primary care physicians, speech-language pathologists) and also mental health clinicians who can see the evolution of Posttraumatic Growth for what is now the new next step for many in PTSD recovery.

The Motoneurone and its Muscle Fibres presents a state-of-the-art summary of knowledge concerning the motoneurones, vital for innervating and commanding skeletal muscles. No muscle action would be possible without motoneurones. These cells are therefore absolutely essential for the execution of normal behaviour and for life support. It is their degeneration that leads to various kinds of motoneurone disease (e.g. ALS) that are often ultimately lethal. However, the study of motoneurones is also important for general insights as to how neurones work, because the motoneurone is probably the best understood kind of nerve cell so far in neuroscience. Motoneurones of the spinal cord were the first type of central nerve cell to be subjected to detailed physiological measurements, and much is known about how their activity is regulated by synapses from other central neurones. For most of the individual neurones within the central nervous system, the precise functional tasks are difficult to define. However, for motoneurones much is now known about their short- and long-term interactions with their main targets, the skeletal muscle fibres. Functions of neurones must be analyzed in relation to the response properties of their target cells. Therefore, this book deals with both, summarizing classical as well as recent knowledge concerning the motoneurone and its muscle fibres. This is the first time that so many aspects of this broad subject matter are treated in one comprehensive monograph.

'Motor Cognition' describes the field of motor cognition - one to which the author's contribution has been seminal. The book examines how the motor actions we perform and watch others perform play a pivotal role in the construction of the 'self' - our ability to acknowledge and recognise our own identity.

Broca's region has been in the news ever since scientists realized that particular cognitive functions could be localized to parts of the cerebral cortex. Its discoverer, Paul Broca, was one of the first researchers to argue for a direct connection between a concrete behavior--in this case, the use of language--and a specific cortical region. Today, Broca's region is perhaps the most famous part of the human brain, and for over a century, has persisted as the focus of intense research and numerous debates. The name has even penetrated mainstream culture through popular science and the theater. Broca's region is famous for a good reason: As language is one of the most distinctive human traits, the cognitive mechanisms that support it and the tissues in which these mechanisms are housed are also quite complex, and so have the potential to reveal a lot not only about how words, phrases, sentences, and grammatical rules are instantiated in neural tissue, but also, and more broadly, about how brain function relates to behavior. Paul Broca's discoveries were an important, driving force behind the more general effort to relate complex behavior to particular parts of the cerebral cortex, which, significantly, produced the first brain maps.
These early studies also, however, suffered from the use of crude techniques, definitions, and distinctions, as well as from ill founded and misdirected assumptions. Although much has been discovered since Broca's work, even today, these problems have not been completely solved. Nonetheless, particularly as a result of important advances made in neuroimaging during the past two decades, Broca's region and all language areas are currently beinginvestigated from every angle. Indeed, as the volume of research into the relations between brain and language has created several communities, each with its own concepts, methods, and considerations, it seemed that it was time to stop, get together, and reflect on the state of the art.
This book is the result of that collective reflection, which took place primarily at the Broca's Region Workshop, held in Julich and Aachen, Germany, in June 2004. In it, Yosef Grodzinsky and Katrin Amunts tried to accomplish a nearly impossible task: to mix intellectual traditions and cultures, and juxtapose rather disparate bodies of knowledge, styles of reasoning, and forms of argumentation. Participants were scientists with diverse backgrounds; each invited to contribute his/her particular take, with the hope that a coherent, perhaps even novel, picture would emerge. All of the participants have a special interest in Broca's Region, and represent the myriad angles from which we currently approach it: neuroanatomy, physiology, evolutionary biology, cognitive psychology, clinical neurology, functional imaging, speech and language research, computational biology, and psycho-, neuro-, and theoretical linguistics. The book's main chapters are the contributions of the Workshop's participants and their research teams. Parts of the discussion during the Workshop are included to underscore the richness of viewpoints, and to give readers an idea of the level of interaction that took place. As Broca's region is such a historically significant concept and rich area, this book contains a collection of classic and recent-yet-classic papers. Along with cutting-edge science, Grodzinsky and Amunts want to remindreaders of the celebrated past from which much can be learned. The historical chapters include the first two papers written by Paul Broca, as well some work by two of the most important neurologists of the nineteenth century, Ludwig Lichtheim and John Hughlings-Jackson. Also included are parts of twentieth century papers by Korbinian Brodmann, Roman Jakobson, Norman Geschwind, Harold Goodglass, and Jay Mohr. Because this book both reflects the state of the art in Broca's-region research and contains a tribute to its celebrated past, it will be a valuable resource for student and professional researchers. It will also stimulate further interdisciplinary research, which is a significant contribution, as the project called "Broca's region," encompassing the study of brain/language relations, is far from finished.

