Nonfiction Psychology

Mescaline, LSD, and psilocybin mushrooms. There’s been a lot of discussion in the medical world lately about the potential benefits of these and other drugs for certain medical conditions, such as anxiety and depression. As we consider the place of psychedelics in the future, we can draw insight and guidance from the history of how psychedelics have been described, sought after, applied, and prohibited over the centuries. Erika Dyck, professor of history at the University of Saskatchewan, introduces you to the world of hallucinogens.

As a boy, Chris Hoy never would have believed that he could have achieved his dream of becoming an Olympic champion. In his first motivational book for children, he shares everything he has learned on his journey to help inspire kids to fulfil their potential and be the best they can be. The book brings together his incredible personal story with practical ideas for building confidence, resilience and self-belief, as well as dealing with failure. An essential listen for any young person with a big dream, this guide shows that anything is possible with a positive attitude!

Paul McKenna wants to help you achieve your true potential in every area of your life. He has spent decades working with sports stars, rock stars, movie stars and business leaders to help them become super successful. Now it's your turn! Here, Paul has distilled seven core easy-to-learn strategies that will give you the edge in life and make you more successful than you'd ever dreamed possible.

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable, audiobook edition of The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep by Carl-Johan Forssén Ehrlin, read by Rachel Bavidge and Roy McMillian. This groundbreaking number-one best seller is sure to turn nightly bedtime battles into a loving and special end-of-day ritual. This child-tested, parent-approved story uses an innovative technique that brings a calm end to any child's day.

Drawing on evidence from many fields, including archaeology, anthropology, neurology and linguistics, Sverker Johansson weaves these disparate threads together to show how our human ancestors evolved into language users. The Dawn of Language provides a fascinating survey of how grammar came into being and the differences or similarities between languages spoken around the world, before exploring how language eventually emerged in the very remote human past.

This positive and empowering guide by best-selling mindset author Matthew Syed will help boys and girls build resilience, fulfil their potential and become successful, happy, awesome adults. I'm no good at sport.... I can't do maths.... I really struggle with exams.... Sound familiar? If you believe you can't do something, the chances are you won't try. But what if you really could get better at maths or sport or exams? In fact, what if you could excel at anything you put your mind to?

Drawing examples from sport, science and even business, Dare to Be You empowers young listeners to follow their own path, love what makes them different and question the world around them. With You Are Awesome's trademark mix of hilarious text, stylish illustration, personal insights and inspiring real-life examples, including Greta Thunberg and Malala Yousafzai, Matthew Syed introduces children to the power of diverse thinking. When you stop doubting yourself, embrace change and let your kindness loose, you become your own action hero.

The highly anticipated follow-up to the sensational bestseller Quiet - empowering introverted children, teens and young adults. Susan Cain sparked a worldwide conversation with Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking. She inspired millions of people and permanently changed the way we see introverts - and the way introverts see themselves. Now she takes the quiet revolution to a younger audience.

In Creative Quest, Questlove synthesizes all the creative philosophies, lessons, and stories he's heard from the many creators and collaborators in his life, and reflects on his own experience, to advise listeners and fans on how to consider creativity and where to find it. He addresses many topics - what it means to be creative, how to find a mentor and serve as an apprentice, the wisdom of maintaining a creative network, coping with critics and the foibles of success, and the specific pitfalls of contemporary culture.

Strangers to Ourselves is a compassionate, courageous and riveting look at the ways we talk about and understand ourselves in periods of crisis and distress. Drawing on unpublished journals and letters, along with deep reporting, it follows people who feel as if they have reached the limits of psychiatric explanations for who they are. Their diagnosis, while giving their experiences a name, also shapes their sense of what their future may look like—and their identities, too.

Imaginative and insightful, Seeing Voices offers a way into a world that is, for many people, alien and unfamiliar - for to be profoundly deaf is not just to live in a world of silence but also to live in a world where the visual is paramount. In this remarkable book, Oliver Sacks explores the consequences of this, including the different ways in which the deaf and the hearing impaired learn to categorise their respective worlds - and how they convey and communicate those experiences to others.

In Born Liars, Ian Leslie takes the listener on an exhilarating tour of ideas that brings the latest news about deception back from the frontiers of psychology, neuroscience and philosophy and explores the role played by lies - both black and white - in our childhoods, our careers and our health, as well as in advertising, politics, sport and war. 

A conversation-changing look at the social, familial, neurological, and psychological benefits of reading aloud, especially for parents and children. A miraculous alchemy occurs when one person reads to another, transforming the simple stuff of a book, a voice, and a bit of time into complex and powerful fuel for the heart, brain, and imagination. Grounded in the latest neuroscience and behavioural research, and drawing widely from literature, The Enchanted Hour explains the dazzling cognitive and social-emotional benefits that await children who are read to.

The need to love and connect with others creates intimacy, but it also creates many difficulties, even failure. But Thomas Moore emphasizes that if you are willing to live through these difficulties, your life is enriched and the soul thrives. "Soul-intimacy" can be cultivated in many ways, even in letter-writing and conversations. It can be deepened through sexuality and jealousy, relationships that have gone stale, and even the pain of endings.

Bad sleep and dysfunctional dreaming are at the heart of how the brain manufactures depressed feelings -including post natal depression.

Be an instant expert on psychology and Bluff Your Way® with all those who seek self-knowledge. No contemplation required, just a sense of humour. From 'Cognitive Therapy' to the 'Collective Unconscious', and from 'Free Will' to 'Freudian Slips', the Bluffer's Guide® to Psychology® provides all you need to know to understand behaviour and (psycho) babble with the best.

Jen Lancaster is here to take a hard look at our elevating anxieties, and with self-deprecating wit and levelheaded wisdom, she charts a path out of the quagmire that keeps us frightened of the future and ashamed of our imperfectly perfect human lives. Take a deep breath, and her advice, and you just might get through a holiday dinner without wanting to disown your uncle.

Bursting with a ton of fun and straightforward exercises that inspire children to think about their feelings, this practical dialectal behavior therapy guide offers an engaging way for parents to help their kids cope with stress and navigate times of emotional difficulty. Balancing a warm and lively approach with proven psychological insights and a collection of easy worksheets, the DBT Workbook for Kids breaks down complex topics into simple language that children of all ages can understand.

This audiobook translates anxiety from the jargon of psychology into concrete experiences that children can relate to. Children and their parents will understand the biological and emotional components of anxiety responsible for the upsetting symptoms they experience. Please Explain Anxiety to Me (2nd Edition) gives accurate physiological information in child friendly language. A colorful dinosaur story explains the link between brain and body functioning, followed by practical therapeutic techniques that children can use to help themselves. Children will:  

This is a brief introductory guide on dogs and why they behave the way they do.