Over the past decade, I have visited a large number of the great (and lesser) research institutions in the world where scientists are focused on practical (therapeutic) extensions of brain plasticity research. Especially over the past year, I’ve witnessed a great ground-swell of activity generated by scientists employing the principles of brain plasticity to drive…
Traveling in Mexico and observing the operation of Mexican families has brought a simple question to my mind: Why are Mexican-American soldiers from the Iraq War significantly more susceptible than other ethnicities for developing post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSDs)? Does their “weakness” reflect genetic contributions to their risk for PTSD, or, more likely perhaps, does it…
About a month ago, results from a NIMH-sponsored statistical study that determined the rate at which children were being labelled and treated for bipolar disorder were published, and reported widely in the popular press (I initially read about it on September 4th in the Sunday New York Times). Twenty years ago, bipolar disorder was a…
Some months ago, after my grand-daughter Leila’s school in Oakland, California burned down and its rebuilding seems to be drowning in a bureaucratic swamp, I predicted that it would NEVER be rebuilt in time to begin the 2007-8 school year on time. I was wrong. The Oakland Unified School District and the contractors that they…
I initiated this blog for two reasons. First, I sought to provide neuroscience-related information to care-givers and to citizens who might benefit from a brain plasticity-informed perspective. There is an ongoing revolution in brain science that bears powerful implications for our understanding of human neurological and psychiatric impairments and disease, and that informs us about…
One of my favorite former research fellows, David Blake, has chided me for posting multiple blog entries on some days, followed by several entry-less days. “Spread ’em out!”, says Dave. “There should be something new and worthwhile to read EVERY day.” Since David is considerably smarter than me, and because he’s a real engineer who…
It was big local news at Posit Science last week when its scientists and engineers completed the development of a new suite of intensive brain plasticity-based training programs targeting declining visual perception, visual attentional control, eye movement control, and related cognitive abilities — and released the programs internally, for evaluation by its “outcomes research” team.…