Our Anxious Selves: Neuropsychological Processes and their Enduring Influence on Who We Are (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology)


Book Description

Discussing the outsized role that fear, anxiety, and other distressing emotions play in forming fundamental aspects of who we are. Using recent findings from neuropsychology, this new book in the best-selling Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology shows that who we are psychologically starts with the early presence of an easily aroused fear/anxiety system. It goes on to discuss how clinicians can view people’s difficulties with self-confidence and identity, and how self-destructive patterns can be traced back to these systems and what clinicians can do to help. It also touches on intergenerational transmission of trauma, as well as people’s responses to COVID-19, PTSD, and real and imagined threats.




Our Anxious Selves


Book Description

Discussing the outsized role that fear, anxiety, and other distressing emotions play in forming fundamental aspects of who we are. Using recent findings from neuropsychology, this new book in the best-selling Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology shows that who we are psychologically starts with the early presence of an easily aroused fear/anxiety system. It goes on to discuss how clinicians can view people’s difficulties with self-confidence and identity, and how self-destructive patterns can be traced back to these systems and what clinicians can do to help. It also touches on intergenerational transmission of trauma, as well as people’s responses to COVID-19, PTSD, and real and imagined threats.




The Neuropsychology of the Unconscious: Integrating Brain and Mind in Psychotherapy (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology)


Book Description

A scientific take on the still-central therapeutic concept of “the unconscious.” More than one hundred years after Freud began publishing some of his seminal theories, the concept of the unconscious still occupies a central position in many theoretical frameworks and clinical approaches. When trying to understand clients’ internal and interpersonal struggles it is almost inconceivable not to look for unconscious motivation, conflicts, and relational patterns. Clinicians also consider it a breakthrough to recognize how our own unconscious patterns have interacted with those of our clients. Although clinicians use concepts such as the unconscious and dissociation, in actuality many do not take into account the newly emerging neuropsychological attributes of nonconscious processes. As a result, assumptions and lack of clarity overtake information that can become central in our clinical work. This revolutionary book presents a new model of the unconscious, one that is continuing to emerge from the integration of neuropsychological research with clinical experience. Drawing from clinical observations of specific therapeutic cases, affect theory, research into cognitive neuroscience and neuropsychological findings, the book presents an expanded picture of nonconscious processes. The model moves from a focus on dissociated affects, behaviors, memories, and the fantasies that are unconsciously created, to viewing unconscious as giving expression to whole patterns of feeling, thinking and behaving, patterns that are so integrated and entrenched as to make them our personality traits. Topics covered include: the centrality of subcortical regions, automaticity, repetition, and biased memory systems; role of the amygdala and its sensitivity to fears in shaping and coloring unconscious self-systems; self-narratives; therapeutic enactments; therapeutic resistance; defensive systems and narcissism; therapeutic approaches designed to utilize some of the new understandings regarding unconscious processes and their interaction with higher level conscious ones embedded in the prefrontal cortex.




Managing Severe and Enduring Anorexia Nervosa


Book Description

Based on the only evidence-based randomized controlled trial yet undertaken in patients with severe and enduing anorexia nervosa, Managing Severe and Enduring Anorexia Nervosa uses the results of that trial to present a new paradigm for treatment. Moreover, this informative new text assembles the leading scientists across three continents to provide a comprehensive overview and new paradigm for treatment and stimulate interest in the development of new psychosocial approaches. Students, clinicians, and researchers in the field of eating disorders will find this edited volume a valuable reference handbook in the clinical management of patients with anorexia nervosa.




