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La vita emotiva del cervello
Cosa succede nel nostro cervello quando siamo tristi o euforici, arrabbiati o ottimisti, oppure quando abbiamo a che fare con gli altri? Quali sono le strutture cerebrali alla base della vita emotiva? Fino a non molti anni fa la ricerca psicologica e neuroscientifica non era affatto interessata al «cuore», ma solo alla «testa», ossia alle funzioni cognitive. Negli anni Settanta alcuni studiosi intrapresero una serie di ricerche pionieristiche che avrebbero portato alla nascita delle cosiddette «neuroscienze affettive». Oggi Richard Davidson è un protagonista assoluto di questa nuova disciplina, riuscendo a dimostrare l’intuizione che lo aveva folgorato all’inizio degli anni Settanta ad Harvard: ragione e sentimento non sono polarità inconciliabili, e a ciascuna corrispondono zone e funzioni cerebrali specifiche. Su queste basi Davidson ha elaborato la teoria degli Stili Emozionali, sei dimensioni emotive che descrivono la personalità di ognuno. Poiché le emozioni si fondano su precise basi neurali, è possibile intervenire sui nostri comportamenti, disfunzionali o meno. Le neuroscienze hanno persino individuato nella meditazione uno strumento molto potente per modificare le strutture cerebrali, sfruttandone la neuroplasticità. A garanzia del valore di queste ricerche, l’équipe di «collaboratori» di Davidson annovera niente meno che il Dalai Lama. Il cervello non è una scatola impenetrabile e immutabile come si è pensato per secoli: migliorandone il funzionamento, possiamo vivere meglio con noi stessi e con gli altri.
411 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 1, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 293 reviews
April 3, 2012
This is not "light" reading, but still truly fascinating. If you don't mind reading about the clinical and scientific aspects of how the brain functions and why we do what we do, this is a worthwhile read.
Davidson has narrowed down peoples' emotional styles to 6 dimensions:
-Resilience (how slowly or quickly you recover from adversity)
-Outlook (how long you're able to sustain positive emotion)
-Social Intuition (how adept you are at picking up social signals from people around you)
-Self-Awareness (how well you perceive bodily feelings that reflect emotions)
-Sensitivity to Context (how good you are at regulating your emotional responses taking into account the context in which you find yourself)
-Attention (how sharp and clear your focus is)
I think all of us are aware we need change or improvements in one or more of these areas. So what was interesting were his suggestions (with scientific experiments to back him up) as to how to go about doing just that.
Many people think "I just am the way I am. I can't help how I think-- how I feel-- how I react." Trust me ... been there.
But I've also done my fair share of re-evaluating instances or events from my past to know that realigning one's thoughts (and, in turn, one's emotions) IS possible.
Reading this only reaffirmed that and has made me more conscious of my ability to continue to do so.
Davidson has narrowed down peoples' emotional styles to 6 dimensions:
-Resilience (how slowly or quickly you recover from adversity)
-Outlook (how long you're able to sustain positive emotion)
-Social Intuition (how adept you are at picking up social signals from people around you)
-Self-Awareness (how well you perceive bodily feelings that reflect emotions)
-Sensitivity to Context (how good you are at regulating your emotional responses taking into account the context in which you find yourself)
-Attention (how sharp and clear your focus is)
I think all of us are aware we need change or improvements in one or more of these areas. So what was interesting were his suggestions (with scientific experiments to back him up) as to how to go about doing just that.
Many people think "I just am the way I am. I can't help how I think-- how I feel-- how I react." Trust me ... been there.
But I've also done my fair share of re-evaluating instances or events from my past to know that realigning one's thoughts (and, in turn, one's emotions) IS possible.
Reading this only reaffirmed that and has made me more conscious of my ability to continue to do so.
September 20, 2012
I bought this book because I find anything about neuroscience pretty interesting, and the emotional aspect doesn't seem to have been investigated in any rigorous way until recently. This book promises to satisfy that, and, to a large extent, I think it does.
I found myself constantly struggling with a sort of duality in this book. At some points I found the observations to be extremely obvious, such as the idea that our emotional styles aren't simply genetic, but a product of our environment and upbringing. Well... yeah. And it took several clinical trials to work that one out? But then he reveals the subtle side of those observations - about how our upbringing doesn't just change our thought patterns, it actually changes the physical configuration of our brains, and he goes on to explain in finer detail, with examples, what this involves.
There's plenty of interesting tid-bits about which bits of the brain usually do what (I say usually because he shows how that can change too), and provides insight into how we can modify our emotional styles so that we can be better balanced individuals.
I don't generally go for self-help books, but I couldn't help catch the bug on this occasion. There seems to be genuine research to back up his claims, and it definitely gave me pause.
Recommended.
I found myself constantly struggling with a sort of duality in this book. At some points I found the observations to be extremely obvious, such as the idea that our emotional styles aren't simply genetic, but a product of our environment and upbringing. Well... yeah. And it took several clinical trials to work that one out? But then he reveals the subtle side of those observations - about how our upbringing doesn't just change our thought patterns, it actually changes the physical configuration of our brains, and he goes on to explain in finer detail, with examples, what this involves.
There's plenty of interesting tid-bits about which bits of the brain usually do what (I say usually because he shows how that can change too), and provides insight into how we can modify our emotional styles so that we can be better balanced individuals.
I don't generally go for self-help books, but I couldn't help catch the bug on this occasion. There seems to be genuine research to back up his claims, and it definitely gave me pause.
Recommended.
May 12, 2015
This book could be retitled: “MY CAREER AS A GREAT PSYCHOLOGIST.” The book gets a lot of rave reviews, so I was expecting a lot. But it didn’t really deliver. It is less about a new unifying psychological concept (as the author would have us believe), and more of a self-congratulatory review of his career. But there was a sprinkling of worthwhile material. I was intrigued by Cognitive Behavior Therapy: regarding depressive thoughts as simple electrical events in the brain. But this kind of open non-judgmental awareness is nothing particularly new, and you don’t have to be depressed to get benefits from this. He also talked about visualizing someone suffering and wishing their suffering ends, repeating a mantra like “May you be free from suffering. May you experience joy and ease.” This kind of thing used to be called prayer, but now it's repackaged as meditation. I feel like praying for the time back that I spent reading this book.
January 15, 2017
If you're looking for...
- a long-winded autobiography, written by a smug and slightly bitter hipster-neuroscientist
- a scale to gauge your 'emotional style', invented by said hipster-neuroscientist, that seems real simplistic
- excessively generalized concepts and definitions of emotion
- a lack of nuance when discussing how a person's global psychology creates an individual mind
- unnecessary rambling about going to meet the Dalai Lama
- vague descriptions of brain areas activated when aspects of your 'emotional style' are in use
- detailed descriptions of studies that don't seem to have anything to do with actual emotion, but are presented as hard evidence*
- constant references to shit the hipster-neuroscientist has done, schools he's studied/worked at, people he knows
- snide digs at people who ~doubted him~ in his younger years (lookit me now, ma!)
- statements like "everybody feels differently we all have our own ways" followed by clear indications our author believes his particular emotional style, which he outlines in detail early on, is best
- a few general, mindfulness-based self-help strategies (which you could find in any mindfulness book)
....then this is gonna be a great read for ya.
