Book excerpt: This thoroughly revised new edition of a classic book provides a clinically inspired but scientifically guided approach to the biological foundations of human mental function in health and disease. It includes authoritative coverage of all the major areas related to behavioral neurology, neuropsychology, and neuropsychiatry. Each chapter, written by a world-renowned expert in the relevant area, provides an introductory background as well as an up-to-date review of the most recent developments. Clinical relevance is emphasized but is placed in the context of cognitive neuroscience, basic neuroscience, and functional imaging. Major cognitive domains such as frontal lobe function, attention and neglect, memory, language, prosody, complex visual processing, and object identification are reviewed in detail. A comprehensive chapter on behavioral neuroanatomy provides a background for brain-behavior interactions in the cerebral cortex, limbic system, basal ganglia, thalamus, and cerebullum. Chapters on temperolimbic epilepsy, major psychiatric syndromes, and dementia provide in-depth analyses of these neurobehavioral entities and their neurobiological coordinates. Changes for this second edition include the reflection throughout the book of the new and flourishing alliance of behavioral neurology, neuropsychology, and neuropsychiatry with cognitive science;major revision of all chapters; new authorship of those on language and memory; and the inclusion of entirely new chapters on psychiatric syndromes and the dementias. Both as a textbook and a reference work, the second edition of Principles of Behavioral and Cognitive Neurology represents an invaluable resource for behavioral neurologists, neuropsychologists, neuropsychiatrists, cognitive and basic neuroscientists, geriatricians, physiatrists, and their students and trainees.