Executive Functions in Health and Disease: New book to help integrate Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuropsychology

__________ Neuroscience used to be the monopoly of a few elite universities located in a handful of countries. Neuropsychology used to be a quaint niche discipline relatively unconnected to the larger world of neuroscience and content in its methods with paper-and-pencil tests. Neuroscience itself was relatively unconcerned with higher-order cognition, and the very term “cognitive neuroscience” was often met with rolled eyes by scientists working in more established areas of brain research (a personal observation made in the 1980s and even 1990s on more than one occasion). And the interest in executive functions was shared by a very small club of neuropsychologists and neuroscientists, a fact often noted in their times by the pioneers of “frontal-lobe” research Alexander Luria and a generation later Patricia Goldman-Rakic. None of this is true today. Important neuroscience research is conducted at numerous academic and biomedical centers worldwide. We are witnessing a substantial fusion, or at least blending, of cognitive neuroscience and neuropsychology. The terms “executive functions” and “frontal-lobe functions” are no longer used interchangeably, and a more refined understanding of both has emerged. Executive functions in health and disease have become the target of intense investigation by scores of researchers, arguably one of the most heavily populated territories of cognitive and cli...
Source: SharpBrains - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Tags: Cognitive Neuroscience Health & Wellness Professional Development Alexander-Luria clinical psychologists cognition cognitive-psychologists disease Executive-Functions frontal-lobe medical neurologists neuropsychologists Neuropsyc Source Type: blogs