Personally, it, ah, wasn't quite my thing.
* "I showed some people who got botox a sentence that said "Beaches are pretty" and they didn't take as long to read it as when they saw the sentence "Sometimes people die" and that means negative emotions are controlled by the face."
I wish...I was kidding? I'm not saying all his info is wrong, but man -- does it ever need to be qualified and heavily retested.
- a long-winded autobiography, written by a smug and slightly bitter hipster-neuroscientist
- a scale to gauge your 'emotional style', invented by said hipster-neuroscientist, that seems real simplistic
- excessively generalized concepts and definitions of emotion
- a lack of nuance when discussing how a person's global psychology creates an individual mind
- unnecessary rambling about going to meet the Dalai Lama
- vague descriptions of brain areas activated when aspects of your 'emotional style' are in use
- detailed descriptions of studies that don't seem to have anything to do with actual emotion, but are presented as hard evidence*
- constant references to shit the hipster-neuroscientist has done, schools he's studied/worked at, people he knows
- snide digs at people who ~doubted him~ in his younger years (lookit me now, ma!)
- statements like "everybody feels differently we all have our own ways" followed by clear indications our author believes his particular emotional style, which he outlines in detail early on, is best
- a few general, mindfulness-based self-help strategies (which you could find in any mindfulness book)
....then this is gonna be a great read for ya.
Personally, it, ah, wasn't quite my thing.
* "I showed some people who got botox a sentence that said "Beaches are pretty" and they didn't take as long to read it as when they saw the sentence "Sometimes people die" and that means negative emotions are controlled by the face."
I wish...I was kidding? I'm not saying all his info is wrong, but man -- does it ever need to be qualified and heavily retested.
October 16, 2018
This book is a snoooozefest. Unfortunately I had to read it for school, and thank god it’s over.
March 2, 2012
I'm not much for self help mind over matter books, but this one seems to have a lot of research to back up what it says. I am bothered by the author's self congratulatory style.
November 26, 2017
For someone who proclaims himself to be a longtime friend of the Dalai Lama, you'd think Davidson might have more modesty. But ultimately, his huge ego destroys this book, partly because he insists on giving us his own detailed personal story (which is not all that interesting), but even more so because the more substantive part of this book (recent neuroscience about the brain and its role in emotions) is seriously skewed to Davidson's own research while ignoring the work of other scientists who have come up with conflicting findings.
A careful read finds lots of "junk science warning" words -- "strongly suggests" or "it makes sense that" -- that are simply hyping his theory when in reality, it's much more accurate to say we don't really know for sure. To cite just one example, his narrative leads one to believe there is a definitive connection between Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and the size of the hypothalamus. I spent some time reviewing the literature and found it is anything but -- by one account, 11 studies have found some sort of connection but 9 have not.
To make matters worse, Davidson and his co-author throw in a heavy dose of pop psychology (yet another of those personality tests): he proposes a "new model" of how the brain works (dividing it up into six easy pieces), which, of course, really is only one of many equally valid ways of looking at a very complicated system.
Don't get me wrong -- at a broader level, I tend to agree that the brain does have a major role in our emotional life and that meditation (which is a good part of his "How You Can Change" solution) clearly can help train our brain. EEGs and MRIs have definitely given neuroscientists and psychologists an unprecedented window into the brain, much like the telescope opened the cosmos and the microscope showed us another invisible world. There are lots of interesting brain "findings" coming out -- but it seems we're a long way from really connecting them into a coherent theory like gravity or relativity.
Someday, when we more fully understand exactly how all of that works, someone will write a great book about it. Unfortunately, this isn't it.
A careful read finds lots of "junk science warning" words -- "strongly suggests" or "it makes sense that" -- that are simply hyping his theory when in reality, it's much more accurate to say we don't really know for sure. To cite just one example, his narrative leads one to believe there is a definitive connection between Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and the size of the hypothalamus. I spent some time reviewing the literature and found it is anything but -- by one account, 11 studies have found some sort of connection but 9 have not.
To make matters worse, Davidson and his co-author throw in a heavy dose of pop psychology (yet another of those personality tests): he proposes a "new model" of how the brain works (dividing it up into six easy pieces), which, of course, really is only one of many equally valid ways of looking at a very complicated system.
Don't get me wrong -- at a broader level, I tend to agree that the brain does have a major role in our emotional life and that meditation (which is a good part of his "How You Can Change" solution) clearly can help train our brain. EEGs and MRIs have definitely given neuroscientists and psychologists an unprecedented window into the brain, much like the telescope opened the cosmos and the microscope showed us another invisible world. There are lots of interesting brain "findings" coming out -- but it seems we're a long way from really connecting them into a coherent theory like gravity or relativity.
Someday, when we more fully understand exactly how all of that works, someone will write a great book about it. Unfortunately, this isn't it.
May 28, 2012
If you've never read anything about the study of emotions/personality I am sure this books is a revelation. However, as someone who has read quite a bit about emotions, this book is just yet another author/researcher trotting out his "new" theory that looks pretty much like all the rest. Nothing new here. Another case of the emperor having no clothes.
May 23, 2012
I first heard of Dr. Richard Davidson’s work in the field of neuroscience a couple of months ago in an unlikely setting: the annual conference of the National Art Education Association in New York. Regular readers might remember my mention of the Compassion Project in Appleton, Wisconsin, which challenged teachers and students at all levels to give some thought to the nature of compassion, to some discussion, and then to join in a collaborative art project. The results, an amazing 10,000 tiny paintings, all about four inches square, were installed in an exhibition at the Trout Museum. As a result of Dr. Davidson’s idea, an entire community became involved in a project intended to increase the understanding and practice of compassion among human beings. Brilliant, I thought.
Now this same Richard Davidson’s book falls into my hands. Co-written with science writer and editor Sharon Begley, it’s called The Emotional Life of Your Brain, and the first two-thirds of it are science. To be honest, my eyes tend to glaze as I attempt to grasp the meaning of it all; my own brain was not trained to follow the meticulous detail of scientific method. Still, I was more than willing to make the effort, because I have come to believe so passionately in the argument that Davidson presents: that we can literally “change our minds.” In the course of life, from childhood on, we acquire certain attitudes, certain ways of thinking about ourselves and the world, certain mental and emotional patterns that can—but need not—entrap us and impoverish our lives. Davidson skillfully and persuasively applies the principles and super-advanced technological tools of scientific research to demonstrate these truths.
It is the last third of the book that is the easiest for me—from the moment he brings in the monks (with the enthusiastic help of none other than the Dalai Lama) to test them for the effects on the brain of long-term meditation. I have argued often in the pages of The Buddha Diaries that meditation offers us the power to discipline the mind to do those things we want it to do, rather than follow its natural tendency to wander off and play, or engage in fruitless and distracting tasks that do nothing but support our old, often destructive habits. It is fascinating and immensely satisfying to see these ideas put to the scientific test and proven to be sound. Davidson’s research demonstrates that meditation can affect not only the minds of long-term meditators like those Tibetan monks who spend long, solitary years in remote mountain caves; even short-term practice, he shows, can produce dramatic results in the rawest of novices.
