Tag Archives: Psychology

Motivation and Success: Two Books from Daniel H. Pink

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

81puh8q8gklCall Number: BF503 .P475 2011
View in IvyCat

Most people believe that the best way to motivate is with rewards like money– the carrot-and-stick approach. That’s a mistake, says Daniel H. Pink. In this provocative and persuasive book, Pink asserts that the secret to high performance and satisfaction–at work, at school, and at home–is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world. Drawing on four decades of scientific research on human motivation, Pink exposes the mismatch between what science knows and what business does– and how that affects every aspect of life. He examines the three elements of true motivation– autonomy, mastery, and purpose– and offers smart and surprising techniques for putting these into action in a unique book that will change how we think and transform how we live.

When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing

71pjsvmp0xlCall Number: BF468 .P57 2018
View in IvyCat

Everyone knows that timing is everything. But we don’t know much about timing itself. Our lives are a never-ending stream of “when” decisions: when to start a business, schedule a class, get serious about a person. Yet we make those decisions based on intuition and guesswork. Drawing on a rich trove of research from psychology, biology, and economics, Daniel Pink reveals how best to live, work, and succeed. How can we use the hidden patterns of the day to build the ideal schedule? Why do certain breaks dramatically improve student test scores? How can we turn a stumbling beginning into a fresh start? Why should we avoid going to the hospital in the afternoon? Why is singing in time with other people as good for you as exercise? And what is the ideal time to quit a job, switch careers, or get married? Pink distills cutting-edge research and data on timing and synthesizes them into a readable narrative packed with irresistible stories and practical takeaways that give readers compelling insights into how we can live richer, more engaged lives.

The Book of Joy

Lasting Happiness in a Changing World

51zclmrv8nlBy His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, with Douglas Abrams
Call Number: BL 65 .H36 B78 2016
View in IvyCat

Two leading spiritual masters share their wisdom about living with joy even in the face of adversity, sharing personal stories and teachings about the science of profound happiness and the daily practices that anchor their emotional and spiritual lives.

High Performance Habits

How Extraordinary People Become That Way

9781401952853By Brendon Burchard
Call Number: BF637.S4 B867 2017
View in IvyCat

Twenty years ago, author Brendon Burchard became obsessed with answering three questions:

  1. Why do some individuals and teams succeed more quickly than others and sustain that success over the long term?
  2. Of those who pull it off, why are some miserable and others consistently happy on their journey?
  3. What motivates people to reach for higher levels of success in the first place, and what practices help them improve the most?

After extensive original research and a decade as the world’s leading high performance coach, Burchard found the answers. It turns out that just six deliberate habits give you the edge. Anyone can practice these habits and, when they do, extraordinary things happen in their lives, relationships, and careers. Which habits can help you achieve long-term success and vibrant well-being no matter your age, career, strengths, or personality? To become a high performer, you must seek clarity, generate energy, raise necessity, increase productivity, develop influence, and demonstrate courage. This book is about the art and science of how to cultivate and practice these proven habits. Whether you want to get more done, lead others better, develop skill faster, or dramatically increase your sense of joy and confidence, the habits in this book will help you achieve it faster. Each of the six habits is illustrated by powerful vignettes, cutting-edge science, thought-provoking exercises, and real-world daily practices you can implement right now. If you’ve ever wanted a science-backed, heart-centered plan to living a better quality of life, it’s in your hands. Best of all, you can measure your progress. A link to a free professional assessment is included in the book.

Back From Madness – The Struggle For Sanity on DVD

Follows four psychiatric patients for one to two years, from the time they arrive at Harvard’s Massachusetts General Hospital, and contextualizes their present-day treatments with rare archival footage demonstrating how their conditions were treated in the past. On one level, the program examines what psychiatric treatment is like today at one of the world’s most famous hospitals. Beyond this, the program is about the patients themselves, and the inner strength that is required of them as they search for some relief from the severe mental illnesses they are coping with–schizophrenia, manic-depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and suicidal depression.

Kings Park DVD

A groundbreaking new documentary

On June 21, 1967, at the age of 17, Lucy Winer was committed to the female violent ward of Kings Park State Hospital following a series of failed suicide attempts. Over 30 years later, now a veteran documentary filmmaker, Lucy returns to Kings Park for the first time since her discharge. Her journey back sparks a decade-long effort to face her past and learn the story of the now abandoned institution that once held her captive. Her meetings with other former patients, their families, and the hospital staff reveal the painful legacy of our state hospital system and the crisis left by its demise.

What do peanuts, alcohol, and sugar cane have in common?


Did you know…following the arrival of the automobile, scientists immediately turned to biofuels? The German inventor Rudolf Diesel fueled his engine with peanut oil, while Henry Ford predicted that the fuel of choice would be alcohol-based. Now, all these years later, this interest in biofuels has been reawakened among the scientific community. Learn more about the options and our progress toward making them a reality in Achieving Sustainability, available on GVRL.Check it out!

