Trouble in Mind

A neuropsychologist muses on brains, books and being happy

by Jenni Ogden, Ph.D.

Whose Face Is That?

Two percent of the healthy population suffer from some degree of prosopagnosia, or face blindness. Prosopagnosia can also result from brain damage, and these rare cases have given us unique insights into how we store our autobiographical memories. Read More

The Unseen Injury: Post-Concussional Syndrome.

You don’t have to be knocked out cold to get a concussion. If you get a knock on the head, and you still feel tired and grumpy two weeks afterwards, see your doctor! The post-concussional syndrome can be successfully treated with simple behavioral strategies, but the longer you leave it, the harder it becomes. Read More

The Long Goodbye: Alzheimer’s Disease

Alzheimer's Dementia is a cruel disease, and one of the hardest decisions the family have to make is when (or whether) to place the person who no longer shares their memories into a nursing home. Read More

The Bizarre Disorder of Hemineglect

Patients who have right parietal damage and suffer from left hemineglect will often copy only the right half of a drawing, eat the food off only the right side of their plate and disown their left limbs. Read More

Sibling Love Challenges Hurricane Katrina

Jesmyn Ward's novel, "Salvage the Bones," is a gut-wrenching ride that can teach us much about the power of sibling love. Read More

Elvis Overcomes Memory Loss

Elvis was such a giant figure to young people in the mid-1950's that the global amnesic, Henry Molaison (HM) remembered some muddled information about him even although he could consciously remember little else from eleven years before his brain surgery in 1953. Elvis was first heard on the radio in 1954. Read More

HM, the Man with No Memory

Henry Molaison (HM) gave science the ultimate gift: his memory. Over 55 years he became the most studied medical case in history, and on death his brain was dissected into 2000 slices and digitized as a three-dimensional brain map, preserving his tragically unique brain for posterity. Read More

Brilliant, Brazen, Teenage Brains

Teenage brains are like adult brains after four glasses of wine. But without the wine effect the teen is less likely to take the risks necessary to move out of home and into adulthood. Read More

Mindboggling Baby Brains

At birth the human baby's brain possesses 100 billion brain cells. With love and lots of stimulation the millions of connections between these cells are pruned so that those used most often are strengthened and those hardly ever used lapse. Love and creative play are the most important brain developing mechanisms: money and fancy toys are not required! Read More

Brain Bullet Points

Everyone is curious about how their mind works. Given that the brain is the most complex system on earth, and perhaps even in the universe, most people think that learning about it would be beyond them. Wrong! Here are some bullet points about the human brain and how it works that will give you a head start! Read More

So You Want to Be a Neuropsychologist?

Why clinical neuropsychology is an exciting career choice. Read More

Jenni Ogden, Ph.D., is a clinical neuropsychologist and author of Trouble in Mind: Stories from a neuropsychologist's casebook, and the text, Fractured Minds.

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About Trouble in Mind

A neuropsychologist and writer discusses the brain and its mind, recounts stories of courageous people whose behaviors, emotions and thinking processes become disordered following brain damage, and recommends non-fiction books and novels with a psychological or medical theme.