The last chapter of the book offers practical, how-to steps that can lead to greater strength of mind—and, indeed, to a more purposeful and satisfying life. With a consistent practice of the visualization and meditation techniques that he describes in detail, we can change the way our brains function and create “new channels in the stream bed of the mind.” We can even change our personalities in significant, life-altering ways. For skeptics, as I myself remained for many years, Davidson’s book presents a convincing scientific argument for the kind of Mind Work that I approach in a very different way (ahem, forgive me: I am not a "book critic"!) in my own recent book of that title.
Richard J. Davidson with Sharon Begley, The Emotional Life of your Brain, March 2012, $25.95, ISBN 978-1-9463-089-7.
Now this same Richard Davidson’s book falls into my hands. Co-written with science writer and editor Sharon Begley, it’s called The Emotional Life of Your Brain, and the first two-thirds of it are science. To be honest, my eyes tend to glaze as I attempt to grasp the meaning of it all; my own brain was not trained to follow the meticulous detail of scientific method. Still, I was more than willing to make the effort, because I have come to believe so passionately in the argument that Davidson presents: that we can literally “change our minds.” In the course of life, from childhood on, we acquire certain attitudes, certain ways of thinking about ourselves and the world, certain mental and emotional patterns that can—but need not—entrap us and impoverish our lives. Davidson skillfully and persuasively applies the principles and super-advanced technological tools of scientific research to demonstrate these truths.
It is the last third of the book that is the easiest for me—from the moment he brings in the monks (with the enthusiastic help of none other than the Dalai Lama) to test them for the effects on the brain of long-term meditation. I have argued often in the pages of The Buddha Diaries that meditation offers us the power to discipline the mind to do those things we want it to do, rather than follow its natural tendency to wander off and play, or engage in fruitless and distracting tasks that do nothing but support our old, often destructive habits. It is fascinating and immensely satisfying to see these ideas put to the scientific test and proven to be sound. Davidson’s research demonstrates that meditation can affect not only the minds of long-term meditators like those Tibetan monks who spend long, solitary years in remote mountain caves; even short-term practice, he shows, can produce dramatic results in the rawest of novices.
The last chapter of the book offers practical, how-to steps that can lead to greater strength of mind—and, indeed, to a more purposeful and satisfying life. With a consistent practice of the visualization and meditation techniques that he describes in detail, we can change the way our brains function and create “new channels in the stream bed of the mind.” We can even change our personalities in significant, life-altering ways. For skeptics, as I myself remained for many years, Davidson’s book presents a convincing scientific argument for the kind of Mind Work that I approach in a very different way (ahem, forgive me: I am not a "book critic"!) in my own recent book of that title.
Richard J. Davidson with Sharon Begley, The Emotional Life of your Brain, March 2012, $25.95, ISBN 978-1-9463-089-7.
August 28, 2020
Despite the author ranking himself as an 8/10 in both "Self-Awareness" and "Sensitivity to Context", this book comprises little more than absurdly exaggerated statements about the hurdles the author faced and his own contributions to the field. To hear him describe it, before he bravely came along and set them straight, all psychologists thought the brain was just a pile of mushy uselessness hanging out in the skull, and anyone who studied the brain literally did not believe in emotion.
Anyone with even a cursory background in the history of psychology/ethology/neuroscience can tell you that this is absurd, and I can't help but wonder if the author's own high self-ranking in resiliency is due to the fact that he has invented most of the obstacles he believes he has faced. Yes, Skinner had some dogmatic ideas about behaviorism that were very briefly in vogue. No, Richard J. Davidson did not single-handedly take him down - the entire fields of psychology and evolutionary biology did that and had been doing it for quite some time before he came onto the scene.
I could really go on, but I'll highlight just a few of the more ridiculous statements made in this book:
1) "I had a rare opportunity to define my own field of study...there was no prevailing paradigm for the neural bases of emotion....
There was two wells I could draw from. The first was research in animals...the second source of knowledge about emotions came from the study of patients who had suffered damage to a specific, localized region of the brain..."
He states that he is the only person to think of studying the neural basis of emotion, and then lists two HUGE fields that are doing JUST THAT. The ego is just...astounding.
2) "I moved to Madison in September 1985, starting a new job in a new state under less than ideal personal circumstances: my wife, Susan, and three-year-old daughter stayed behind in New York so Susan could complete her residency in obstetrics and gynecology...for the first year I commuted between time zones, spending Thursday through Sunday nights in New York and flying to Madison very early each Monday morning. My resilient, positive-outlook Emotional Style definitely helped keep the stress from overwhelming me."
Really? His resilient, positive-outlook style helped, not the fact that it was his wife and not him who suddenly had to parent a three-year-old alone while working eighty-hour-weeks at a hospital? It's very easy to have a positive outlook when you get to stop being a parent for four days a week. I'm curious how many times he told his wife she was just lacking on the resiliency scale and that's why it was so hard for her and not him. And even if he did do everything possible to help his family and took on an equal burden, how is there still no self-awareness that describing a situation that is objectively harder for your wife than you and then bragging about your own emotional strength while not mentioning hers is...tacky at best, and completely undermining of your self-proclaimed "sensitivity to context" at worst?
3) And finally, in describing an autistic woman he met very briefly while his daughter was helping her prepare for her bat mitzvah, "During Amelie and Molly's tutoring sessions in our dining room, I noticed one very striking thing about Molly: her lack of eye contact...Over time, as I met with other children of autism, I observed that no matter how mild or severe the disease, gaze aversion was a consistent symptom."
I think this man genuinely believes that he discovered autistic people don't like to make eye contact, and, having "discovered" this, did not stop to think that maybe many, many people--people who spend their entire lives working with autistic people--have made the same observation. He also claims later in that chapter that "if autistic people could somehow learn to look at people's eyes, without discomfort or anxiety, much of their social and emotional deficit might melt away." Really. Really? Again, the ego. Where will it end?
I think people should avoid this book because the author is an obnoxious, pompous ass. But for the record, the science is also suspect. Anyone who claims to be able to discern huge, important things about your entire personality and way you live your life based on tests like "can you tell when a rhythm is out of tune with your heartbeat" is probably selling you a load of crap. The fact that the author believes his theory of emotion should supplant the thoroughly reviewed and vetted (though surely flawed in its own way) view of psychologists who have spent lifetimes talking to actual human beings, for the simple reason that it is "grounded in neuroscience", tells me that he is in denial both of the limits of current methods in neuroscience and of the enormous complexity of the brain. If we could tell, from a brain scan or EEG, exactly how and what someone is thinking, and how they would behave in the future....we would.
The author seems to have built an entire belief system based on shaky and probably p-hacked correlations: the fact that an easy-to-administer laboratory test in which someone is shown upsetting photos and then their blink response is measured is loosely correlated with responses on a questionnaire about small-life setbacks, and all of the sudden the way your eye blinks is indicative of how long it will take you to recover from the death of a child. This is...dumb. This is an extreme over-interpretation of data. This is what happens when you become a PI and no one tells you you're wrong for twenty years.
I feel quite bad for hating this book because it was a gift from someone who really thought I would enjoy it, but...this is terrible. My deepest condolences to the graduate students and postdocs of Richard J. Davidson who have to deal with him every day.