Preventing Bullying Through Science, Policy, and Practice


Book Description

Bullying has long been tolerated as a rite of passage among children and adolescents. There is an implication that individuals who are bullied must have "asked for" this type of treatment, or deserved it. Sometimes, even the child who is bullied begins to internalize this idea. For many years, there has been a general acceptance and collective shrug when it comes to a child or adolescent with greater social capital or power pushing around a child perceived as subordinate. But bullying is not developmentally appropriate; it should not be considered a normal part of the typical social grouping that occurs throughout a child's life. Although bullying behavior endures through generations, the milieu is changing. Historically, bulling has occurred at school, the physical setting in which most of childhood is centered and the primary source for peer group formation. In recent years, however, the physical setting is not the only place bullying is occurring. Technology allows for an entirely new type of digital electronic aggression, cyberbullying, which takes place through chat rooms, instant messaging, social media, and other forms of digital electronic communication. Composition of peer groups, shifting demographics, changing societal norms, and modern technology are contextual factors that must be considered to understand and effectively react to bullying in the United States. Youth are embedded in multiple contexts and each of these contexts interacts with individual characteristics of youth in ways that either exacerbate or attenuate the association between these individual characteristics and bullying perpetration or victimization. Recognizing that bullying behavior is a major public health problem that demands the concerted and coordinated time and attention of parents, educators and school administrators, health care providers, policy makers, families, and others concerned with the care of children, this report evaluates the state of the science on biological and psychosocial consequences of peer victimization and the risk and protective factors that either increase or decrease peer victimization behavior and consequences.




The Inter-Processual Self


Book Description

How should we understand the self, as well as personal, relational and systemic growth? This volume proposes a radical new way of answering this question. It rests on a non-representational theory of knowledge on how to approach and understand the self and action more broadly. Although it has never been lost, the Aristotelian emphasis on excellence in moral character and practical reason as preconditions for achieving happiness has gradually been degraded. This book suggests that this has happened thanks to a split between knowledge and action that can be traced back to the origins of modernity. Modern academic disciplines in general, and psychology in particular, are based on the idealisation of theoretical, hypothetical and abstract reason, suggesting that this morally neutral ideal must guide human action. This volume systematically integrates those domains in a more profound and meaningful proposal, relevant for current times and challenges. Based on previous research bridging philosophy, psychology and neuroscience, the contributors here identify two alternative paradigms for conceiving of the self and human development: the so-called “autonomous self” (AS) and the “inter-processual self” (IPS). The book considers the person as an ethical being and as the foundational cornerstone of a new theory of self, action and knowing that achieves decisive distance from modern theory’s limitations. To keep on-going dialogue on human development open, the authors introduce a new theoretical model (IPS) which can be scientifically measured and tested; they also suggest its further application in concrete, practical realms, thus touching on how the adoption of the IPS paradigm inspires a renewed view of human cognition, education, governance, and business management.




Eight Key Brain Areas of Mental Health and Illness


Book Description

Bridging the gap between neuroscience and clinical therapy. In this handbook, clinical psychologist and bestselling author Jennifer Sweeton details the eight main areas of the brain affected by mental illness, how brain changes show up in the therapy room as symptoms and behaviors, and the types of therapies and psychotherapeutic techniques research has shown can heal the brain. Areas covered are the thalamus, amygdala, hippocampus, insula, nucleus accumbens, anterior cingulate, ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. No longer will you need to feel unsure when referencing basic brain functions related to behavioral health. After reading this book, you will feel confident and excited about your ability to take a client-centered, strategic, brain-based approach to treatment planning. Chapter summaries and tables of brain region, mental health condition, and therapeutic approach are included for easy reference.




