• The best books on Clinical Neuroscience - Recollections of My Life by Santiago Ramon y Cajal
  • The best books on Clinical Neuroscience - Harvey Cushing: A Biography by John F. Fulton
  • The best books on Clinical Neuroscience - No Man Alone: A Neurosurgeon's Life by Wilder Penfield
  • The best books on Clinical Neuroscience - In Search of Memory by Eric Kandel
  • The best books on Clinical Neuroscience - Awakenings by Oliver Sacks

The best books on Clinical Neuroscience, recommended by Frederick Lepore

We still don’t have a complete understanding of the ‘terra incognita’ that is the human brain, says Frederick Lepore—the noted US neurologist and author of Finding Einstein’s Brain—but we’ve made enormous breakthroughs over the past hundred years. Here, he selects five of the best books that detail the development of the strange and delicate study of clinical neuroscience through the eyes of its researchers.

  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want by Ruha Benjamin
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole by Susan Cain
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness by Meghan O'Rourke
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Elite Capture: How the Powerful Took Over Identity Politics (And Everything Else) by Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living by Dimitris Xygalatas

Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022, recommended by Avram Alpert

At the turn of the year, many of us take the opportunity to think about our lives—how they are going, and how we hope to live them in future. We asked Avram Alpert, author of The Good-Enough Life, to recommend five of the best self-help books of 2022 that might help our bids for self-improvement; his choices remind us that self-help is not only about life-hacks and diets, but about bringing the world more in line with our ideals.

  • The best books on Behavioral Science - Love at Goon Park by Deborah Blum
  • The best books on Behavioral Science - How We Know What Isn’t So by Thomas Gilovich
  • The best books on Behavioral Science - Delusions of Gender by Cordelia Fine
  • The best books on Behavioral Science - Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert
  • The best books on Behavioral Science - Nudge by Cass Sunstein & Richard Thaler

The best books on Behavioral Science, recommended by Nicholas Epley

What can we draw from behavioral science to help us better understand each other? Nicholas Epley, Professor of Behavioral Science and Faculty Director of the Center for Decision Research at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, recommends the five best books for learning about an interdisciplinary field that draws from psychology, sociology, economics and anthropology.

  • The best books on Emotional Intelligence - The Triple Focus: A New Approach to Education by Daniel Goleman and Peter Senge
  • The best books on Emotional Intelligence - Handbook of Social and Emotional Learning: Research and Practice by ed. Durlak et al
  • The best books on Emotional Intelligence - The Oxford Handbook of Compassion Science by ed. Seppälä et al
  • The best books on Emotional Intelligence - Emotional Alchemy: How the Mind Can Heal the Heart by Tara Bennett-Goleman
  • The best books on Emotional Intelligence - Marrow: Love, Loss, and What Matters Most by Elizabeth Lesser

The best books on Emotional Intelligence, recommended by Daniel Goleman

We are taught to value intelligence and academic ability, but raw mental firepower does not always translate into success at work or a life of contentment. Just as important are the skills that make up ’emotional intelligence,’ says Daniel Goleman, whose bestselling book popularised the concept. Here he chooses five emotional intelligence books that explore its practical applications.

  • The best books on Sigmund Freud - The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud
  • The best books on Sigmund Freud - The Life And Work of Sigmund Freud by Ernest Jones
  • The best books on Sigmund Freud - Becoming Freud: The Making of a Psychoanalyst by Adam Phillips
  • The best books on Sigmund Freud - Dispatches from the Freud Wars: Psychoanalysis and Its Passions by John Forrester
  • The best books on Sigmund Freud - Tribute to Freud by H.D.

The best books on Sigmund Freud, recommended by Lisa Appignanesi

Born into a middle-class Jewish family in Moravia in the Austro-Hungarian empire, Sigmund Freud spent most of his life in Vienna, until fleeing to London just before his death in 1939. Using his classical education to illustrate his points, he introduced the idea that we have an ‘unconscious’ that plays an important role in our actions. For his sessions when patients talked freely to him about their thoughts in a one-on-one setting, he coined the term ‘psychoanalysis.’ Freud expert Lisa Appignanesi talks us through books that shed light on his life as well as his work.