Anyone with even a cursory background in the history of psychology/ethology/neuroscience can tell you that this is absurd, and I can't help but wonder if the author's own high self-ranking in resiliency is due to the fact that he has invented most of the obstacles he believes he has faced. Yes, Skinner had some dogmatic ideas about behaviorism that were very briefly in vogue. No, Richard J. Davidson did not single-handedly take him down - the entire fields of psychology and evolutionary biology did that and had been doing it for quite some time before he came onto the scene.
I could really go on, but I'll highlight just a few of the more ridiculous statements made in this book:
1) "I had a rare opportunity to define my own field of study...there was no prevailing paradigm for the neural bases of emotion....
There was two wells I could draw from. The first was research in animals...the second source of knowledge about emotions came from the study of patients who had suffered damage to a specific, localized region of the brain..."
He states that he is the only person to think of studying the neural basis of emotion, and then lists two HUGE fields that are doing JUST THAT. The ego is just...astounding.
2) "I moved to Madison in September 1985, starting a new job in a new state under less than ideal personal circumstances: my wife, Susan, and three-year-old daughter stayed behind in New York so Susan could complete her residency in obstetrics and gynecology...for the first year I commuted between time zones, spending Thursday through Sunday nights in New York and flying to Madison very early each Monday morning. My resilient, positive-outlook Emotional Style definitely helped keep the stress from overwhelming me."
Really? His resilient, positive-outlook style helped, not the fact that it was his wife and not him who suddenly had to parent a three-year-old alone while working eighty-hour-weeks at a hospital? It's very easy to have a positive outlook when you get to stop being a parent for four days a week. I'm curious how many times he told his wife she was just lacking on the resiliency scale and that's why it was so hard for her and not him. And even if he did do everything possible to help his family and took on an equal burden, how is there still no self-awareness that describing a situation that is objectively harder for your wife than you and then bragging about your own emotional strength while not mentioning hers is...tacky at best, and completely undermining of your self-proclaimed "sensitivity to context" at worst?
3) And finally, in describing an autistic woman he met very briefly while his daughter was helping her prepare for her bat mitzvah, "During Amelie and Molly's tutoring sessions in our dining room, I noticed one very striking thing about Molly: her lack of eye contact...Over time, as I met with other children of autism, I observed that no matter how mild or severe the disease, gaze aversion was a consistent symptom."
I think this man genuinely believes that he discovered autistic people don't like to make eye contact, and, having "discovered" this, did not stop to think that maybe many, many people--people who spend their entire lives working with autistic people--have made the same observation. He also claims later in that chapter that "if autistic people could somehow learn to look at people's eyes, without discomfort or anxiety, much of their social and emotional deficit might melt away." Really. Really? Again, the ego. Where will it end?
I think people should avoid this book because the author is an obnoxious, pompous ass. But for the record, the science is also suspect. Anyone who claims to be able to discern huge, important things about your entire personality and way you live your life based on tests like "can you tell when a rhythm is out of tune with your heartbeat" is probably selling you a load of crap. The fact that the author believes his theory of emotion should supplant the thoroughly reviewed and vetted (though surely flawed in its own way) view of psychologists who have spent lifetimes talking to actual human beings, for the simple reason that it is "grounded in neuroscience", tells me that he is in denial both of the limits of current methods in neuroscience and of the enormous complexity of the brain. If we could tell, from a brain scan or EEG, exactly how and what someone is thinking, and how they would behave in the future....we would.
The author seems to have built an entire belief system based on shaky and probably p-hacked correlations: the fact that an easy-to-administer laboratory test in which someone is shown upsetting photos and then their blink response is measured is loosely correlated with responses on a questionnaire about small-life setbacks, and all of the sudden the way your eye blinks is indicative of how long it will take you to recover from the death of a child. This is...dumb. This is an extreme over-interpretation of data. This is what happens when you become a PI and no one tells you you're wrong for twenty years.
I feel quite bad for hating this book because it was a gift from someone who really thought I would enjoy it, but...this is terrible. My deepest condolences to the graduate students and postdocs of Richard J. Davidson who have to deal with him every day.
May 16, 2012
This book is absolutely fascinating. Author Davidson is the founder of the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at UW-Madison. He's gotten a lot of attention with his work doing brain scans on Tibetan monks while they meditate.
This book is an introduction to the work he's been doing. He has come up with six different categorizations of types of mental/emotional styles that operate something like the Myers-Briggs type indicator. Each category places you on a spectrum between two extremes, which leads to an infinite variety of styles. Unlike Myers-Briggs, Davidson's styles are based on actual neuroscience studies.
Davidson gives a great history of his work in the book, lays out the details of the emotional types and how they work, then provides a brief introduction into how people can work to modify their emotional styles. If I have one complaint with the book, it's that the section on "how-to" could have been longer. I hope at some point in the future he will maybe devote an entire book to the practical applications of how the styles work, and how we can modify the workings of our own mind.
I especially love this book, and Davidson's work, for it's tight integration with Buddhism. The Dalai Lama has been a strong supporter of Davidson's research, which I think is very cool. When Davidson's new Center opened at UW-Madison, I was able to go to Madison to see a discussion between Davidson and the Dalai Lama facilitated by Daniel Goleman. It was unbelievably cool to listen to the Dalai Lama discuss the importance of scientific research for bettering our understanding of humanity (while wearing a Badgers baseball cap no less!).
This is a worthwhile read, and be sure to check out the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds.
This book is an introduction to the work he's been doing. He has come up with six different categorizations of types of mental/emotional styles that operate something like the Myers-Briggs type indicator. Each category places you on a spectrum between two extremes, which leads to an infinite variety of styles. Unlike Myers-Briggs, Davidson's styles are based on actual neuroscience studies.
Davidson gives a great history of his work in the book, lays out the details of the emotional types and how they work, then provides a brief introduction into how people can work to modify their emotional styles. If I have one complaint with the book, it's that the section on "how-to" could have been longer. I hope at some point in the future he will maybe devote an entire book to the practical applications of how the styles work, and how we can modify the workings of our own mind.
I especially love this book, and Davidson's work, for it's tight integration with Buddhism. The Dalai Lama has been a strong supporter of Davidson's research, which I think is very cool. When Davidson's new Center opened at UW-Madison, I was able to go to Madison to see a discussion between Davidson and the Dalai Lama facilitated by Daniel Goleman. It was unbelievably cool to listen to the Dalai Lama discuss the importance of scientific research for bettering our understanding of humanity (while wearing a Badgers baseball cap no less!).
This is a worthwhile read, and be sure to check out the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds.
Read
April 6, 2016We are so fortunate to have Richard Davidson here at the University of Wisconsin, so those of us that know him can testify that his findings that regular meditation can change your brain patterns and make you calm and cheerful despite a busy life hold particularly true in his example. The other benefits of mindfulness training, as well as other approaches to altering our brain's responses to stimulus, are fascinating -- and are clearly described in this book, which also describes recent discoveries regarding the parts of the brain used for different aspects of emotion and perception. The fact that the brain is more elastic and forgiving than had originally been thought holds hope for those who are suffering.
Please note that I do not use the star rating system, so this review should not be viewed as a zero.
Please note that I do not use the star rating system, so this review should not be viewed as a zero.
