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I know this is kind of a "soft question", but it isn't very easy to find a good, comprehensive brain atlas book, which would also link the different areas to their functions (according to recent work). Best would be if the book could also be used for teaching (from the very basics). Any recommendations? I would not like to pay myself sick in finding a good book. Please provide some insights why the book you recommend is better than the others available (or, if you know just one book, what did you learn from it).

lookinfor
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    What is your goal? Do you want to be able to pick a brain area and know something about what it does, or do you want to pick a function and know what brain areas are involved? – Craig Bennett Jul 16 '13 at 20:23
  • If both ways are not covered, then I'd like to first pick the brain area. – lookinfor Jul 16 '13 at 20:24
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    Another useful place to ask this is in our reading room – Josh Jul 17 '13 at 03:00
  • I'm going to be the bad guy here and say that this is probably too dependent on opinions to be worth much to future visitors. – Chuck Sherrington Jul 17 '13 at 14:52
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    @ChuckSherrington maybe, but the answers would provide a very nice reference list - something that is very helpful for researchers. –  Jul 20 '13 at 11:54
  • @Damien It's a fine line, I think, and easy to cross over into the "here's my favorite book" type answers. Stack Overflow has had varying success with these type of questions in the past, but most end up a cluttered, unmanaged list. I'm only one vote, so we can see what the rest of the community thinks. – Chuck Sherrington Jul 20 '13 at 17:10
  • It's easy to say "oh, there's no harm", and I agree to some extent, but do we really want to end up with questions looking like this in 4 years time? – Chuck Sherrington Jul 20 '13 at 17:13
  • @ChuckSherrington I agree, it is indeed a fine line, that link actually doesn't look too bad - and given the massive amount of upvotes in that thread - it certainly has been useful to a lot of people. –  Jul 20 '13 at 17:15
  • @Damien As you've probably observed within our microcosm here, votes don't always indicate quality... Again, this is a hotly debated issue on Stack Exchange in general, so people are going to have differing opinions, and that's fine (see all the MSO debate on that one question alone). I just tend to think that SO has already gone through many of the "growing pains" and we can map those lessons on to our site to the extent that we can. Stats.SE does have a lot of book questions with a modicum of success, but some of the quality does tend to degrade over time. – Chuck Sherrington Jul 20 '13 at 17:26
  • @ChuckSherrington I should clarify that I view the amount of upvotes as a gauge of usefulness, other indicators could include the amount and quality of responses etc. Book related questions can be useful in he way the 2 responses (so far) here are - impersonal recommendations. –  Jul 20 '13 at 17:29
  • @Damien I'm willing to let the question be, but I think we're going to have to agree to disagree on this one. Democracy in action! :) – Chuck Sherrington Jul 20 '13 at 17:43

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I have a couple of reference recommendations for you, please take these with a truck load of salt as I am just an enthusiast in this field - given this, the criteria I tend to go by are - ease-to-understand and interest-factor (ie. gets me thinking) - as I do not know where you are, I am not sure of their costs for you:

Brain, Mind and the Structure of Reality (Nunez, 2010).

This book brings together neuroscience and links it to other related fields related to cognition and how we perceive the world.

Atlas of Brain Function (Orrison, 2008).

This book has a glossary as well as the details and results of imaging.

Biology of Mind (Bownds, 1999).

Even though this reference is a bit dated, it is a good starting point about brain structures and the evolution of the human brain.

Hope these are a bit helpful.

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Michael Saunders Gazzaniga, Richard B. Ivry, G. George Ronald Mangun, Cognitive Neuroscience: The Biology of the Mind

Dana Sugu
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