  • The best books on The Decline of Violence - The Internationalists: How a Radical Plan to Outlaw War Remade the World by Oona Hathaway & Scott Shapiro
  • The best books on The Decline of Violence - Homicide by Martin Daly and Margo Wilson
  • The best books on The Decline of Violence - Statistics of Deadly Quarrels by Lewis F Richardson
  • The best books on The Decline of Violence - Violent Land by David Courtwright
  • The best books on The Decline of Violence - The Remnants of War by John Mueller
  • The best books on The Decline of Violence - Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty by Roy Baumeister

The best books on The Decline of Violence, recommended by Steven Pinker

Our TV screens may be full of news about war and crime, but this masks a fall in historical terms in the number of violent deaths that’s nothing short of astonishing, says Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker. He tells us how and why this happened. (This interview was updated 17 December, 2020, to include books that have come out since it was published in 2011)

  • The best books on Disagreeing Productively - The Enigma of Reason: A New Theory of Human Understanding by Dan Sperber & Hugo Mercier
  • The best books on Disagreeing Productively - Knowing Mandela: A Personal Portrait by John Carlin
  • The best books on Disagreeing Productively - The Five Percent: Finding Solutions to Seemingly Impossible Conflicts by Peter Coleman
  • The best books on Disagreeing Productively - Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of Toleration by Teresa Bejan
  • The best books on Disagreeing Productively - Learning Lessons From Waco: When Parties Bring Their Gods to the Negotiation Table by Jayne Docherty

The best books on Disagreeing Productively, recommended by Ian Leslie

Many of us avoid conflict in our relationships with family and friends or at work, but that’s probably a mistake, says Ian Leslie, author of a number of nonfiction books on human behaviour. Here, he recommends books that offer insight into how to disagree productively, from evolutionary biology to 17th century Rhode Island, from Nelson Mandela to seemingly intractable conflicts.

  • Best Books on the Neuroscience of Consciousness - Consciousness Explained by Daniel Dennett
  • Best Books on the Neuroscience of Consciousness - The Mechanization of the Mind by Jean Pierre Dupuy
  • Best Books on the Neuroscience of Consciousness - Consciousness: How Matter Becomes Imagination by Gerald Edelman & Giulio Tononi
  • Best Books on the Neuroscience of Consciousness - Being No One: The Self-Model Theory of Subjectivity by Thomas Metzinger
  • Best Books on the Neuroscience of Consciousness - Klara and the Sun: A Novel by Kazuo Ishiguro

Best Books on the Neuroscience of Consciousness, recommended by Anil Seth

Nearly every human has a sense of self, a feeling that we are located in a body that’s looking out at the world and experiencing it over the course of a lifetime. Some people even think of it as a soul or other nonphysical reality that is yet somehow connected to the blood and bones that make up our bodies. How things seem, however, is quite often an unreliable guide to how things are, says neuroscientist Anil Seth. Here he recommends five key books that led him to his own understanding of consciousness, and explores why it is that what is likely an illusion can be so utterly convincing.

  • Meditation Books - Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice by Shunryu Suzuki
  • Meditation Books - The Life of Milarepa Translated by Lobsang P Lhalungpa
  • Meditation Books - Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chogyam Trungpa
  • Meditation Books - The Bodhicaryāvatāra by Śāntideva
  • Meditation Books - One Robe, One Bowl: The Zen Poetry of Ryōkan by Ryōkan

Meditation Books, recommended by Andy Puddicombe

Two decades ago Andy Puddicombe was ordained as a Buddhist monk. Now back in lay life, he tries to teach the benefits of meditation to the rest of us—most notably through the Headspace app, but also by writing books. Here he chooses some of the books that inspired him, from Japanese poetry to Tibetan philosophy. Not all are meditation books but they are his “old favorites.”

  • The best books on Animal Consciousness - The Animal Mind: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Animal Cognition by Kristin Andrews
  • The best books on Animal Consciousness - What Would Animals Say If We Asked the Right Questions? by Vinciane Despret, translated by Brett Buchanan
  • The best books on Animal Consciousness - An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us by Ed Yong
  • The best books on Animal Consciousness - The Emotional Lives of Animals by Marc Bekoff
  • The best books on Animal Consciousness - Why Look At Animals? by John Berger

The best books on Animal Consciousness, recommended by David Peña-Guzmán

The more we learn about the minds of other species, the more we are forced to question any assumptions that might previously have been made about their inner lives. Here, the philosopher David Peña-Guzmán talks us through the profound questions thrown up by research into animal cognition, perception and emotion, as he recommends five of the best books on animal consciousness.