August 2, 2012
The Emotional Brain: Character, Personality, and Temperament
Those of us committed to personal growth will find much that is rewarding in The Emotional Life of Your Brain. Davidson draws on an array of scientific experiments and studies to develop a set of ideas that can add to our understanding of how the “emotional brain” works, how its unique patterns affect the way we think, feel, and live, and how we can change them.
Three of these ideas are worth highlighting here. The first is that contrary to the way we tend to think about it, personality and temperament, though innate, are not fixed or immutable. That traditional view was reinforced in the age of genetics by “The dogma that ‘genetic equals unchangeable.’” If a “negative” trait (say shyness) is inherited and in your genes, you’re stuck with it. Instead, says Davidson, “plasticity is intrinsic to the brain,” and its “ability to change its structure and function in significant ways” extends into adulthood and “through the life of the individual.”
The second idea is that such “change can come about in response to experiences we have as well as to the thoughts we think.” Traits that are genetically based can be altered because “the mere presence of a gene is not sufficient for the trait for which it codes to be expressed. A gene must also be turned on, and studies . . . have shown that life experiences can turn genes on or off.” Thus, “In terms of the shopworn debate called nature vs. nurture, nurture is able to act on nature.” Our brain can be altered by these “experiences as well as by conscious, intentional effort . . . through the intentional cultivation of specific mental qualities or habits.”
And, thirdly, the reason such change is possible is that head and heart are more closely linked in the brain than previously thought: “the barricade that psychology had erected between reason and emotion has no basis in fact.” Emotion involves neural activity in the right and in the left side of the brain, in the amygdala and in the prefrontal cortex. “The circuitry of the emotional brain often overlaps with that of the rational, thinking brain,” so that “Emotion works with cognition in an integrated and seamless way to enable us to navigate the world of relationships, work, and spiritual growth.”
These ideas have broad implications. They suggest that we are not irremediably shaped by our genes, upbringing, environment, or of this or that neural circuitry in our limbic system. We are not at the mercy of our emotions. We can change because our brain can change.
The question of course is how. Davidson answers this question in the terms of traditional psychology by focusing on personality and temperament, offering a new classification of these traits which he calls “Emotional Style.” His claim is that “Understanding the neural underpinnings of the six dimensions of Emotional Style can empower you to recognize your own” overall style and apply various techniques he recommends to change it in the direction you desire.
Briefly stated, the six dimensions are: Resilience (how fast you recover from adversity); Outlook (optimist vs. pessimist); Social Intuition (how adept you are at picking up social signals); Self-Awareness (how well you are in touch with your feelings); Sensitivity to Context (how well you adapt your emotional responses to a given context); and Attention (how well you can focus).
To get an idea of the problems that arise with Davidson’s model, let us consider an example he gives of a situation involving two of these categories: “You might be irritable for a whole day after a morning argument with a coworker but not realize that your funk is the result of being Slow to Recover (This ability to introspect and understand our own emotions is an aspect of the Self-Awareness dimension).”
Now, suppose I answer the book’s questionnaires for these categories, identify their neural correlates in the brain, conclude my styles are “Slow to Recover” and “Self-Opaque,” and follow Davidson’s techniques in the back of the book so that, assuming they work, I’m able to recover faster after my morning argument with my coworker.
Does that improve my relationship with my coworker? Not necessarily. In fact, it could even worsen it, for the more successfully I reduce their negative impact on me and the faster I recover from these arguments the easier it is to continue having them. They just won’t bother me that much anymore. But they may bother my co-worker, other colleagues, and my boss. My “resilience” could actually end up making a lot of people unhappy, affect my work, and even cost me my job.
This is because traits of personality and temperament do not necessarily correlate with the rightness or wrongness of what I’m doing. They are not moral categories. A high degree of optimism can lead me to take unreasonable risks in business or the stock market and leave me in financial ruin. High social intuition, self-awareness, and sensitivity to context can all help me manage myself better the better to lie and manipulate people. Being highly focused can help me succeed in my career even as it leads me to neglect my family and fail as a spouse and as a parent.
In the situation cited by Davidson, I need to look at more than my “emotional style.” I need to look at what I might be doing wrong, at the moral dimensions of the situation. This means looking at my character, understood as a moral category. Traits of character determine whether a trait of personality or temperament serves a morally worthy or unworthy end, whether it works for good or for ill. But Davidson’s model, which is based on personality and temperament to the exclusion of character, makes no provision for such considerations.
A more effective model for personal growth is found in the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, whose principles, it should be noted, can be practiced by anyone. One of these principles is the discipline of self-examination, where I make an inventory of my character defects and associated emotions, taking into account the positive character traits and associated emotions which can displace and replace them. Considered principles of the good life, these positive character traits are traditionally known as virtues, among which, honesty, for instance, is essential to the process of self-examination.
Honestly looking at myself in the above situation, I might find that my “funk” is the result of my nursing a resentment against my coworker. I may be “irritable” because I’m still angry over something she said or did that affected something that is important to me (e.g. my self-esteem), and I’ve been obsessing about it all day. Upon further examination, I may discover that I said or did something which started or contributed to the argument, and that behind my words and actions there were certain character defects at work, perhaps impatience, or unkindness, or intolerance. My adversity, as is often the case with many of us, may have been self-inflicted.
Having made such an examination, I move to take corrective action by practicing other applicable principles. Where I am in the wrong, I promptly and humbly admit it, and I sincerely make amends. Where my coworker is in the wrong, I forgive, turn the matter over, and let go of any ill feelings.
By practicing these principles, I can surrender my resentment and obsession, reconcile with my coworker, and restore peace and harmony to our relationship. Not only do I recover from negative emotions myself, but I can help my coworker to do the same. My recovery goal is not self-centered. I’m not selfishly concerned only about my own well-being.
Depending on the situation, I will find other principles that can help me to recover from adversity: after a loss, for instance, acceptance of the things I cannot change, and gratitude for the things I still do have. By practicing these principles day in and day out and in situation after situation, I am engaging in the kind of conscious, intentional, and repeated effort which Davidson says can help me to acquire the habits which can alter my brain and reshape my thoughts and emotions. I will become better at recovering from adversity, but my recovery will reflect fundamental character and emotional changes, not just an improved personality trait (more resilient).
That personality and temperament are malleable, that emotion and cognition work in an integrated manner, and that experience and thought can reshape the brain are important ideas in Davidson’s book. When it comes to translating these ideas into practice, however, the 12 Steps remain the best program of action.
Those of us committed to personal growth will find much that is rewarding in The Emotional Life of Your Brain. Davidson draws on an array of scientific experiments and studies to develop a set of ideas that can add to our understanding of how the “emotional brain” works, how its unique patterns affect the way we think, feel, and live, and how we can change them.
Three of these ideas are worth highlighting here. The first is that contrary to the way we tend to think about it, personality and temperament, though innate, are not fixed or immutable. That traditional view was reinforced in the age of genetics by “The dogma that ‘genetic equals unchangeable.’” If a “negative” trait (say shyness) is inherited and in your genes, you’re stuck with it. Instead, says Davidson, “plasticity is intrinsic to the brain,” and its “ability to change its structure and function in significant ways” extends into adulthood and “through the life of the individual.”
