San Antonio College Library

"We are accustomed to think of sociopaths as violent criminals, but in The Sociopath Next Door, clinical psychologist Marth Stout reveals that a shocking 4 percent of ordinary people have an often undetected mental disorder, the chief symptom of which is the complete absence of conscience. They could be your colleague, your neighbor, even family. And they can do literally anything at all and feel absolutely no guilt, shame, or remorse. In The Sociopath...

"A cogent, gorgeous examination of empathy, illuminating the myths, the science, and the power behind this transformative emotion. Empathy has become a gaping fault line in American culture. Pioneering programs aim to infuse our legal and educational systems with more empathic thinking, even as pundits argue over whether we should bother empathizing with our political opposites at all. Meanwhile, we are inundated with the buzzily termed "empathic...

Interweaving the latest research with personal tales and real world examples, this offers reassurance and provides valuable insights into how listeners can embrace their personal quirks and unique talents to harness their awesome potential, and more comfortably navigate their complex world.

""On a stage, there's seemingly nothing that Tracy Letts can't do."--The Daily Beast Known for his complex portrayals of the human psyche, Tracy Letts' new play expands what at first appears to be an intimate snapshot of one woman's seemingly ordinary life into a grand and elaborate manifest, complete with different versions of the same woman at various stages of her life. In a series of elegant, nonlinear scenes spanning the years from 1946 all the...

"Gaslighting is a technique of manipulating others to gain control, often practiced by those with personality disorders (including Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Antisocial Personality Disorder, and Borderline Personality Disorder). Whether it's a spouse, parent, coworker, or friend, gaslighters use a series of manipulation and distraction tactics to distort the truth--from lying, controlling, withholding, triangulation, and more--making their...

Most people are rather confident of their ability to recognize bullshit and to avoid being taken in by it, yet we have no clear understanding of what bullshit is, why there is so much of it, or what functions it serves--and we lack a conscientious appreciation of what it means to us. In other words, as Harry Frankfurt writes, "we have no theory." Frankfurt, one of the world's most influential moral philosophers, attempts to build such a theory here....

"Popular examines why popularity plays such a key role in our development and, ultimately, how it still influences our happiness and success today. In many ways -- some even beyond our conscious awareness -- those old dynamics of our youth continue to play out in every business meeting, every social gathering, in our personal relationships, and even how we raise our children. Our popularity even affects our DNA, our health, and our mortality in fascinating...

"Whether it is the loss of a parent to death or divorce; bullying; alcoholism or drug abuse in the home; mental illness in a parent or a sibling; neglect; emotional, physical or sexual abuse; having a parent in jail; or growing up alongside domestic violence, nearly 75% of us experience adversity by the age of 20. But these experiences are often kept secret, as are our courageous battles to overcome them. Drawing on nearly two decades of work with...