States of Mind

An all-star lineup of brain scientists reveal what the public needs to know States of Mind is a wonderfully accessible introduction to the most important recent findings about how our health, behavior, feelings, and identities are influenced by what goes on inside our brains. The book covers the sources of depression and how it can be treated; the effects of stress on our brains and general health; how memory works and the phenomenon of false memory; why we dream and the role dreams play in our lives; how genes and life experience combine to shape our personalities and temperaments; and more. Kay Redfield Jamison, bestselling author of An Unquiet Mind, on depression. J. Allan Hobson, author of the groundbreaking The Dreaming Brain, on dreams. Steven Hyman, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, on genes and environment. Jerome Kagan, director of Harvard's Mind-Brain Behavior Initiative, on temperament. Eric Kandel, director of Columbia's Center for Neurobiology and Behavior, on memory. Joseph LeDoux, author of the acclaimed The Emotional Brain, on emotions. Bruce McEwen, director of the Neuroendocrinology Laboratory at Rockefeller University, on stress. Esther Sternberg, head of Immunology and Behavior at the Naitonal Institute of Mental Health, on the brain and disease. From the Smithsonian Associates/Dana Alliance for the Brain Initiatives Series