Changing Your Mind
By the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

For centuries the human adult brain has been thought to be incapable of fundamental change. Now the discovery and growing awareness of neuroplasticity has revolutionized our understanding of the brain—and has opened the door to new treatments and potential cures for many diseases and disorders once thought incurable.

Neuroscience is past viewing the human brain as a machine, as it once did, where, if one part breaks down or doesn’t work properly, the function it performed is permanently gone, in all cases. Indeed, in just the past few years, we’ve built on our knowledge that our brains are constantly changing their structure and function and that the adult brain is not “hard-wired” but plastic—always changing. It applies even in old age—a particularly hopeful note for an aging population like ours.

Changing Your Mind, is based on the best-selling book by Toronto psychiatrist and researcher Dr. Norman Doidge. Dr. Doidge takes us through some very compelling neurological cases to illustrate how the changing brain plays an important role in treating mental diseases and disorders. We explore the latest research that is offering hope to those suffering from obsessive compulsive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder and even schizophrenia.

44 minutes
© 2010
Purchase $248.00 DVD
Order No. QA-576

Reviews
"...describes promising cognitive interventions for obsessive-compulsive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and schizophrenia that appear to reverse some physiological markers of abnormal brain function. The film dramatically delivers its key message that the brain can be physically altered through mental experience and that this has exciting implications for recovery from mental disorders." Science Books and Films

Awards & Conference Screenings
Winner, Western Psychological Association Film Festival 2013

Related Films
A Change of Character: Truett Allen's personality changed drastically after a series of strokes resulted in damage to the frontal lobes of his brain. This captivating video features neuroscientist Dr. Elkhonon Goldberg, author of The Executive Brain, as well as neurologist and best-selling author Dr. Oliver Sacks (Awakenings).

Four Lives: Four people with bipolar disorder, along with their families and psychiatrists, share their struggles to achieve control over the illness and their lives.

The Hidden Face of Fear: Neuroscientists and psychologists are approaching a common understanding of how the brain's fear circuitry works, and changes.

When the Brain Goes Wrong: Portraits of individuals with brain dysfunctions including schizophrenia, manic depression, epilepsy, stroke, head injury, headaches and addiction. Physicians add information about causes and treatments.

To rent or purchase this film, please visit the Icarus Films website

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