Embodied: The Psychology of Physical Sensation

Open any general textbook of psychology and the topic of perception will be covered in detail. However much of it will be about the big five senses - the senses we grew up learning about as children: sight, sound, smell, taste and touch. The primacy of these sensations in our thinking and learning is reflected in their cultural dominance. The big five dominate across cultures, religions and histories,

'Embodied' is about how we experience our bodies and how our bodies experience the world; it is about physical sensation. Uniquely, each chapter focuses on a neglected physical sense - senses that we are only too happy to talk about in everyday life, yet have been neglected from the point of view of serious psychological enquiry. While some have been studied more than others, compared to the big five, the ten bodily senses that form the heart of this book have been neglected for too long. Throughout, we see how these bodily sensations operate within extreme situations and are presented with pathological case studies providing insights into these sensations, their evolutionary purpose, and their physical bases. The sensations discussed include, amongst others, itch, balance, convulsion, balance, and proprioception.

The result is a highly original and accessible exploration of the human body, one accessible to both students and lay readers.