Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School—A heady success

Not a day goes by lately when I do not see mention on blogs of the new book Brain Rules. The praise often includes the Web site created by the book's author Dr. John Medina. Coert Visser at Solution Focused Change writes:

Dr. Medina's website is an impressive display of modern day book promotion. There are video's, there's a blog, there are links to reviews and articles, and there is more.

At Neuroanthropology, Greg Downey commented on the site and also complimented Medina on his accessible way of presenting information .

The website contains a wealth of Flash-based audio-visual elements from the book, bibliography, graphics, and a host of other resources. I’m struck by several things about it; first, Medina is very savvy — he’s pitched this book brilliantly for a general audience. I don’t mean that as a backhanded compliment; in fact, it’s something that I aspire to in my own writing, and it’s educational to see such a good practitioner. Second, he’s done a great job of distilling some complicated ideas into bullet-point amenable, succinct statements.

Alvaro Fernandez at SharpBrains earlier this week posted an article by Medina which will give you the flavor of the book.

Interested in a good, non-technical, summary of the implications of recent brain science in our daily lives? Biologist John Medina offers that in his article below (as part of our Author Speaks Series) and in his new book: Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School. Enjoy!

Matt Homann at the [non]billable hour explained his favorite of the 12 rules presented in the book.

I especially liked Rule # 10: Vision Trumps All Other Senses, and it contains this rule of thumb for presenters:

You'll get 3x better recall for visual information than for oral. And you'll get 6x better recall for information that's simultaneously oral and visual.

Hey, Matt? Have you read The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures by Dan Roam? I think you are going to love it!

I am reading Brain Rules and will tell you more when I have finished. So far, I have enjoyed it thoroughly. Have you read it yet?

Note (added March 30, 2008, 8:50 PM Mountain): Click for a BusinessWeek article which includes The Back of the Napkin titled "Doodling for Profits."

Here's another article on The Back of the Napkin: "Pictures aid communication, book argues." And the "lost chapter" of the book: "The 10-1/2 Commandments of Visual Thinking." (pdf)

Comments

[Victoria Pynchon]

This book has a permanent place on my night stand. It's not simply brilliant -- it's FUNNY!! I.e.,

"Regardless of who you are, the brain pays a great deal of attention to these questions:

"Can I eat it? Will it eat me?

Can I mate with it? Will it mate with me?

Maybe it's just me, but these questions pretty much sum up law firm life.

I LOVE THIS GUY!