Drawing on data collected through 45 interviews with faculty, doctoral students, and administrators affiliated with an interdisciplinary neuroscience program, I examine the structure of the interdisciplinary graduate curriculum. The data presented here highlight the challenge of such programs. I review the purpose, organization, and content of the…

Brain imaging offers a new technology for understanding the acquisition of reading by children. It can contribute novel evidence concerning the key mechanisms supporting reading, and the brain systems that are involved. The extensive neural architecture that develops to support efficient reading testifies to the complex developmental processes…

Background: We examined longitudinal relations between children's sleep and their emotional security in the mother-child, father-child, and parental marital relationships, with the goal of explicating the direction of association over time. Gender-related effects were also examined. Method: Sleep duration was examined through actigraphy, and sleep…

The present study aimed to examine social attribution in children with high-functioning autism (HFA) and Asperger's syndrome (AS). A sample of 20 boys (9 with HFA and 11 with AS) and 20 age-matched controls were recruited for this study. All participated in two tasks measuring social attribution ability, the conventional Social Attribution Task…

This essay explores how viewing a single Theatre for Young Audiences production might affect the attitudes, values, and/or beliefs of adolescent spectators. Data is drawn from a mixed-methods case study performed with middle school students who viewed a professional performance for young people, and is considered through the lens of cognitive…

The left inferior frontal cortex, the caudate and the anterior cingulate have been proposed as the neural origin of language switching, but most of the studies were conducted in low proficient bilinguals. In the present study, we investigated brain areas involved in language switching in a sample of 19 early, high-proficient Spanish-Catalan…

Split fovea theory proposes that when the eyes are fixated within a written word, visual information about the letters falling to the left of fixation is projected initially to the right cerebral hemisphere while visual information about the letters falling to the right of fixation is projected to the left cerebral hemisphere. The two parts of the…

As we learn new information about the social and moral behaviors of other people, we form and update character judgments of them, and this can profoundly influence how we regard and act towards others. In the study reported here, we capitalized on two interesting neurological patient populations where this process of complex "moral…

Vulnerability to depression and non-response to Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) are associated with specific neurophysiological characteristics including greater right hemisphere (RH) relative to left hemisphere (LH) activity. The present study investigated the relationship between hemispheric specialization and processing of…

There is a considerable linguistic debate on whether phrasal verbs (e.g., "turn up," "break down") are processed as two separate words connected by a syntactic rule or whether they form a single lexical unit. Moreover, views differ on whether meaning (transparency vs. opacity) plays a role in determining their syntactically-connected or lexical…

Normative analysis of cognition-enhancing drugs frequently weighs the liberty interests of drug users against egalitarian values. Yet those who would refuse to engage in neuroenhancement may well find their liberty to do so limited in a society where such drugs are widespread. To the extent that unvarnished emotional responses are…

This book brings together a group of extraordinary educators and scholars who offer important insights about what we can do to defend childhood from societal challenges. The authors explain new findings from neuroscience and psychology, as well as emerging knowledge about the impact on child development of cultural and linguistic diversity,…

Despite a profusion of popular misinformation about the left brain and right brain, there are functional differences between the left and right cerebral hemispheres in humans. Evidence from split-brain patients, individuals with unilateral brain damage, and neuroimaging studies suggest that each hemisphere may be specialized for certain cognitive…

Retrieval practice on a subset of previously studied material enhances later memory for practiced material but can inhibit memory for related unpracticed material. The present study examines the effects of prior retrieval practice on evoked (ERPs) and induced (oscillatory power) measures of electrophysiological activity underlying recognition of…

Steven F. Maier, winner of the Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions, is cited for his work in the fields of learned helplessness; cytokines, depressed mood, and cognitive interference; and the brain structures that produce and counteract learned helplessness. In addition to the citation, a biography and selected bibliography of Maier's…