The 10 Best-Ever Anxiety Management Techniques Workbook


Book Description

A much-anticipated companion to the popular book on how to understand, manage, and conquer your stress. Brimming with exercises, worksheets, tips, and tools, this how-to workbook is the much-anticipated companion to Wehrenberg’s popular The 10 Best-Ever Anxiety Management Techniques. Expanding on those top 10 anxiety-busting techniques, the workbook demonstrates exactly how to put them to work to understand, manage, and conquer your stress. From panic disorders, generalized anxiety, and social anxiety, to everyday worry and stress, manifestations of anxiety are among the most common and pervasive mental health complaints. Whether you suffer from sweaty palms during a work presentation, persistent rumination, or even agoraphobia, anxiety can be debilitating. But thanks to a flood of supporting brain research, effective, practical strategies have emerged that allow us to manage day-to-day anxiety on our own. In this workbook, Wehrenberg walks us through a valuable collection of them, showing just how physical, emotional, and behavioral symptoms can be alleviated with targeted training. Step-by-step exercises on developing and implementing counter-cognitions, mindfulness meditation, thought-stopping and thought-replacement, “breathing minutes,” demand delays, cued relaxation, affirmations, and much more are presented—all guaranteed to soothe your anxious thoughts. The accompanying audio CD features an array of calming, author-guided exercises including targeted breath work, muscle relaxation, mindfulness, and much more. Praise for Margaret Wehrenberg's books: "[A] thoughtful book that provides immediate help for people suffering from depression. I highly recommend it.” —Daniel G. Amen, MD, Author of Change Your Brain, Change Your Life "[O]ffers the key to unlocking the complex biochemistry of your brain, and reversing you anxiety-inducing habits. Dr. Wehrenberg has done the work to create the right learning environment and organize the needed tools. Follow her lead and your body and mind will thank you with the peace and quiet you deserve.” —Reid Wilson, PhD, Author of Don't Panic: Taking Control of Anxiety Attacks “[A] well-researched book with clearly-written brain science for the non-scientist. Its life-changing, self-motivating techniques, many of which can be practiced outside the treatment room, will benefit anyone who suffers from depression and everyone who treats them. The appendix of practices alone is worth the price!” —Amy Weintraub, Author of Yoga Skills for Therapists and Yoga for Depression “In steps that are both clear and scaled for easily attainable victories, Wehrenberg extends a hand to those with the recourse of clinical therapy.” —Booklist “Any practitioner who works with anxious clients will want to have this comprehensive book.” —The Psychologist




The Neuroscience of Psychotherapy: Healing the Social Brain (Second Edition)


Book Description

How the brain's architecture is related to the problems, passions, and aspirations of human beings. In contrast to this view, recent theoretical advances in brain imaging have revealed that the brain is an organ continually built and re-built by one's experience. We are now beginning to learn that many forms of psychotherapy, developed in the absence of any scientific understanding of the brain, are supported by neuroscientific findings. In fact, it could be argued that to be an effective psychotherapist these days it is essential to have some basic understanding of neuroscience. Louis Cozolino's The Neuroscience of Psychotherapy, Second Edition is the perfect place to start. In a beautifully written and accessible synthesis, Cozolino illustrates how the brain's architecture is related to the problems, passions, and aspirations of human beings. As the book so elegantly argues, all forms of psychotherapy--from psychoanalysis to behavioral interventions--are successful to the extent to which they enhance change in relevant neural circuits. Beginning with an overview of the intersecting fields of neuroscience and psychotherapy, this book delves into the brain's inner workings, from basic neuronal building blocks to complex systems of memory, language, and the organization of experience. It continues by explaining the development and organization of the healthy brain and the unhealthy brain. Common problems such as anxiety, trauma, and codependency are discussed from a scientific and clinical perspective. Throughout the book, the science behind the brain's working is applied to day-to-day experience and clinical practice. Written for psychotherapists and others interested in the relationship between brain and behavior, this book encourages us to consider the brain when attempting to understand human development, mental illness, and psychological health. Fully and thoroughly updated with the many neuroscientific developments that have happened in the eight years since the publication of the first edition, this revision to the bestselling book belongs on the shelf of all practitioners.




Pandemic Anxiety: Fear, Stress, and Loss in Traumatic Times


Book Description

From a leading writer on anxiety management, a timely and urgent book on navigating the “new normal.” With the global pandemic, our world changed seemingly overnight. Nobody knows when normalcy will return. Uncertainty engenders anxiety, so it isn’t surprising that now, without exaggeration, we can say that the world is seeing a new face of anxiety: fear of grocery stores or friendly strangers standing nearby on a hiking trail; fear of returning to offices as “the Great Pause” transitions to re-emerging work life; fear of sending our children back to school. This new anxiety also masks real experiences of grief and loss, making them unmanageable and, therefore, hard to navigate. Margaret Wehrenberg, one of our most sensitive anxiety writers, offers context and strategies for dealing with the bewildering state of life today. With her trademark combination of neurobiological context, practical suggestions, and engaging stories, Wehrenberg provides readers just what is needed in these uncertain times: a way to deal with unprecedented challenges and the realities of the world as it is now.