Internet Psychology The Basics - Y Amichai-Hamburger

1. Internet Psychology (The Basics) by Yair Amichai-Hamburger

Overview: We can’t imagine our lives without the Internet. It is the tool of our existence; without it we couldn’t work, plan our social and leisure activities, and interact with friends. The Internet’s influence on contemporary society extends across every aspect of our personal and professional lives, but how has this altered us in psychological terms? How are we to understand how the Internet can promote enormous amounts of caring and kindness to strangers and yet be the source of unremitting acts of terror?

This book, grounded in the latest cutting-edge research, enhances our understanding of how we, and our children, behave online. It explores questions such as:

Why does our self-control abandon us sometimes on the Internet?
Why does the Internet create a separate realm of social and personal relationships?
How does all that change us as people?
Are youngsters really as exposed and threatened on the web as people think?
Internet Psychology: The Basics is a vital and fascinating guide to the online world, drawing on classic theories of human behaviour to shed fresh light on this central facet of modern life. It argues that, even in an age of constant technological advancement, our understanding of the human psyche remains rooted in these well-established theories. Embracing both positive and negative aspects of Internet use, this easy introduction to the subject will appeal to students and general readers alike.

2. The Bilingual Edge: Why, When, and How to Teach Your Child a Second Language by Kendall King, Alison Mackey

Overview: It’s no secret that parents want their children to have the lifelong cultural and intellectual advantages that come from being bilingual. Parents spend millions of dollars every year on classes, computer programs, and toys, all of which promise to help children learn a second language. But many of their best efforts (and investments) end in disappointment.

3. WHOLE: What Teachers Need to Help Students Thrive by Rex Miller, Bill Latham, Kevin Baird, Michelle Kinder

Overview: A shocking statistic in education reveals that 70% of K-12 teachers work under chronic stress. This revolutionary new book explains how removing stress from the classroom holds the key to improving education. The book also explains what administrators, teachers, parents, and communities can do to help accomplish a stress-free classroom.

For years, the expert voices said “disengagement” was the crucial issue behind poor educational environments and results. Naturally, only massive reform could fix it. But what if the enormous restructuring and expenditures attacked the wrong problem?

MindShift, an organization that reframes tired and clogged conversations, pushed the old conclusions off the table and started fresh. They gathered diverse leaders in education, leadership, neuroscience, architecture, and wellness in working forums around the nation. These pivotal meetings produced WHOLE, a game-changing approach to education. This book captures the story and details of how the system can be remade for real and lasting benefits to everyone.

With the authors’ expertise, the book exposes the exhausted and antiquated thinking that led to the present crisis. But, WHOLE also proposes a new era of disruptive change that can produce happier, healthier, and more successful education for the 21st century.

4. Hunger, Thirst, Sex, and Sleep: How the Brain Controls Our Passions by John K. Young

Overview: Sensations of hunger, thirst, sexual attraction, and love can dominate our thoughts to the exclusion of almost everything else, but until the last 10 years or so, the precise reasons why these passions arise have not been understood very well. We now know that these, and other drives like the urge to sleep, are controlled by a small portion of the brain called the hypothalamus. This book presents the latest information about how the brain controls our most basic drives.
Genre: Non-Fiction > Educational

In a series of fascinating anecdotes, Young tells the tale of how scientists have discovered the role of the hypothalamus in our basic drives and in medical conditions in which these drives are drastically altered. Covering our need for food, water, sex, sleep, and other life essentials, he reveals the brain’s part in how we provide for each, and how in some cases, those needs can swing wildly out of control resulting in problems such as obesity, diabetes, insomnia, or narcolepsy. He shows how regulating body temperature can affect the lifespan, how the aging process affects sexual behavior, how empathy and love develop in relationships with family members or with love interests, and how all these functions and more can go awry.
Like other science writers before him, Young illuminates even the complex inner workings of the brain in a way that anyone can understand, so that readers are treated to a tour of a tiny part of the brain that is responsible for so many fundamental aspects of life.

5. Remember It!: The Names of People You Meet, All of Your Passwords, Where You Left Your Keys, and Everything Else You Tend to Forget by Nelson Dellis, Sanjay Gupta

Overview: Throughout his research into memory theory, Nelson Dellis found existing memory improvement guides to be wanting—overcomplicated, dry, and stodgy. So he decided to write a book that is approachable and fun, centered on what people actually need to remember. In Remember It!, Dellis teaches us how to make the most of our memory, using his competition-winning techniques.