Author: Glossary

A generic term for dependence on (addiction to) alcohol or other drugs.  

Named after the eighteenth-century Swiss naturalist Charles Bonnet (1720–1793), the term is used to describe a situation in which people with sight problems start to see things that they know are not real (visual hallucinations). People often do not report their visual hallucinations for fear that others will think that they are losing their minds.…

An older term referring to personality disorder manifested by a chronic, habitual, maladaptive pattern of reaction that is relatively inflexible, limits the optimal use of a person’s potential, and often provokes responses from the environment that the person wants to avoid. In contrast to symptoms of Neurosis, symptoms of a character disorder are typically ego-syntonic.…

Any character or personality trait which serves an unconscious defensive purpose.  

Psychoanalytic treatment aimed at the character defenses.  

Brand name for the smoking cessation drug varenicline.  

Specialized neurons found in all regions of the hippocampal formation, these cells form symmetrical synapses and have been shown to function as gabaergic (gaba (gamma-aminobutyric acid)–producing) inhibitory neurons, possibly preventing excessive excitatory activity in neuronal networks. In schizophrenia, scientists have observed changes in chandelier cell form and functionality, which may reflect altered information processing within…

The expanded anterior portion of the brain, which is considered the seat of conscious mental processes. The main portion of the brain occupying the upper part of the cranium the two cerebral hemispheres united by the coipus collosum forming the largest part of the central nervous system in humans. The consists of derivatives of the…

Clear fluid occupying the space around and inside the brain and spinal cord. Clear fluid that bathes the ventricles of the brain and the central cavity of the spinal cord. The fluid contained within the brain and the subarachnoid space about the brain and spinal cord. Normally clear liquid, produced in the ventricles of the…

The external layer of gray matter that covers the human brain hemispheres. This gray surface has a thickness varying from 1 to 4 mm. Its largest part is composed of neurons, which receive and transmit electrical impulses from and to other brain regions and bony parts. The cerebral cortex is the part of the brain…