The Emotional Brain: The Mysterious Underpinnings of Emotional Life (Paperback)

by Joseph Ledoux (Author) "MY FATHER WAS A butcher..." (more)
Key Phrases: limbic system theory, conditioned fear stimulus, explicit conscious memory, William James, New York, Scientific American (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Joseph LeDoux, a professor at the Center for Neural Science at New York University, has written the most comprehensive examination to date of how systems in the brain work in response to emotions, particularly fear. Among his fascinating findings is the work of amygdala structure within the brain. The amygdala mediates fear and other responses and actually processes information more quickly than other parts of the brain, allowing a rapid response that can save our lives before other parts of the brain have had a chance to react. He also offers findings and theories on how the brain handles--and in many cases, buries--extremely traumatic experiences. In all, a compelling read about the mysteries of emotions and the workings of the brain. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly
Brain researcher LeDoux believes that emotions evolved from bodily and behavioral responses controlled by the brain as a means to help our remote ancestors survive a hostile environment. The emotional states we subjectively experience, in this theory, are the end result of information processing that occurs unconsciously as the brain decodes the significance of stimuli in order to shape appropriate behavior. In this intriguing report, LeDoux, a professor at New York University, draws heavily on his own research into the brain's "fear system," which suggests that unconscious fear-related memories imprinted on the brain can result in deep-rooted neurotic anxiety, phobias, panic attacks or obsessive-compulsive disorders. He also reviews studies indicating that multiple memory systems exist in the brain, including one for "emotional memories," which helps to explain the course of Alzheimer's disease as well as adults' inability to remember early childhood experiences. Research cited here suggests that behavior therapy may actually rewire the brain's pathways. LeDoux's lively, heavily annotated text is amplified by numerous photos and drawings. Newbridge Library of Science main selection.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (March 27, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0684836599
• ISBN-13: 978-0684836591
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (36 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #39,725 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

62 of 62 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Laypersons will like it; Psychologists will NEED it..., March 17, 1998

By A Customer

For the layperson, LeDoux's book is an excellent account of the scientific search for understanding what emotions are and what they do. Comparing it to the several trendy books about measuring emotional intelligence isn't quite fair--this is not a self-help book that stresses the importance of good social skills (which to me, seems what emotional quotient boils down to). Instead, this book nicely weaves the best of psychological, biological, and cutting-edge neuroscientific research to give the reader a good picture of what scientists currently know about emotions and how emotions are experienced in the body and the mind. But despite the comprehensive scientific explanations, the book is extremely readable and filled with real-world implications. For a professor of neural science, LeDoux writes creatively (love those subheadings!), and I think this book can do for the study of emotions what Carl Sagan's Cosmos did for astronomy.

For psychologists, particularly psychotherapists, this book should be required reading. Despite dealing with people's emotions everyday, few therapists can give more than a basic explanation of what exactly an emotion is, and how it influences human functioning. This is partly because most textbook discussions of emotions are either too basic or too difficult, are just plain boring, or don't make the implications for therapists clear. LeDoux's book changes all that--I've reviewed several academic books, articles, and texts on understanding emotions, and kept coming back to this one. Do your graduate students (who may be groaning under the pressure of a dry neuroscience text!) a favor and make them all read The Emotional Brain--they'll be just as educated, and a lot more excited as well.

117 of 124 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A long needed book, June 10, 2002

By	magellan (Santa Clara, CA) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)

This book is a long-needed look at how those parts of the brain that mediate emotion, primarily the limbic system and the medial and lateral frontal cortex, affect our behavior, thinking, and our lives. This is a well-written and thoughful account for the intelligent layman about this important topic.

There are excellent discussions of the different limbic system structures as well as the frontal lobes. The sections on the amygdala I thought were especially good, and the discussions of how the frontal lobes and the limbic areas interact in various and important ways is equally good.

Unlike other important areas of science, there are few really accessible books on the brain for the non-specialist, but I've noticed the situation has improved significantly in the last 5 to 10 years. If you liked this book and want to round out your knowledge of the human brain, I can also recommend the following books, all of which are similarly well-regarded and well-written:

1. Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain, by Antonio Damasio

2. The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language, by Steven Pinker

3. Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind, by V. S. Ramachandran, Sandra Blakeslee

4. Nature's Mind: The Biological Roots of Thinking, Emotions, Sexuality, Language, and Intelligence, by Michael Gazzaniga

5. How Brains Think: Evolving Intelligences, Then & Now, by William H. Calvin

There are about a half dozen others that I could have added to this list, but I would read these first. In fact, I would start with Gazzaniga's book and then read the others, since his book is more of a general introduction, whereas the others deal more with certain special topics.

If you read these books you'll be in pretty good shape in terms of having at least a basic understanding of current neuroscience. Anyway, good luck and happy reading.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Finally one for Western Science!, May 15, 2002

By	L. Dann "adhdmom" (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is not only intriguing for advancing neuroscience but enormously necessary for a cultural correction. The research findings that attempt to isolate fear do little to substantiate psychotherapy, or a talking cure for treatment of generic mental illness. Le Doux points out among other things, that what we think about our'true' emotions, is generally inaccurate. Indeed, our feelings are generally understood by others better than by ourselves. There is NO verbal process that will release, inhibit or otherwise subordinate underlying fear and/or trauma. The unconscious memories of these are coded in symbols, not linguistically. The retrieval of `buried memories' as a means to catharsis is most often, impossible, as stress hormones prevented the original memory from being formulated. In short, those memories of trauma are not `repressed' they don't exist. The author spends a great deal of time on the small amygdala as somewhat of a central switch operator for setting the fear response mechanism into play as a reflex and also as information into the conscious mind. He enlightens us as to the flexibility of the brain, the alternate systems and the somewhat disturbing concept that painful memories are never forgotten, they are life long. He challenges Psychometrics, i.e. what we know as psych. testing as being glaringly inadequate means to measure brain functioning mainly because of their complete reliance on words. Words are not the language of the greatest power areas of our neural systems.


The first part of the book, is proof positive that LeDoux is an excellent scientist. He is methodical, detailed, and not on the same attention level as the rest of us. However, his research, and the research of others that support his thesis, is riveting. I definitely recommend this book for the revolutionary challenge it presents to the dominant, crude systems of mental health treatment, as well as to any lay persons with an interest in this material.

The history of medicine could be a horror movie, and I have always believed that future generations will place us therapy people in a category with the barbers who did blood letting. Now I know it.
LeDoux is doing fantastic work and can, along with other pioneers and 'teachers' reinform and reinvent approaches and manners of intervening when human suffering overcomes a life.