The Neuroscience of Being Human
The Neuroscience of Psychoneuroimmunology
How the brain talks to the immune system, why your state of mind changes the way your body fights disease, and what happens when the oldest division in medicine turns out to be a fiction
1,416-word article with 8 Harvard references.
Premium article
For most of medical history, the brain and the immune system were treated as though they occupied separate countries with sealed borders. Neurologists studied one. Immunologists studied the other. Psychoneuroimmunology, or PNI, is the field that discovered the borders were always open. The brain and the immune system are in constant, bidirectional communication through the autonomic nervous system, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, and a vast network of cytokines and neuropeptides. Your thoughts alter your immune function. Your immune function alters your thoughts. This article traces the science that dismantled the wall between mind and body, from Robert Ader's foundational conditioning experiments to the contemporary research on how stress, loneliness, meditation, and emotional states produce measurable changes in the cells that defend you against infection, cancer, and disease.
£1.59 (full price £1.99). Includes full article access and branded PDF download.
What you will receive:
- Full 1,416-word article with 8 Harvard references
- Branded article download with sign-off and resource links
- Invitation to reflect section for personal or professional use