Psychophysiologist Stephen Porges’s research on the polyvagal nervous system provides insight into the evolutionary roots of trauma and anxiety, and how therapists can effectively convey safety to clients.

Changes in the habitual attitudes and behaviors that shape our lives rarely happen as the result of psychological epiphanies or emotional catharsis. Most therapeutic progress comes from the painstaking process of continual practice that reinforces some behaviors while actively discouraging others.

As a growing body of research shows, deep change doesn’t come when clients just talk about their problems: it results from the impact of an emotionally arousing therapeutic experience on the structures and biochemistry of the brain.

New research into the complexities of memory reconsolidation offers important clues about how we can make the most elusive of consulting room events—the deep, therapeutic breakthrough—a regular occurrence.

The more we learn about the emotional brain, the clearer it becomes: to have real therapeutic impact, we need to create experiences that help clients learn to relate to themselves and the world in entirely new ways.

Therapists were doing helpful work long before neuroscience made its official debut and the field developed a collective case of “brain fever.” In fact, at this stage of its development, neuroscience may be irrelevant to what needs to happen in therapy.

With the U.S. Army suicide rate at an all-time high, there’s a greater need than ever to understand the struggles of soldiers returning from war zones and trying to resume a normal life.

Men with anger problems are generally highly reluctant clients who come to our offices only because they’ve gotten “the ultimatum” from their wives, girlfriends, or bosses. Fortunately, understanding the angry brain can help build their motivation for change.

Neuroscientists recently established emotion is the prime force shaping how we cope with life’s challenges. Psychotherapists are beginning to learn how to work with emotion, rather than trying to control it and create change through purely cognitive or behavioral means.

Daniel Kahneman, the founder of behavioral economics, has written a comprehensive dissection of the reasoning mind, which should be on every therapist’s required reading list.