This unique volume is a comprehensive, well-illustrated study of the organization of the white matter pathways of the brain. Schmahmann and Pandya have analyzed and synthesized the corticocortical and corticosubcortical connections of the major areas of the cerebral cortex of the rhesus monkey. The result is a detailed understanding of the constituents of the cerebral white matter and the organization of the fiber tracts. The findings from the 36 cases studied are presented on a single template brain, facilitating comparison of the locations of the different fiber pathways. The summary diagrams provide a comprehensive atlas of the cerebral white matter. The text is enriched by close attention to functional aspects of the anatomical observations. The clinical relevance of the pathways is addressed throughout the text and a chapter is devoted to human white matter diseases. The introductory account gives a detailed historical background. Translations of seminal original observations by early investigators are presented, and when these are considered in the light of the authors' new observations, many longstanding conflicts and debates are resolved. This scholarly book is an important addition to systems and cognitive neuroscience that will be of lasting value to neurobiologists, anatomists, neurologists, neurosurgeons, neuroradiologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, and to their students and trainees.

* The field of AAC is a rapidly expanding one, as both technology innovations and demographic profiles make it increasingly possible and important to provide non-speech communication options for individuals with significant communication impairments. * Case reports provide a hook for student learning, drawing their interest and providing immediate relevance for students. * Features internationally recognised authors who are experts in their field and have been drawn from Ireland, the United Kingdom, the USA and Australia, to ensure that the reach of the text is broad and internationally relevant.

In this book, leading experts in the field review how circadian rhythms impact the brain. An essential function of mammalian life is the exploitation of the regularities provided by the 24-hour cycle of day and night. The development and evolution of circadian clock mechanisms have allowed us to optimally adapt our behavior and physiology to the external world. Not surprisingly, a growing body of evidence links the disruption of circadian rhythms by genetic, lifestyle and environmental factors to illnesses of the brain. In the first section of the book, readers will learn about the molecular and anatomic architecture of circadian function in mammals. The ways in which environmental disruptions and misalignments can influence such mechanisms and therefore impair brain function and health status are also addressed. In the second part, the focus shifts to those brain regions responsible for brain function and the body-wide regulation of circadian function. Amongst others, special attention is paid to the role of astrocytes and the brain's reward and hyprocretin / orexin systems. The book concludes with an extensive discussion on the consequences of circadian rhythm dysfunction. Several chapters present the latest findings on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, schizophrenia, autism spectrum disorder, drug abuse and mood disorders. Written by auhorities in the field, the book provides a state-of-the-art review of the latest findings on circadian clocks in the brain and highlights their potentially far-reaching impacts on our health and well-being. As such, it is essential reading for all neuroscientists and clinicians seeking to understand the intricate connections between circadian rhythms and brain health and illness.

This book explores a central question in the study of depth perception - 'does the visual system rely upon objective knowledge and subjective meaning to specify visual depth?' Linton advances an alternative interpretation to the generally accepted affirmative answer, according to which many of the apparent contributions of knowledge and meaning to depth perception are better understood as contributions to our post-perceptual cognition of depth. In order to defend this position a new account of visual cognition is required, as well as a better understanding of the optical and physiological cues to depth. This book will appeal to students and researchers in psychology, vision science, and philosophy, as well as technologists and content creators working in virtual and augmented reality.

Linguistic Morphology is a unique collection of cutting-edge research in the psycholinguistics of morphology, offering a comprehensive overview of this interdisciplinary field. This book brings together world-leading experts from linguisics, experimental psychology and cognitive neuroscience to examine morphology research from different disciplines. It provides an overview of how the brain deals with complex words; examining how they are easier to read, how they affect our brain dynamics and eye movements, how they mould the acquisition of language and literacy, and how they inform computational models of the linguistic brain. Chapters discuss topics ranging from subconscious visual identification to the high-level processing of sentences, how children make their first steps with complex words through to how proficient adults make lexical identification in less than 40 milliseconds. As a state-of-the-art resource in morphology research, this book will be highly relevant reading for students and researchers of linguistics, psychology and cognitive neuroscience. It will also act as a one-stop shop for experts in the field.

