Book Review: Welcome to Your Brain

Subtitle: Why You Lose Your Car Keys But Never Forget How to Drive And Other Puzzles of Everyday Life

by  Sandra Aamodt, Ph.D and Sam Wang, Ph.D
Paperback edition, 2009, 256 pages

I  have mentioned this book on several occasions. I have enjoyed it so much over the past few months that I decided to do a review of it. If you have any interest in the study of human psychology, human nature or how things work in general, you may want to read this book. Or, you may want to recommend it to someone.

The authors of the book are neuroscientists. In this book they attempt to explain some things about the human brain, with its 10 billion neurons. They are dealing with the very complex processes by which the brain coordinates sensory information and thoughts, regulates our emotions and forms memories.  They manage to pull it off with humor and clarity.

Aamodt and Wang take on some of the controversial issues related to human psychology. They discuss whether men and women have different brains. Their answer is “Yes,” but they are not sure how much difference it makes in terms of behaviors and capabilities. They also tackle the never ending debate about whether intelligence stems mainly from nature or nurture, heredity or environment. They conclude that heredity establishes some limitations around intelligence, but that environment, such as child rearing, significantly affects the degree to which individuals reach their genetic potential. The authors discuss the differences between humans and other mammals.  They reveal what is happening in the brain when we dream. Other topics include jet lag, and the effect of your brain on your religion.

I really enjoyed the numerous sidebars devoted to exploding brain myths. For example, it is not true that we only use 10% of our brain’s capacity. In fact, we use almost all of its capacity. The book was especially appealing to me because of its emphasis on how to protect the brain as we age. It is a lively and humorous work, with lots of illustrations, quizzes, trivia and charts. All in all, this is a book that is fun and practical at the same time. I know I will return to it time after time as a reference source and as a source of entertaining reading. The book is available at a discount from Amazon.com by clicking the image on this page. Let me know what you think of it!

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Tagged as: Aging, Brain Health, Human brain, memory, Memory Loss, neurology, Psychology, Religion