The second idea is that such “change can come about in response to experiences we have as well as to the thoughts we think.” Traits that are genetically based can be altered because “the mere presence of a gene is not sufficient for the trait for which it codes to be expressed. A gene must also be turned on, and studies . . . have shown that life experiences can turn genes on or off.” Thus, “In terms of the shopworn debate called nature vs. nurture, nurture is able to act on nature.” Our brain can be altered by these “experiences as well as by conscious, intentional effort . . . through the intentional cultivation of specific mental qualities or habits.”
And, thirdly, the reason such change is possible is that head and heart are more closely linked in the brain than previously thought: “the barricade that psychology had erected between reason and emotion has no basis in fact.” Emotion involves neural activity in the right and in the left side of the brain, in the amygdala and in the prefrontal cortex. “The circuitry of the emotional brain often overlaps with that of the rational, thinking brain,” so that “Emotion works with cognition in an integrated and seamless way to enable us to navigate the world of relationships, work, and spiritual growth.”
These ideas have broad implications. They suggest that we are not irremediably shaped by our genes, upbringing, environment, or of this or that neural circuitry in our limbic system. We are not at the mercy of our emotions. We can change because our brain can change.
The question of course is how. Davidson answers this question in the terms of traditional psychology by focusing on personality and temperament, offering a new classification of these traits which he calls “Emotional Style.” His claim is that “Understanding the neural underpinnings of the six dimensions of Emotional Style can empower you to recognize your own” overall style and apply various techniques he recommends to change it in the direction you desire.
Briefly stated, the six dimensions are: Resilience (how fast you recover from adversity); Outlook (optimist vs. pessimist); Social Intuition (how adept you are at picking up social signals); Self-Awareness (how well you are in touch with your feelings); Sensitivity to Context (how well you adapt your emotional responses to a given context); and Attention (how well you can focus).
To get an idea of the problems that arise with Davidson’s model, let us consider an example he gives of a situation involving two of these categories: “You might be irritable for a whole day after a morning argument with a coworker but not realize that your funk is the result of being Slow to Recover (This ability to introspect and understand our own emotions is an aspect of the Self-Awareness dimension).”
Now, suppose I answer the book’s questionnaires for these categories, identify their neural correlates in the brain, conclude my styles are “Slow to Recover” and “Self-Opaque,” and follow Davidson’s techniques in the back of the book so that, assuming they work, I’m able to recover faster after my morning argument with my coworker.
Does that improve my relationship with my coworker? Not necessarily. In fact, it could even worsen it, for the more successfully I reduce their negative impact on me and the faster I recover from these arguments the easier it is to continue having them. They just won’t bother me that much anymore. But they may bother my co-worker, other colleagues, and my boss. My “resilience” could actually end up making a lot of people unhappy, affect my work, and even cost me my job.
This is because traits of personality and temperament do not necessarily correlate with the rightness or wrongness of what I’m doing. They are not moral categories. A high degree of optimism can lead me to take unreasonable risks in business or the stock market and leave me in financial ruin. High social intuition, self-awareness, and sensitivity to context can all help me manage myself better the better to lie and manipulate people. Being highly focused can help me succeed in my career even as it leads me to neglect my family and fail as a spouse and as a parent.
In the situation cited by Davidson, I need to look at more than my “emotional style.” I need to look at what I might be doing wrong, at the moral dimensions of the situation. This means looking at my character, understood as a moral category. Traits of character determine whether a trait of personality or temperament serves a morally worthy or unworthy end, whether it works for good or for ill. But Davidson’s model, which is based on personality and temperament to the exclusion of character, makes no provision for such considerations.
A more effective model for personal growth is found in the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, whose principles, it should be noted, can be practiced by anyone. One of these principles is the discipline of self-examination, where I make an inventory of my character defects and associated emotions, taking into account the positive character traits and associated emotions which can displace and replace them. Considered principles of the good life, these positive character traits are traditionally known as virtues, among which, honesty, for instance, is essential to the process of self-examination.
Honestly looking at myself in the above situation, I might find that my “funk” is the result of my nursing a resentment against my coworker. I may be “irritable” because I’m still angry over something she said or did that affected something that is important to me (e.g. my self-esteem), and I’ve been obsessing about it all day. Upon further examination, I may discover that I said or did something which started or contributed to the argument, and that behind my words and actions there were certain character defects at work, perhaps impatience, or unkindness, or intolerance. My adversity, as is often the case with many of us, may have been self-inflicted.
Having made such an examination, I move to take corrective action by practicing other applicable principles. Where I am in the wrong, I promptly and humbly admit it, and I sincerely make amends. Where my coworker is in the wrong, I forgive, turn the matter over, and let go of any ill feelings.
By practicing these principles, I can surrender my resentment and obsession, reconcile with my coworker, and restore peace and harmony to our relationship. Not only do I recover from negative emotions myself, but I can help my coworker to do the same. My recovery goal is not self-centered. I’m not selfishly concerned only about my own well-being.
Depending on the situation, I will find other principles that can help me to recover from adversity: after a loss, for instance, acceptance of the things I cannot change, and gratitude for the things I still do have. By practicing these principles day in and day out and in situation after situation, I am engaging in the kind of conscious, intentional, and repeated effort which Davidson says can help me to acquire the habits which can alter my brain and reshape my thoughts and emotions. I will become better at recovering from adversity, but my recovery will reflect fundamental character and emotional changes, not just an improved personality trait (more resilient).
That personality and temperament are malleable, that emotion and cognition work in an integrated manner, and that experience and thought can reshape the brain are important ideas in Davidson’s book. When it comes to translating these ideas into practice, however, the 12 Steps remain the best program of action.
September 13, 2023
I enjoyed this books but I must confess I found it to be a bit of a bait and switch. The introduction promises a revision of personality types with a more neurological backed "emotional styles" but first you have to get through a sizable chunk of the author's early professional life - not the worst story to be honest and I enjoyed reading their journey, just a little 'not what was advertised'
A similar issue happens when the author switches to the benefits of meditation, again a very interesting/actually part of the highlight of the book for me, hearing about the author's strange attempts to access expert monks to study meditation.
The last few sections felt a little brushed over which is a shame because that section was actually about improving one's situation not just classifying different styles.
Overall I wouldn't rate this an absolute must read, but if you like neurology and meditation then it is for you!
A similar issue happens when the author switches to the benefits of meditation, again a very interesting/actually part of the highlight of the book for me, hearing about the author's strange attempts to access expert monks to study meditation.
The last few sections felt a little brushed over which is a shame because that section was actually about improving one's situation not just classifying different styles.
Overall I wouldn't rate this an absolute must read, but if you like neurology and meditation then it is for you!
June 3, 2015
MY God this book was so amazingly interesting! It provided such insight into the way the mind works and how the patterns in our brain help shape us into the people we are. This took me quite a while to read because it is a heavy book; it requires a lot of focus (at least for me it did) and I found I had to really sit and think about what I was reading. It was like a step down from reading a textbook. There were plenty of facts and spatterings of humour.
It was good for me to read as I am studying nursing so a knowledge of the brain is helpful.I really enjoyed it and whilst I think it was interesting and intriguing, I am in no rush to recommend it to people as it takes so SO much effort to read.
It was good for me to read as I am studying nursing so a knowledge of the brain is helpful.I really enjoyed it and whilst I think it was interesting and intriguing, I am in no rush to recommend it to people as it takes so SO much effort to read.