This book presents a unique synthesis of the current neuroscience of cognition by one of the world's authorities in the field. The guiding principle to this synthesis is the tenet that the entirety of our knowledge is encoded by relations, and thus by connections, in neuronal networks of our cerebral cortex. Cognitive networks develop by experience on a base of widely dispersed modular cell assemblies representing elementary sensations and movements. As they develop cognitive networks organize themselves hierarchically by order of complexity or abstraction of their content. Because networks intersect profusely, sharing commong nodes, a neuronal assembly anywhere in the cortex can be part of many networks, and therefore many items of knowledge. All cognitive functions consist of neural transactions within and between cognitive networks. After reviewing the neurobiology and architecture of cortical networks (also named cognits), the author undertakes a systematic study of cortical dynamics in each of the major cognitive functions--perception, memory, attention, language, and intelligence. In this study, he makes use of a large body of evidence from a variety of methodologies, in the brain of the human as well as the nonhuman primate. The outcome of his interdisciplinary endeavor is the emergence of a structural and dynamic order in the cerebral cortex that, though still sketchy and fragmentary, mirrors with remarkable fidelity the order in the human mind.

Mathematical Modelling in Motor Neuroscience: State of the Art and Translation to the Clinic, Gaze Orienting Mechanisms and Disease, Volume 249, the latest release in the Progress in Brain Research series, highlights new advances in the field, with this new volume presenting interesting chapters on a variety of topics, including Sequential Bayesian updating, Maps and Sensorimotor Transformations for Eye-Head Gaze Shifts: Role of the Midbrain Superior Colliculus, Modeling Gaze Position-Dependent Opsoclonus, Eye Position-Dependent Opsoclonus in Mild Traumatic Brain Injury, Saccades in Parkinson's disease -- hypometric, slow, and maladaptive, Brainstem Neural Circuits for Fixation and Generation of Saccadic Eye Movements, and much more.

Alcohol, Crime and Public Health explores the issue of drinking in the criminal justice system, providing an overview of the topic from both a criminal justice and public health perspective. The majority of prisoners in the UK (70%) have an alcohol use disorder, and evidence tells us that risky drinking is high amongst those in contact with all areas of the criminal justice system. Uniquely, this book brings both a criminal justice and public health perspective to the topic. The book opens by exploring the levels of crime attributed to alcohol, the policy context of alcohol and crime, and the prevalence of risky alcohol consumption in the criminal justice system. The following chapters examine risky drinking amongst men, women and young people in the criminal justice system. The final chapters look at the efficacy of psychosocial interventions for risky drinking in the criminal justice system, and look forward to how researchers and practitioners can work together to produce research in the criminal justice system. Written in an accessible and concise style, Alcohol, Crime and Public Health will be of great use to students of Criminology, Criminal Justice, and Public Health as well as the wider area of Public and Social Policy in relation to alcohol and crime.

Whether reading, looking at a picture, or driving, how is it that we know where to look next - how does the human visual system calculate where our gaze should be directed in order to achieve our cognitive aims? Of course, there is an interaction between the decisions about where we should look and about how long we should look there. However, our eyes do not just move randomly over the visual field - whether we are reading, driving, or solving a problem. There are systematic variations not only in the duration of each eye fixation, but also in what we are looking at. It is these variations in eye movements that can tell us much about the cognitive processes involved in the performance of these activities. Within reading research, great progress has already been made in understanding these processes and there are now a number of competing and well-formed models. In some other areas of perception, the development of formal theories and the search for critical evidence is less advanced. This book brings together leading vision scientists studying eye movements across a range of activities, such as reading, driving, computer activities, and chess. It provides groundbreaking new research that will help us understand how it is that we know where to move our eyes, and thereby better understand the cognitive processes underlying these activities.

Educating and caring for a child with autism is a severely difficult task, too often associated with frustration and disappointment. As a result, the inner development of these children is at times considered to be beyond the reach of parents and carers. This book challenges that assumption, exploring case studies where therapy based on a holistic approach has resulted in marked improvements in the children's behaviour and social integration. With an extended holistic programme, autistic children discover inner self-awareness and self-recognition, leading to first steps in relationships and social skills. The authors describe in detail their own practical experiences, as well as the findings of other experts in the field. This new third edition covers recent developments in diagnostic methods and approaches to treatment, including new case studies and a new chapter looking at the sensory aspect of autism and Sensory Integration Therapy. Well-researched and movingly written, this book has an essential, positive message for all those involved in the care and education of children with autism.

Mathematical Modelling in Motor Neuroscience: State of the Art and Translation to the Clinic. Ocular Motor Plant and Gaze Stabilization Mechanisms, Volume 248, the latest release in the Progress in Brain Research series, highlights new advances in the field, with this new volume presenting interesting chapters on a variety of topics, including Mathematical modeling in clinical and basic motor neuroscience, The math of medicine - the computational lessons learned from the human disease, Mathematical models - an extension of the clinician's mind, From differential equation to linear control systems: the study of the VOR, Closed lop and nonlinear systems, State-space equations and learning, Integrators and optimal control, and much more.

