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References: Emotion, Stress, and the Body

  1. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) - A plain-language guide to PTSD: who develops it, the four symptom groups, how it is diagnosed and treated, and how to help a friend. It is the source for this chapter's symptom table and diagnostic time frame.

  2. PTSD Treatment Basics - U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, National Center for PTSD - Explains that PTSD treatment works and names the talk therapies and medications with the most evidence. A clear starting point for anyone curious about how PTSD is treated.

  3. Talk Therapy - U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, National Center for PTSD - Short descriptions of Prolonged Exposure, Cognitive Processing Therapy, EMDR, and other supported therapies, including Written Exposure Therapy. Helps readers see what happens in each kind of treatment.

  4. I'm So Stressed Out! Fact Sheet - National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) - Explains the difference between stress and anxiety, how long-lasting stress can affect the body, and practical coping strategies. Written for teens and young adults.

  5. 12.2 Neural Mechanisms and Circuitry of the Stress Response - OpenStax, Introduction to Behavioral Neuroscience (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) - A free college-level textbook section on the sympathetic response, the HPA axis, negative feedback, and how the amygdala, hippocampus, and prefrontal cortex respond to stress. A good next step for readers who want more depth.

  6. 13.3 What Is the Contribution of Brain Structures in Emotional States? - OpenStax, Introduction to Behavioral Neuroscience (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) - Covers the Papez circuit, Klüver-Bucy syndrome, patient S.M., the amygdala and fear conditioning, and the cingulate and insular cortex. Useful background for the limbic system and amygdala sections.

  7. Hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis - Wikipedia - An overview of the HPA axis, including CRH, ACTH, cortisol, negative feedback, and the daily cortisol rhythm. Handy for review, but check key claims against the primary sources above.

  8. The human amygdala and the induction and experience of fear - Feinstein, Adolphs, Damasio, and Tranel, Current Biology (2011) - The study of patient S.M., who lacks both amygdalae and showed almost no fear in real-life tests. A readable example of how rare patients teach us about the brain.

  9. Fear Extinction as a Model for Translational Neuroscience: Ten Years of Progress - Milad and Quirk, Annual Review of Psychology (2012) - A review of how the amygdala and prefrontal cortex control fear extinction in rats and humans, and why that matters for treating anxiety and PTSD. Best for advanced readers.

  10. A Brief Exposure-Based Treatment vs Cognitive Processing Therapy for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: A Randomized Noninferiority Clinical Trial - Sloan, Marx, Lee, and Resick, JAMA Psychiatry (2018) - The trial behind this chapter's "What's new in research" box, comparing five sessions of Written Exposure Therapy with 12 sessions of Cognitive Processing Therapy. Shows how clinical trials test whether a shorter treatment works as well.