UC Irvine

Many books and review articles have been written about the structure and function of the brain. That is beyond the scope of this one chapter or, indeed, of this entire volume. Instead, this chapter will emphasize general principles and salient features of human brains and attempt to provide a useful theoretical framework for considering how to design experiments and perform data analysis that yields a better understanding of the vast amounts of information being obtained about the function of the human brain by neuroscientists using EEG, MEG, ECoG, fMRI, NIRS, etc. The details of these techniques can be found in other chapters in this volume, and I will not consider the strengths and weaknesses of these methods in detail. Rather, I will try to assess what kind of questions we can ask with non-invasive measures of brain function in humans. In my view, the field of cognitive neuroscience has to grow beyond the marriage of experimental psychology to brain mapping, and I consider some potential directions.