This is the first book to offer a comprehensive overview of higher-order motor disorders. It introduces new concepts emerging from basic neurosciences and shows how they have impacted on the field of cognitive motor control and led to new vistas for the understanding of Higher-order Motor Disorders far beyond the traditional field of topological diagnosis. It describes in detail a wide range of clinical disorders including those of bimanual co-ordination, apraxia and sensorimotor transformation deficits, motor neglect, anarchic hand syndrome, imitation and utilisation behaviours, action motivational and action monitoring disorders, as well as new approaches to motor cortex plasticity and reorganisation and rehalibitation of complex movement problems. The book reviews the topic, starting with a description of the neuroanatomical, neurobiological and cognitive basis of normal motor behaviours, before moving on to cover the clinical features of the disordered states. The final chapters cover the issues of plastcity and recovery, pharmacological treatments and rehabilitation.
This volume will stimulate research and foster new insights into cognitive and motivational motor disorders. With expert contributions from the major international centres in Europe and the Americas his book gives a truly new framework for a complex and confusing field.

Quickly acquire the knowledge and skills you need to confidently administer, score, and interpret the most popular neuropsychological assessment instruments

Neuropsychological testing can identify changes in cognition, behavior, and emotion; aid in determining the cause of a disorder or developmental problem; and assist clinicians in planning treatment and rehabilitation. To use these tests properly, professionals need an authoritative source of advice and guidance on how to administer, score, and interpret them. Now fully revised and in a second edition, "Essentials of Neuropsychological Assessment" is that source.

Completely updated to include the most current instruments, including the Delis-Kaplan Executive Function System (D-KEFS), the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Fourth Edition (WISC-IV), the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Fourth Edition (WAIS-IV), and the Wechsler Memory Scale-Fourth Edition (WMS-IV), Essentials of Neuropsychological Assessment, Second Edition presents an overview of the assumptions, logic, knowledge base, and skills underlying the practice of neuropsychological assessment. Neuropsychological experts Nancy Hebben and William Milberg describe how clinical history, behavioral observations, and formal test results are used to make inferences about the contribution of brain dysfunction to psychological functioning.

Like all the volumes in the Essentials of Psychological Assessment series, this book is designed to help busy mental health professionals quickly acquire the knowledge and skills they need to make optimal use of major neuropsychological assessment instruments. Each concise chapter features numerous callout boxes highlighting key concepts, bulleted points, and extensive illustrative material, as well as test questions that help you gauge and reinforce your grasp of the information covered.

"Essentials of Neuropsychological Assessment," Second Edition provides comprehensive instruction on neuropsychological test administration, scoring, interpretation, and report writing. It also addresses practical and conceptual issues related to neuropsychological assessment in geriatric, pediatric, forensic, and other specialized settings.

Other titles in the Essentials of Psychological Assessment series:

Essentials of Assessment Report Writing

Essentials of WAIS-IV Assessment

Essentials of WISC-IV Assessment, Second Edition

Essentials of WIAT-II and KTEA-II Assessment

Essentials of WJ IIITM Cognitive Abilities Assessment

Essentials of WJ IIITM Tests of Achievement Assessment

Essentials of School Neuropsychological Assessment

Essentials of Cross-Battery Assessment, Second Edition

Essentials of KABC-II Assessment

Essentials of NEPSY Assessment

Essentials of Executive Function Assessment

Essentials of Processing Assessment

The presentation and interpretation of visual information is essential to almost every activity in human life and most endeavors of modern technology. This book examines the current status of what is known (and not known) about human vision, how human observers interpret visual data, and how to present such data to facilitate their interpretation and use. Written by experts who are able to cross disciplinary boundaries, the book provides an educational pathway through several models of human vision; describes how the visual response is analyzed and quantified; presents current theories of how the human visual response is interpreted; discusses the cognitive responses of human observers; and examines such applications as space exploration, manufacturing, surveillance, earth and air sciences, and medicine. The book is intended for everyone with an undergraduate-level background in science or engineering with an interest in visual science. This second edition has been brought up to date throughout and contains a new chapter on "Virtual reality and augmented reality in medicine."

This book provides a comprehensive overview of our current understanding of binge eating, which is characterized by the uncontrollable consumption of large amounts of food in a discrete time period. Written by experts on eating disorders, it first introduces the phenotype of binge eating, including its epidemiology and assessment. It then describes the underlying neurobiological alterations, drawing on cutting-edge animal models and human studies to do so. In addition, it extensively discusses current treatment models, including medication, psychotherapy, self-interventions and disease prevention. Lastly, an outlook on the future research agenda rounds out the coverage. Given binge eating's current status as an under-researched symptom, but one shared across many eating disorders, this book provides an up-to-date, integrative and comprehensive synthesis of recent research and offers a valuable reference for scientists and clinicians alike.

