harnad@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Stevan Harnad) (09/18/90)
Below is the abstract of a book that will be accorded multiple book review in Behavioral and Brain Sciences (BBS), an international, interdisciplinary journal that provides Open Peer Commentary on important and controversial current research in the biobehavioral and cognitive sciences. Commentators must be current BBS Associates or nominated by a current BBS Associate. To be considered as a commentator on this book, to suggest other appropriate commentators, or for information about how to become a BBS Associate, please send email to: harnad@clarity.princeton.edu or harnad@pucc.bitnet or write to: BBS, 20 Nassau Street, #240, Princeton NJ 08542 [tel: 609-921-7771] To help us put together a balanced list of commentators, please give some indication of the aspects of the topic on which you would bring your areas of expertise to bear if you are selected as a commentator. ____________________________________________________________________ BBS Multiple Book Review of: FROM NEUROPSYCHOLOGY TO MENTAL STRUCTURE Tim Shallice MRC Applied Psychology Unit Cambridge, UK ABSTRACT: Studies of the effects of brain lesions on human behavior are now cited more widely than ever, yet there is no agreement on which neuropsychological findings are relevant to our understanding of normal function. Despite the range of artefacts to which inferences from neuropsychological studies are potentially subject -- e.g., resource differences between tasks, premorbid individual differences and reorganisation of function -- they are corroborated by similar findings in studies of normal cognition (short-term memory, reading, writing, the relation between input and output systems and visual perception). The functional dissociations found in neuropsychological studies suggest that not only are input systems organized modularly, but so are central systems. This conclusion is supported by considering impairments of knowledge, visual attention, supervisory functions, memory and consciousness. -- Stevan Harnad INTERNET: harnad@confidence.princeton.edu harnad@princeton.edu srh@flash.bellcore.com harnad@elbereth.rutgers.edu harnad@princeton.uucp BITNET: harnad@pucc.bitnet CSNET: harnad%princeton.edu@relay.cs.net (609)-921-7771