It's been said that advertising is a form of sorcery. Consider the use of brand logos. Symbols bring reality into being.

Dance therapy has recently been recognized in the treatment of Parkinson’s disease, autism, and posttraumatic stress. And dance—whether you can move and groove with the best or not-- offers more than just good medicine; it unites the heart and soul of humanity on a global level. Enjoy a compelling film, a testament to the power of dance, that was 14 months in the making, spans 42 countries, and includes an international cast of thousands.

In China and Myanmar, the innate impulse to communicate through art, play, and imagination is emerging as children begin the long process of recovery. But what about those who don’t want to remember what happened or discuss the terror they have experienced? Some children are so traumatized they may never learn to be children again.

For decades neuroscientific dogma held that the brain was immutable, unchangeable and static. New research in the field of neuroscience has shown this core belief to be untrue, and revealed that the brain is in fact a dynamic organ that changes almost constantly.  The implications of these findings for neuroscience, cognitive science and applied psychology are staggering.  One of the most fascinating aspects of this revolution in neuroscientific study is that it has been motivated in no small part by a simple Tibetan monk named Tenzin Gyatso -- more commonly known as His Holiness The Dalai Lama.

When last week's number two draft pick, Michael Beasley, played basketball at Kansas State, the school listed his height at 6'10". When he was measured for the NBA draft, they found his height to be a significantly diminutive 6'7". On hearing that he had "shrunk" three inches in his time after college, Beasley responded by saying: "I don't think it's a big deal. Other than it's a little disappointing to me that I found out I'm actually a midget."

Judges are now being educated about neuroscience and law.

Last Friday, 250 lawyers, neuroscientists, academics and students got together on a Friday afternoon in Houston...

New research brings us ever closer to understanding one of the most elusive feelings on earth.

"This is your brain on drugs. Any questions?" For anyone who watched TV in the late 1980s, that phrase should bring back memories of an egg in a frying pan.

Law, as a human institution, is a system for governing human behavior...The brain, as an organ, is the physiological system that governs individual behavior...Thus, at their very core, law and neuroscience are intimately interwoven.

Welcome to the new Psychology Today blog “Neurisprudence”! Neurisprudence is a term we came up with to describe our present area of inquiry—the intersection of neuroscience and law, or ‘jurisprudence.’ At the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, the Initiative on Neuroscience and Law has begun to move forward with research and experiments into this fascinating area, and Psychology Today invited us to share some of our thoughts on this topic.

When I was a kid, I was very good at frustrating my school psychologists. When I was 10, my parents wanted me to try out private school since I didn't seem to be receiving much enjoyment from the public school I was attending. They consulted a school psychologist to determine the best placement. I remember the day quite vividly, the day when I took an IQ test.

Some memories are better off forgotten. Like your ex-boyfriend's phone number or the reason why you dated your ex-boyfriend in the first place. If forgetting can be a blessing, why do we more often think of it as a curse?

After telling people that I am a researcher studying autism, I am often asked the above question. Unfortunately, there is no straight answer for this question. If one goes back in the literature, it is true that for decades (several studies conducted from 1966-late 1990's) the prevalence estimates were on the order of 4-5:10,000 while studies conducted over the past decade have estimated the prevalence on the order of 2-6:1,000 with one study showing as high as 12:1,000. So, why this difference? Is it a real increase in the prevalence of the disorder or something else?

In her recent post The Art of Neurodiversity, fellow PT blogger Cathy Malchiodi discusses the work of Stephen Wiltshire, an artist with autism known for his remarkable talent for duplicating scenes with photographic accuracy.

Ms. Malchiodi asks the very real question - should any type of diagnosis, psychological or neurological, come into play when looking at art, or is art just art?

Suppose you learned that someone had committed a horrible rape. And now suppose you find out that he is suffering from a neurological condition. Would you still hold him responsible for what he had done?

Artist with autism Stephen Wiltshire has an uncanny gift for capturing any scene on paper with photographic accuracy. But is it the result of a mental aberration, the mind of a savant, or the work of an outsider artist? Or perhaps it’s neurodiversity.

Presuppositions. We all know what they are -- but what part do they play in our interactions?

Any member of a minority group will tell you stories in which they felt that they have been unfairly stereotyped - in which the other person made a presupposition about their character dependent on certain criteria - be it age, gender, race, or some other factor.

These are obvious cases of presuppositions impacting our social interaction. But are there situations in which presuppositions more subtly impact interactions?

There's one magic trick we are fooled by consistently, every day. It's so convincing that most people don't even believe it's a trick, and even those who do are STILL fooled by it. What is it?

Pachyderms from Milwaukee to Thailand are painting. But is it for pure pleasure or just for the money? And what does it have to do with health and well being in humans?