September 12, 2022
Welchen emotionalen Stil hast du? Dieser Frage geht dieses Buch nach.
Denn jede Emotion bewirkt, dass unser Körper unterschiedlich reagiert und unsere Erfahrungen festigen neuronale Netzwerke und "Teufelskreise", die man dann auch nur überkommen kann, wenn man sich mit diesem Thema auseinandersetzt und sich selbst beobachtet. Dabei hilft dieses Buch, da es den ein oder anderen "Test" hat, um zu schauen in welche Richtung man tendiert.
Ein gutes Buch, um in das emotionale Leben des Gehirns einzusteigen.
Denn jede Emotion bewirkt, dass unser Körper unterschiedlich reagiert und unsere Erfahrungen festigen neuronale Netzwerke und "Teufelskreise", die man dann auch nur überkommen kann, wenn man sich mit diesem Thema auseinandersetzt und sich selbst beobachtet. Dabei hilft dieses Buch, da es den ein oder anderen "Test" hat, um zu schauen in welche Richtung man tendiert.
Ein gutes Buch, um in das emotionale Leben des Gehirns einzusteigen.
April 8, 2013
I will say from the outset that this book was better than I thought it was going to be. That said, I didn’t have very high hopes to start. OK, that’s a bit unfair. "The Emotional Life of Your Brain" (TELoYB) is a decent read and does introduce some useful ideas I had not heard before. But, at the end of the day I didn’t feel all that smarter for reading it. TELoYB is one part professional autobiography, two parts popular psychology and one part self-help.
The professional autobiography parts follow coauthor Richard Davidson from his undergraduate days at NYU to his faculty position at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In many ways, the biographical stories are the book’s best moments, especially if you’ve spent any time in academia. There is something universal about the anxieties felt by young graduate students and new professors regardless of subject area.
The popular psychology comes from the exploration of the six emotional styles of resilience, outlook, social intuition, context, self-awareness and attention. The self-help bits come from the self tests you can take to assess yourself on these six emotional styles. Frankly, I found these self tests to be the least convincing bits of the book. It seems impossible to get a valid psychology result if you know that you’re being evaluated, especially when you the do the evaluating on yourself. Nonetheless, they are interesting categories and worth thinking about.
The overall conclusion to take away from the book is one that I’ve heard elsewhere (and more convincingly..."See The Brain That Changes" Itself) – the brain can change itself. In the case of emotional styles, the path to plasticity favored by Davidson leads him to various meditation techniques that are certainly worth exploring for the interested reader.
The professional autobiography parts follow coauthor Richard Davidson from his undergraduate days at NYU to his faculty position at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In many ways, the biographical stories are the book’s best moments, especially if you’ve spent any time in academia. There is something universal about the anxieties felt by young graduate students and new professors regardless of subject area.
The popular psychology comes from the exploration of the six emotional styles of resilience, outlook, social intuition, context, self-awareness and attention. The self-help bits come from the self tests you can take to assess yourself on these six emotional styles. Frankly, I found these self tests to be the least convincing bits of the book. It seems impossible to get a valid psychology result if you know that you’re being evaluated, especially when you the do the evaluating on yourself. Nonetheless, they are interesting categories and worth thinking about.
The overall conclusion to take away from the book is one that I’ve heard elsewhere (and more convincingly..."See The Brain That Changes" Itself) – the brain can change itself. In the case of emotional styles, the path to plasticity favored by Davidson leads him to various meditation techniques that are certainly worth exploring for the interested reader.
July 21, 2013
Valuable read, if not a bit long winded in places. I appreciated the expansion on the emotional styles that make us unique and how the brain processes and interprets emotion. Much of the text is dedicated to the research and history of studying emotion and the brain, and also expounding upon the authors' experiences in researching this multidimensional topic. But I'll admit there were times the narrative lost my attention because it was so bogged down in the actual portrayal of these experiences and information. That's one of the reasons why it took me so long to pick this up, through a series of starts and stops. I thought it was very interesting and valuable, but even as an academically oriented text, I don't think there was a cohesiveness to the topic highlighted in each chapter versus what was portrayed. The questionaires on emotional patterns/dimension and diagrams highlighting the different parts of the brain were valuable, though, and I think people who want an introduction to how the brain functions with respect to emotions and its reactions will like this as a scientific read. For a self-help read, however, it's a bit weighted.
Overall score: 3/5
Note: I received this as an ARC from NetGalley, from the publisher Penguin Group (USA).
Overall score: 3/5
Note: I received this as an ARC from NetGalley, from the publisher Penguin Group (USA).
April 8, 2013
A unique look at the brain through the work of neuro-psycholgical researcher Richard Davidson, linking our emotions to significant circuits and activities in our brain. For those interested in the intricacies of the brain chemistry and circuitry this is the book for you. Davidson is a very good writer and explains complex scientific phenomena in laypersons' terms. Sometimes the detail has gotten a bit overwhelming to me and I skipped over that to the "so what does this mean" section. It has been a good complement to my understanding of emotional intelligence, whose primary writer Daniel Goleman was one who encouraged Davidson early in his career when his ideas were not seen as plausible. The book also reveals how far neuroscience and psychology have come in the last 20 years.
While I enjoyed the book, there was too much detail for me. If someone is really interested in how experiments about the brain are being conducted and how they are coming up with their conclusions, this is a great book. After a while it was just too much and so I skimmed over most of the chapters to get to the conclusions.
While I enjoyed the book, there was too much detail for me. If someone is really interested in how experiments about the brain are being conducted and how they are coming up with their conclusions, this is a great book. After a while it was just too much and so I skimmed over most of the chapters to get to the conclusions.
April 18, 2014
This took me so long to read (considering it was only 252 pages) that it affected my opinion of the book as a whole. Though the subject was genuinely interesting, by the time I got to page 200, I wanted to be done with it so much that I started skimming. I was a psychology major, so I really enjoyed reading about Dr. Davidson's various research studies, as well as his amazing and illustrious career. For people who aren't very interested in psychology, though? I would think they'd have a difficult time with this book. Part of the problem is that the title touts "how you can change" your brain patterns. That is not talked about until the last half of the last chapter. There is also some repetition among the chapters (in regards to research studies, stories, etc) that make you feel crazy, like "Haven't I heard this before?" Anyway, though this was very interesting for the first half or so, I had trouble sticking with it to the end.
October 5, 2019
323 sayfa. Az önce bitirdim. Uzun zamandır beyinle ilgili okuduğum en iyi kitaplardan. Duygusal stilleri 6 ya ayırmış.
Dirençlilik, olumsuzluklar karşısında hızlı mı yoksa yavaş mı iyileşme gösterdiğinizi ortaya koyuyor.
Bakış açısı, olumlu duygularınızı ne kadar süre koruyabildiğinizi ifade eder.
Sosyal sezgi, Çevrenizdeki insanların verdiği sosyal işaretleri algılamadaki yetinizi belirtir.
Öz farlındalık, duyguları yansıtan bedensel duyumları algılamada ne kadar iyi olduğunuzu gösterir.
Durumsal hassasiyet, içinde bulunduğunuz durum göz önünde bulundurulduğunda duygusal tepkilerinizi yönetmede ne kadar başarılı olduğunuzun ölçütüdür.