  • The Best Books on Social Media and Political Polarization - Frenemies: How Social Media Polarizes America by Jaime Settle
  • The Best Books on Social Media and Political Polarization - The Hype Machine: How Social Media Disrupts Our Elections, Our Economy, and Our Health—and How We Must Adapt by Sinan Aral
  • The Best Books on Social Media and Political Polarization - The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life by Erving Goffman
  • The Best Books on Social Media and Political Polarization - Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Our Identity by Lilliana Mason
  • The Best Books on Social Media and Political Polarization - Bit by Bit: Social Research in the Digital Age by Matthew Salganik

The Best Books on Social Media and Political Polarization, recommended by Chris Bail

Convenient as it is to blame our political woes on the polarizing effect of social media, echo chambers, interference by foreign powers or other shadowy operators, the truth is that human nature and our search for identity and status are more likely culprits. Sociologist Chris Bail, a professor at Duke University and director of its ‘Polarization Lab’, talks us through what social science has to say about the connection between social media and political polarization.

  • The best books on Sports Psychology - The Inner Game of Tennis by W. Timothy Gallwey
  • The best books on Sports Psychology - Golf Is Not A Game Of Perfect by Bob Rotella
  • The best books on Sports Psychology - Zen Putting: Mastering the Mental Game on the Greens by Joseph Parent
  • The best books on Sports Psychology - Heads-Up Baseball: Playing the Game One Pitch at a Time by Ken Ravizza & Tom Hanson
  • The best books on Sports Psychology - The Champion’s Mind: How Great Athletes Think, Train, And Thrive by Jim Afremow

The best books on Sports Psychology, recommended by Bill Cole

What do you think about when you’re training at the gym, or on the tennis court? And what should you think about, if your goal is maximizing performance and results? Seasoned sports psychologist Bill Cole, coach for numerous Olympic teams and top-level international athletes, reveals that the number one road block to athletic performance often isn’t physical—it’s overthinking.

  • The best books on Minimalism - In Praise of Shadows by Junichiro Tanizaki
  • The best books on Minimalism - Donald Judd Writings by Donald Judd
  • The best books on Minimalism - Goodbye, Things: The New Japanese Minimalism by Fumio Sasaki
  • The best books on Minimalism - Silence by John Cage
  • The best books on Minimalism - Agnes Martin: Her Life and Art by Nancy Princenthal

The best books on Minimalism, recommended by Kyle Chayka

In times of political or personal turmoil, there’s a tendency to seek solace in stripping back life to its bare essentials. Minimalist thought is threaded through Stoicism and Zen Buddhism; absence and space became major preoccupations of 1960s US art. Kyle Chayka, the art critic and author of The Longing for Less, recommends five books on the philosophy that underpins the present fad for minimalist self-help.

  • The best books on Grief - Grief is the Thing with Feathers by Max Porter
  • The best books on Grief - Broken Hierarchies: Poems 1952-2012 by Geoffrey Hill
  • The best books on Grief - Late Fragments: Everything I Want To Tell You (About This Magnificent Life)
  • The best books on Grief - With the End in Mind: Dying, Death, and Wisdom in an Age of Denial by Kathryn Mannix
  • The best books on Grief - I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith

The best books on Grief, recommended by Sophie Ratcliffe

We often think of bereavement in terms of deep melancholy or gentle sadness, but “grief behaves badly and grief is risk-taking”, says Sophie Ratcliffe, Oxford literary critic and author of the memoir The Lost Properties of Love. Here, she recommends five books that may act as a balm for those who have lost someone, and says that the act of reading—any book, any poem—can be consoling.

  • The best books on Personality Types - Psychological Types by Carl Jung
  • The best books on Personality Types - The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • The best books on Personality Types - Murder Yet To Come by Isabel Briggs Myers
  • The best books on Personality Types - Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote
  • The best books on Personality Types - The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life by Erving Goffman

The best books on Personality Types, recommended by Merve Emre

Since its birth in the early twentieth century, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) has become the most popular personality test in the world. Here, Merve Emre, author of the new book The Personality Brokers: The Strange History of Myers Briggs and the Birth of Personality Testing, recommends five books that reveal how the language of ‘type’ has seeped into the marrow of American civic institutions and social life—from Fortune 500 companies to Breakfast at Tiffany’s.