Genes, Brain Function, and Behavior: What Genes Do, How They Malfunction, and Ways to Repair Damage

Genes, Brain Function, and Behavior offers a concise description of the nervous system that processes sensory input and initiates motor movements. It reviews how behaviors are defined and measured, and how experts decide when a behavior is perturbed and in need of treatment. Behavioral disorders that are clearly related to a defect in a specific gene are reviewed, and the challenges of understanding complex traits such as intelligence, autism and schizophrenia that involve numerous genes and environmental factors are explored. New methods of altering genes offer hope for treating or even preventing difficulties that arise in our genes. This book explains what genes are, what they do in the nervous system, and how this impacts both brain function and behavior.

Presents essential background, facts, and terminology about genes, brain function, and behaviorBuilds clear explanations on this solid foundation while minimizing technical jargonExplores in depth several single-gene and chromosomal neurological disordersDerives lessons from these clear examples and highlights key lessons in boxesExamines the intricacies of complex traits that involve multiple genetic and environmental factors by applying lessons from simpler disordersExplains diagnosis and definitionIncludes a companion website with Powerpoint slides and images for each chapter for instructors and links to resources

1. Levels of explanation 2. Genes 3. Gene expression 4. Nervous system 5. Brain development 6. Behavior 7. Single gene transmission and expression 8. Phenylketonuria – recessive expression 9. Huntington disease – dominant expression 10. Androgen insensitivity syndrome – X-linked transmission 11. Leber’s optic neuritis – mitochondrial transmission 12. Down syndrome – trisomy 21 13. XYY male 14. Complex traits 15. Intelligence 16. Autism spectrum disorder 17. Schizophrenia 18. Sex and gender 19. Race 20. Applications and ethics; dignity and human rights