Meditation, Volume 244, the latest release in the Progress in Brain Research series, highlights new advances in the field with this new volume presenting interesting chapters on The effect of meditation on attentional processes, State-trait influences of Vipassana meditation practice on P3 EEG dynamics, What could teachers learn from the neuroscience of self-experience?, Training Attention for Conscious Non-REM Sleep: The Yogic Technique of Yoga Nidra and Its Implications for Neuroscience Research, CNV and P3 modulations following sensorimotor training, Analytical meditation: a characterization of a reasoning-based meditation training, Buddhist meditation and the regulation of brain networks, Mindfulness-based Emotional Balance Training in Military Spouse, and more.

This informative and entertaining compilation of 50 short neurological cases demonstrates important principles in clinical localization and differential diagnosis. Each case presents the key elements without revealing the diagnosis at first. A vivid clinical scenario provides enough information for the student to localize the site of the lesion and for the experienced neurological physician to reach a differential diagnosis. Each case description is followed by one or two illustrations, the diagnosis, and then a commentary by a Mayo Clinic consultant. The commentary highlights the issues in the differential diagnosis and provides an update on what is currently known about the specific diagnostic entity. The book will be of interest to physicians and surgeons caring for neurological patients at each stage of their career. It will be of particular help to medical students and to residents and fellows in neurology and neurosurgery. Internists, pediatricians, geriatricians, and psychiatrists will also find it useful.

Neurons are arguably the most complex of all cells. From the action of these cells comes movement, thought and consciousness. It is a challenging task to understand what molecules direct the various diverse aspects of their function. This has produced an ever-increasing amount of molecular information about neurons, and only in Molecular Biology of the Neuron can a large part of this information be found in one source. In this book, a non-specialist can learn about the molecules that control information flow in the brain or the progress of brain disease in an approachable format, while the expert has access to a wealth of detailed information from a wide range of topics impacting on his or her field of endeavour. The text is designed to achieve a balance of accessibility and broad coverage with up-to-date molecular detail. In the six years since the first edition of Molecular Biology of the Neuron there has been an explosion in the molecular information about neurons that has been discovered, and this information is incorporated into this second edition. Entirely new chapters have been introduced where recent advances have made a new aspect of neuronal function more comprehensible at the molecular level. Written by leading researchers in the field, the book provides an essential overview of the molecular structure and function of neurons, and will be an invaluable tool to students and researchers alike.

Many organisms possess multiple sensory systems, such as vision, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. The possession of such multiple ways of sensing the world offers many benefits. These benefits arise not only because each modality can sense different aspects of the environment, but also because different senses can respond jointly to the same external object or event, thus enriching the overall experience-for example, looking at an individual while listening to them speak. However, combining the information from different senses also poses many challenges for the nervous system. In recent years, there has been dramatic progress in understanding how information from different sensory modalities gets integrated in order to construct useful representations of external space; and in how such multimodal representations constrain spatial attention. Such progress has involved numerous different disciplines, including neurophysiology, experimental psychology, neurological work with brain-damaged patients, neuroimaging studies, and computational modelling. This volume brings together the leading researchers from all these approaches, to present the first integrative overview of this central topic in cognitive neuroscience.

In the thirty years since its discovery by Terje Lomo and Tim Bliss, Long Term Potentiation (LTP) has become one of the most extensively studied topics in contemporary neuroscience. In LTP the strength of synapses between neurons is potentiated following brief but intense activation. LTP is thought to play a central role in learning and memory, though the exact nature of its role is less clear. In spite of years of research, there are many questions about LTP regarding its functional relevance that remain unanswered - for example, is it a model of memory formation, or is the actual neural mechanism used by the brain to store information? This volume presents a state of the art account of LTP. It begins with lively accounts, by the scientists most closely involved, of the discovery of LTP and of the experiments that established its basic properties and induction mechanisms. Later contributions contain reviews and new research that cover the range of molecular, cellular, physiological and behavioural approaches to the study of LTP. Provocative, accessible, and authoritative, this book makes it clear why LTP continues in equal measure to puzzle and beguile neuroscientists today. Advance praise for Long Term Potentiation: "This book provides a definitive overview of the development of ideas about synaptic plasticity and about the wide range of current research in this fascinating field." Colin Blakemore, University of Oxford