Reading is a unique human ability that has become very pivotal for functioning in our world today. As modern societies rely extensively on literacy skills, and as reading disabilities have profound personal, economic and social consequences, it is surprising that we have a very underdeveloped scientific understanding of the neural basis of reading and visual word recognition in the normal brain. This book fills this gap in the literature by addressing some of the fundamental questions in reading research.

Reading is a unique human ability that has become very pivotal for functioning in our world today. As modern societies rely extensively on literacy skills, and as reading disabilities have profound personal, economic and social consequences, it is surprising that we have a very underdeveloped scientific understanding of the neural basis of reading and visual word recognition in the normal brain. A better understanding of normal reading processes could help individuals with developmental dyslexia and other reading disabilities, and also inform our strategies for improving early learning and carrying out effective interventions. Neuroimaging offers a unique window on reading through which we have achieved profound insights into its neural correlates in both health and disease, and has also raised important questions that have generated much scientific debate.This book addresses some of the fundamental questions in reading research. Piers Cornelissen, Peter Hansen, Morten Kringelbach, and Ken Pugh have brought together some of the leading scientists to provide comprehensive articles that shed light on the neural basis of reading. Its broad-yet-integrative treatment is divided into three parts: 1) behavioural data and modelling (with direct implications for neuroimaging), 2) neuroimaging, and 3) impaired reading. The book will be a useful resource for everyone interested in the reading brain, particularly those in neuroimaging, cognition and attention, sensation and perception, language, development and aging, education, and computational modelling.

Reading is a unique human ability that has become very pivotal for functioning in our world today. As modern societies rely extensively on literacy skills, and as reading disabilities have profound personal, economic and social consequences, it is surprising that we have a very underdeveloped scientific understanding of the neural basis of reading and visual word recognition in the normal brain. A better understanding of normal reading processes could help individuals with developmental dyslexia and other reading disabilities, and also inform our strategies for improving early learning and carrying out effective interventions. Neuroimaging offers a unique window on reading through which we have achieved profound insights into its neural correlates in both health and disease, and has also raised important questions that have generated much scientific debate.This book addresses some of the fundamental questions in reading research. Piers Cornelissen, Peter Hansen, Morten Kringelbach, and Ken Pugh have brought together some of the leading scientists to provide comprehensive articles that shed light on the neural basis of reading. Its broad-yet-integrative treatment is divided into three parts: 1) behavioural data and modelling (with direct implications for neuroimaging), 2) neuroimaging, and 3) impaired reading. The book will be a useful resource for everyone interested in the reading brain, particularly those in neuroimaging, cognition and attention, sensation and perception, language, development and aging, education, and computational modelling.

The issues of mental causation, consciousness, and free will have vexed philosophers since Plato. This book examines these unresolved issues from a neuroscientific perspective. In contrast with philosophers who use logic rather than data to argue whether mental causation or consciousness can exist given unproven first assumptions, Tse proposes that we instead listen to what neurons have to say. Because the brain must already embody a solution to the mind--body problem, why not focus on how the brain actually realizes mental causation? Tse draws on exciting recent neuroscientific data concerning how informational causation is realized in physical causation at the level of NMDA receptors, synapses, dendrites, neurons, and neuronal circuits. He argues that a particular kind of strong free will and downward mental causation are realized in rapid synaptic plasticity. Recent neurophysiological breakthroughs reveal that neurons function as criterial assessors of their inputs, which then change the criteria that will make other neurons fire in the future. Such informational causation cannot change the physical basis of information realized in the present, but it can change the physical basis of information that may be realized in the immediate future. This gets around the standard argument against free will centered on the impossibility of self-causation. Tse explores the ways that mental causation and qualia might be realized in this kind of neuronal and associated information-processing architecture, and considers the psychological and philosophical implications of having such an architecture realized in our brains.

Humans have a unique ability to understand the beliefs, emotions, and intentions of others—a capacity often referred to as mentalizing. Much research in psychology and neuroscience has focused on delineating the mechanisms of mentalizing, and examining the role of mentalizing processes in other domains of cognitive and affective functioning. The purpose of the book is to provide a comprehensive overview of the current research on the mechanisms of mentalizing at the neural, algorithmic, and computational levels of analysis. The book includes contributions from prominent researchers in the field of social-cognitive and affective neuroscience, as well as from related disciplines (e.g., cognitive, social, developmental and clinical psychology, psychiatry, philosophy, primatology). The contributors review their latest research in order to compile an authoritative source of knowledge on the psychological and brain bases of the unique human capacity to think about the mental states of others. The intended audience is researchers and students in the fields of social-cognitive and affective neuroscience and related disciplines such as neuroeconomics, cognitive neuroscience, developmental neuroscience, social cognition, social psychology, developmental psychology, cognitive psychology, and affective science. Secondary audiences include researchers in decision science (economics, judgment and decision-making), philosophy of mind, and psychiatry.

The Science of Reading: A Handbook brings together state-of-the-art reviews of reading research from leading names in the field, to create a highly authoritative, multidisciplinary overview of contemporary knowledge about reading and related skills. Provides comprehensive coverage of the subject, including theoretical approaches, reading processes, stage models of reading, cross-linguistic studies of reading, reading difficulties, the biology of reading, and reading instruction Divided into seven sections:Word Recognition Processes in Reading; Learning to Read and Spell; Reading Comprehension; Reading in Different Languages; Disorders of Reading and Spelling; Biological Bases of Reading; Teaching Reading Edited by well-respected senior figures in the field

An examination of how we use the term 'dyslexia' and how this may undermine aid for struggling readers.