Positive life changes lead to positive brain changes. Drawing on the huge success of his groundbreaking book, The Upward Spiral, neuroscientist Alex Korb offers actionable, step-by-step skills to help you reshape your brain and create an upward spiral towards a happier, healthier life.Depression is defined by a collection of symptoms. You feel crappy most of the time. Nothing seems interesting, and everything seems overwhelming. You have trouble with sleep...

In this optimistic and inspiring book, Peter Whybrow, the prize-winning author of American Mania, returns to offer a prescription for genuine human progress.The Well-Tuned Brain is a call to action. Swept along by the cascading advances of today’s technology, most of us take for granted that progress brings improvement. Despite spectacular material advance, however, the evidence grows that we are failing to create a sustainable future for humanity...

In this book we present a conceptually integrated approach to disorders of mood. These disorders are defined narrowly as the clinical syndromes of mania and melancholia. The latter is our particular focus, for the simple reason that it is more common and thus more is known about it. Our approach owes much to Adolf Meyer, who first used the term psychobiology. It was he who emphasized in a practical way the importance of the clinician consider ing the joint contribution of psychosocial and ...

A doctor's bold analysis of the cultural disease that afflicts us all.Despite an astonishing appetite for life, more and more Americans are feeling overworked and dissatisfied. In the world's most affluent nation, epidemic rates of stress, anxiety, depression, obesity, and time urgency are now grudgingly accepted as part of everyday existence they signal the American Dream gone awry.Peter C. Whybrow, director of the Neuropsychiatric Institute at UCLA, groun...

The bestselling author of American Mania, eminent neuroscientist Peter C. Whybrow here addresses overconsumption in modern society. Using personal stories and the latest research, Whybrow illuminates the path toward a sustainable market society of responsible and well-tuned individuals.

The nationally recognized, leading authority on choice exposes the surprising truths behind the decisions we make everyday.Every day we make choices. Coke or Pepsi? Save or spend? Stay or go?Whether mundane or life-altering, the choices we make define us and shape our lives. Sheena Iyengar asks the difficult questions about how and why we choose: Is the desire for choice innate or bound by culture? Why do we sometimes choose against our best interests? How ...

A leading evolutionary psychologist probes the hidden instincts behind our working, shopping, and spendingEvolutionary psychology-the compelling science of human nature-has clarified the prehistoric origins of human behavior and influenced many fields ranging from economics to personal relationships. In Spent Geoffrey Miller applies this revolutionary science's principles to a new domain: the sensual wonderland of marketing and status seeking that we call ...

A revolutionary and timely reconsideration of everything we know about power. Celebrated UC Berkeley psychologist Dr. Dacher Keltner argues that compassion and selflessness enable us to have the most influence over others and the result is power as a force for good in the world.Power is ubiquitous—but totally misunderstood. Turning conventional wisdom on its head, Dr. Dacher Keltner presents the very idea of power in a whole new light, demonstrating not just how it...

A timely examination by a leading scientist of the physical, psychological, and moral effects of inequality.Today’s inequality is on a scale that none of us has seen in our lifetimes, yet this disparity between rich and poor has ramifications that extend far beyond mere financial means. In The Broken Ladder psychologist Keith Payne examines how inequality divides us not just economically, but has profound consequences for how we think, how our cardiovascul...

"A thorough education in how to move from simply maximizing the economic output of cities to improving the well-being of all urban residents." —Daniel L. Doctoroff, CEO, Sidewalk Labs2017 PROSE Award Winner: Outstanding Scholarly Work by a Trade PublisherCities are birthplaces of civilization; centers of culture, trade, and progress; cauldrons of opportunity—and the home of eighty percent of the world's population by 2050. As the twenty-firs...

Why are we attuned to the latest headline, diet craze, smartphone, fashion statement? Why do we relish a change of scene, eye attractive strangers, develop new interests?How did Homo sapiens survive near-extinction during an environmental crisis 80,000 years ago, while close cousins very like us have died out?Why is your characteristic reaction to novelty and change the key to your whole personality?Why do we enjoy inexpensive pleasure...

A renowned neuroscientist provides an “unorthodox but enlightening” (Wall Street Journal) narrative of how addiction happens in the brain, and what we can do to overcome itThrough the vivid, true stories of five people who journeyed into and out of addiction, a renowned neuroscientist—and former addict himself—explains why the disease model of addiction is wrong and how it obstructs the path to recovery. Combining intimate human examples with clearly rende...