——————————————————————————————-
GVRL (Gale Virtual Reference Library) is a wonderful eReference source available through your Ivy Tech Library. GVRL offers students thousands of full-text proprietary titles Subject areas include:

  • Arts & Entertainment
  • Biography & Genealogy
  • Business& Economics
  • Computing & IT
  • Education
  • Professional Development
  • Fiction
  • General Reference, Interests & Hobbies
  • Health & Nursing
  • History
  • Humanities & Social Sciences
  • Language
  • Law, Government & Politics
  • Literature
  • Mathematics & Science
  • Philosophy & Psychology
  • Religion & Mythology

Moral origins : the evolution of virtue, altruism, and shame / Christopher Boehm

Call number: BJ1311 .B645 2012

From the age of Darwin to the present day, biologists have been grappling with the origins of our moral sense. Why, if the human instinct to survive and reproduce is “selfish,” do people engage in self-sacrifice, and even develop ideas like virtue and shame to justify that altruism? Many theories have been put forth, some emphasizing the role of nepotism, others emphasizing the advantages of reciprocation or group selection effects. But evolutionary anthropologist Christopher Boehm finds existing explanations lacking, and in Moral Origins, he offers an elegant new theory.

Tracing the development of altruism and group social control over 6 million years, Boehm argues that our moral sense is a sophisticated defense mechanism that enables individuals to survive and thrive in groups. One of the biggest risks of group living is the possibility of being punished for our misdeeds by those around us. Bullies, thieves, free-riders, and especially psychopaths—those who make it difficult for others to go about their lives—are the most likely to suffer this fate. Getting by requires getting along, and this social type of selection, Boehm shows, singles out altruists for survival. This selection pressure has been unique in shaping human nature, and it bred the first stirrings of conscience in the human species. Ultimately, it led to the fully developed sense of virtue and shame that we know today.A groundbreaking exploration of the evolution of human generosity and cooperation, Moral Origins offers profound insight into humanity’s moral past—and how it might shape our moral future. (From Google Books)

Thinking, fast and slow / Daniel Kahneman

Call number: BF441 .K238 2011


In this work the author, a recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for his seminal work in psychology that challenged the rational model of judgment and decision making, has brought together his many years of research and thinking in one book. He explains the two systems that drive the way we think. System 1 is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical. He exposes the extraordinary capabilities, and also the faults and biases, of fast thinking, and reveals the pervasive influence of intuitive impressions on our thoughts and behavior. He reveals where we can and cannot trust our intuitions and how we can tap into the benefits of slow thinking. He offers practical and enlightening insights into how choices are made in both our business and our personal lives, and how we can use different techniques to guard against the mental glitches that often get us into trouble. This author’s work has transformed cognitive psychology and launched the new fields of behavioral economics and happiness studies. In this book, he takes us on a tour of the mind and explains the two systems that drive the way we think and the way we make choices.

Dreaming yourself awake : lucid dreaming and Tibetan dream yoga for insight and transformation / B. Alan Wallace ; edited by Brian Hodel

Call Number: BF1099.L82 W35 2012

Some of the greatest of life’s adventures can happen while you’re sound asleep. That’s the promise of lucid dreaming, which is the ability to alter your own dream reality any way you like simply by being aware of the fact that you’re dreaming while you’re in the midst of a dream. There is a range of techniques anyone can learn to become a lucid dreamer—and this book provides all the instruction you need to get started. But B. Alan Wallace also shows how to take the experience of lucid dreaming beyond entertainment to use it to heighten creativity, to solve problems, and to increase self-knowledge. He then goes a step further: moving on to the methods of Tibetan Buddhist dream yoga for using your lucid dreams to attain the profoundest kind of insight.

(From Google Books)

The batterer as parent : addressing the impact of domestic violence on family dynamics / Lundy Bancroft

Call number: HV6626.2 .B25 2012

Moving beyond the narrow clinical perspective sometimes applied to viewing the emotional and developmental risks to battered children, The Batterer as Parent: Addressing the Impact of Domestic Violence on Family Dynamics, Second Edition offers a view that takes into account the complex ways in which a batterer’s abusive and controlling behaviors are woven into the fabric of daily life. This book is a guide for therapists, child protective workers, family and juvenile court personnel, and other human service providers in addressing the complex impact that batterers-specifically, male batterers of a domestic partner when there are children in the household-have on family functioning. In addition to providing an understanding of batterers as parents and family members, the book also supplies clearly delineated approaches to such practice issues as assessing risk to children (including perpetrating incest), parenting issues in child custody and visitation evaluation, and impact on children’s therapeutic process and family functioning in child protective practice. (From Google Books)