The 2007 Wisconsin Symposium on Emotion
Since the mid-20th century, ever increasing attention has been given to identifying specific biological pathways that contribute to complex cognitive and emotional behaviors, an effort essential to our understanding of how individual differences in these behaviors emerge and how such differences may confer vulnerability or promote resilience to psychiatric disease. Yet despite significant advances, we are still in the early stages of understanding the intricate neurobiological substrates of risk and resilience in psychopathology, and researchers and mental healthcare providers continue to work with a relatively basic knowledge of the neurobiology underlying most mental disorders. Recent advances in molecular biology, genetics and neuroimaging, however, have begun to provide the tools necessary to explore these neurobiological pathways and other behaviorally relevant biological mechanisms. Increasingly sophisticated technologies and cutting-edge disciplines are allowing investigators to observe and record with greater precision the pathophysiology of mental illness.
The challenge remains to continue to develop, refine and apply these tools and techniques while translating the findings to individually tailored treatments targeting specific neurobiological pathways and mechanisms. The better we understand the neurobiology underlying psychopathological risk, resilience and individual variation in expression, the better positioned we will be to identify risk prior to the onset of full-blown psychopathology, treat existing mental disorders, and bolster resilience in the face of environmental and biological risk.
The 2007 Wisconsin Symposium on Emotion – Risk, Resilience & Psychopathology – will feature the work of seven of the world’s leading scientists whose research focuses on major psychopathologies in children, adolescents and adults, relevant brain regions and underlying neurobiological mechanisms, environmental influences, and the innovative use of advanced technologies and research strategies in studying mental illness. Presentations will focus on how these techniques and strategies are being developed and employed, and what they are revealing about risk, resilience and psychopathology.
Again in 2007, through a unique and innovative Student and Trainee Travel Award Program, a diverse attendee roster, and a distinguished lineup of speakers, the HealthEmotions Research Institute will bring together in Madison some of the finest minds in the field to discuss the latest findings in mental health research. This year’s meeting will cover scientific ground at the forefront of affective and behavioral neuroscience and will afford the opportunity to significantly broaden the interdisciplinary scope of interest in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disease.