Dikkat, odak noktanızın ne kadar keskin ve net olduğuyla ilgidir.
Farkındalık meditasyonu ile beynimizi değiştirebileceğimizi de söylüyor. O da ilginç. Tavsiye ederim
Dirençlilik, olumsuzluklar karşısında hızlı mı yoksa yavaş mı iyileşme gösterdiğinizi ortaya koyuyor.
Bakış açısı, olumlu duygularınızı ne kadar süre koruyabildiğinizi ifade eder.
Sosyal sezgi, Çevrenizdeki insanların verdiği sosyal işaretleri algılamadaki yetinizi belirtir.
Öz farlındalık, duyguları yansıtan bedensel duyumları algılamada ne kadar iyi olduğunuzu gösterir.
Durumsal hassasiyet, içinde bulunduğunuz durum göz önünde bulundurulduğunda duygusal tepkilerinizi yönetmede ne kadar başarılı olduğunuzun ölçütüdür.
Dikkat, odak noktanızın ne kadar keskin ve net olduğuyla ilgidir.
Farkındalık meditasyonu ile beynimizi değiştirebileceğimizi de söylüyor. O da ilginç. Tavsiye ederim
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 31, 2022
Das Buch hat so ziemlich das, was ich im Psychologie Bachelor bereits gelernt habe, zusammengefasst.
Teilweise war es sehr spannend zu lernen, welche Gehirnstrukturen wie verändert werden können. Andererseits war der Schreibstil manchmal sehr aufreißerisch (so als würde der Wissenschaftler die sensationellsten Dinge herausfinden). Es wurde Spannung aufgebaut für den letzten Teil mit Übungen, um den eigenen emotionalen Stil zu verändern. Letztendlich war aber fast jede Übung, die empfohlen wurde, die (Achtsamkeits)-Meditation.
Wer sich also das Lesen sparen will, dem kann ich zusammenfassend sagen, dass durch Achtsamkeitsmeditation viele Hirnstrukturen in positiver Weise verändert werden können.
Es ist eigentlich verrückt, wie viel Einfluss der achtsame Umgang mit Gedanken und Gefühlen die Physiologie des Gehirns und damit wieder die eigenen Gefühle verändern kann.
Teilweise war es sehr spannend zu lernen, welche Gehirnstrukturen wie verändert werden können. Andererseits war der Schreibstil manchmal sehr aufreißerisch (so als würde der Wissenschaftler die sensationellsten Dinge herausfinden). Es wurde Spannung aufgebaut für den letzten Teil mit Übungen, um den eigenen emotionalen Stil zu verändern. Letztendlich war aber fast jede Übung, die empfohlen wurde, die (Achtsamkeits)-Meditation.
Wer sich also das Lesen sparen will, dem kann ich zusammenfassend sagen, dass durch Achtsamkeitsmeditation viele Hirnstrukturen in positiver Weise verändert werden können.
Es ist eigentlich verrückt, wie viel Einfluss der achtsame Umgang mit Gedanken und Gefühlen die Physiologie des Gehirns und damit wieder die eigenen Gefühle verändern kann.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 18, 2020
You can't go wrong with neuroscience, especially since you've been practicing it for many, many years. This book is both a friendly reminder about how patterns can shape behaviors (good and bad) and how we digest emotions to improve our lives.
"I would go so far as to assert that of all the forms of human behavior and psychological states, the most powerful influence on our physical health is our emotional life."
Without learning the language of emotions and expressing it, we live empty lives, my friends.
"I would go so far as to assert that of all the forms of human behavior and psychological states, the most powerful influence on our physical health is our emotional life."
Without learning the language of emotions and expressing it, we live empty lives, my friends.
July 30, 2021
Pentru mine ,a fost nevoie să-mi doresc cunoașterea creierului și a inteligenței emoționale pentru a putea incepe si termina aceasta carte.
Foarte interesantă și captivantă,însă nu potrivită celor ce nu le plac cărțile cu multe informatii despre biologie și neuroștiință.
La început nu mi-a plăcut deloc deorece nu citisem acest gen de carți,ducându-mă chiar într-un reading slump.Însă,într-un final am avut voința să o termin și sunt fericit că am reușit.
O recomand !
Foarte interesantă și captivantă,însă nu potrivită celor ce nu le plac cărțile cu multe informatii despre biologie și neuroștiință.
La început nu mi-a plăcut deloc deorece nu citisem acest gen de carți,ducându-mă chiar într-un reading slump.Însă,într-un final am avut voința să o termin și sunt fericit că am reușit.
O recomand !
October 12, 2023
Amazing to learn about methods in neurological and psychological research. The author was in an "I discovered emotional neuroscience before anyone else did, and no one appreciated my efforts back then," attitude, which was quite annoying at times. Wish it hadn't turned into a self-help/meditation book for the last 50 pages.
May 3, 2019
I have learned a lot about the brain, especially the impact of emotions on the brain. It's interesting to know the scientific analysis of meditation and its effect on the brain. The six emotional styles are helpful to know my usual emotional response to the good and the bad.
November 11, 2019
Useful, practical, easy to read
The book explains in a popular accessible way the most important dimensions of our personality. It offers precious advice on how to train and increase the traits we need or desire.
The book explains in a popular accessible way the most important dimensions of our personality. It offers precious advice on how to train and increase the traits we need or desire.
June 26, 2021
Bien que l’auteur ait une expertise incomparable dans le domaine et qu’il soit définitivement apte à parler de ce sujet, je me suis lassée rapidement de l’écriture au « je, me, moi ». J’avais parfois l’impression de lire une biographie narcissique d’un chercheur qui avait besoin d’une petite tappe dans le dos de reconnaissance, plus que d’un livre de théorie psychologique pertinente.
En dehors de cela, le livre est intéressant, sans plus. J’aurais aimé savoir vraiment comment gérer les différents types émotionnels autour de nous (pas seulement les reconnaître ou en comprendre les principaux patrons).
En dehors de cela, le livre est intéressant, sans plus. J’aurais aimé savoir vraiment comment gérer les différents types émotionnels autour de nous (pas seulement les reconnaître ou en comprendre les principaux patrons).
December 13, 2024
bu kitaba ne kadar ihtiyacım vardı size anlatamam kitap duygularımızın beynimizde nasıl şekillendiğini ve bunu nasıl değiştirebileceğimizi bilimsel bir temele oturtarak açıklamış.
Kitabı okurken hoşuma giden ve aklıma yatan şey duygusal durumlarımızın kader olmadığını aksine üzerinde çalışarak geliştirebileceğimiz bir alan olduğunun farkına varmaktı
Kendimi ve çevremdeki çoğu insanı daha iyi anlamama yardım etti diyebilirim BEĞENDİM👍
Kitabı okurken hoşuma giden ve aklıma yatan şey duygusal durumlarımızın kader olmadığını aksine üzerinde çalışarak geliştirebileceğimiz bir alan olduğunun farkına varmaktı
Kendimi ve çevremdeki çoğu insanı daha iyi anlamama yardım etti diyebilirim BEĞENDİM👍
March 31, 2018
unique & persuasive insights into the correlates of emotion in the brain. wish he commented on neurofeedback's effect (if at all) on changing these patterns.
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