Psychology Today

Ever wonder how dogs became our best friends? Dr. Brian Hare developed a research program to understand how dogs evolved to read human gestures.

Recent brain scan imaging research explains risky behavior in adolescents as a failure of emotional and logical centers of the brain to communicate with each other. Normal adolescent growth improves neural connectivity explaining improved self-control by the middle twenties.

Dogs are more similar to us than we like to believe.

Sesame Street creates a mobile app for preschoolers aimed at increasing vocabulary and concept development. With the new camera phone, children can learn anywhere and anytime. Is this an effective educational tool or a replacement for face time with parents?

Children can learn responsibility, nurturance, and a sense of being needed from a pet. Dogs are playful, warm, and fun. Dogs are non-judgmental and children learn from them. They make loving and accepting friends.

It has long been known that dogs respond to human gestures and voice tone. But can they understand our words? Are they more similar to us than we previously believed?

I have been worried about the random use of ADHD medications for about a decade.

The take home message is get a dog and walk it.

Life is a stern teacher. You get the test first and then the lesson.

If marijuana becomes legal, cheaper, easier to get, and marketed to teens, imagine a 13 year old using for the first time and having panic attacks, psychotic symptoms and visits to the ER.

Libraries and book stores are packed with books on motivational strategies, but few are helpful.

Doctors are reluctant to recommend cannabis for good reasons. Like lack of a thorough intake exam and lack of follow-up exams, for example. But, if they know of something with relatively benign side effects that helps people in extreme pain, as healers how can they justify denying access?

Robert Wicks' book, The Inner Life of the Counselor, is packed with wisdom.