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8 - Tackling Hard Problems: Neuroscience, Treatment, and Anxiety

from Section 3

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2020

By
Daniel S. Pine
Edited by
Kenneth S. Kendler ,
Josef Parnas  and
Peter Zachar
Kenneth S. Kendler
Affiliation:
Virginia Commonwealth University
Josef Parnas
Affiliation:
University of Copenhagen
Peter Zachar
Affiliation:
Auburn University, Montgomery
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Summary

This chapter reviews efforts to use neuroscience to inform clinical practice for mental disorders, discussing anxiety disorders as an exemplary foundation for work on other mental illnesses. The chapter unfolds in four stages. The first portion provides an overview, focusing on three levels of inquiry: clinical state; psychological testing; and brain function, as revealed by functional magnetic resonance imaging. Next, the chapter describes research across these three levels for one narrow area of neuroscience, related to the orienting of attention, where progress in clinically relevant domains has been steady. The third section also focuses on the three levels to summarize work on appraisal, a process closely connected to consciousness, where research has yet to profoundly impact clinical thinking.Finally, the chapter concludes by summarizing problems confronting future attempts to establish a clinical neuroscience approach to mental disorders, problems which are difficult to solve due to unique aspects of human thought.

Keywords

AnxietyNeuroscienceDevelopmenttranslationalAmygdalaAttention biasappraisal
Type
Chapter
Information
Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives
 , pp. 91 - 113
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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