Psychology Today Blogger Releases Book About How the Body’s Chemicals Control People’s Emotions

Oakland, CA, April 19, 2013 --(PR.com)-- Humans have emotional ups and downs because they’ve inherited the operating system of earlier mammals. The mammal brain releases dopamine when we approach a reward, and serotonin when we get respect. Oxytocin gives people a good feeling when they trust, and endorphin makes people feel good when they’re injured. These happy chemicals evolved to do a job, not to surge all the time. The brain defines that job in its own way because it built happy chemical pathways from each person’s unique experience. Everyone can build new pathways to turn them on in new ways. This book guides readers through that challenge. It helps them choose new happy habits that are right for them, and repeat them until new circuits build. This is harder than some might expect it to be. The mammal brain evolved to rely on the circuits it built in youth, and to use unhappy chemicals as much as happy ones. But if people repeat a new behavior for 45 days, the electricity in their brain will start surging down the new path.

Breuning says, “I started writing books in hopes of more people understanding their inner mammal. Why does a biology textbook sounds like a soap opera script? Why do the field notes of a primatologist sound like the lyrics of a country western song? I was thrilled when I found the answer. Our neurochemicals are managed by brain structures common to all mammals. When you know what these brain chemicals do in animals, life suddenly makes sense. I couldn't wait to share what I'd learned. I'm happy to say that my work has helped people in a wide range of professions and life circumstances.”

Meet Your Happy Chemicals is available in print and ebook formats.

Book Information:
Meet Your Happy Chemicals
Author: Loretta Breuning, PhD
Publisher: CreateSpace
ISBN: 978-1463790929
Published: February 2012
Pages: 200

About The Author:
Loretta Graziano Breuning, PhD is a docent at the Oakland Zoo, where she gives tours on mammalian social behavior. She's Professor Emerita of International Management at California State University, East Bay. She spent a year in Africa working as a United Nations Volunteer, and has lectured worldwide on resisting corruption pressures. Her blog, Your Neurochemical Self, is hosted by Psychology Today. Breuning is a graduate of Cornell University (BS) and Tufts (PhD). She's the mother of two tax-paying adults, and lives with her husband in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Mrs. Bruening is also the author of I, Mammal: Why Your Brain Links Status and Happiness, and the forthcoming Beyond Cynical: Transcend Your Mammalian Negativity.

For more information, review copies, or interviews please contact the author at:

Loretta Breuning
E-mail: Loretta@InnerMammalInstitute.org
Website: http://www.innermammalinstitute.org