"The unique aspect of human inheritance is an immeasurabley superior brain. It has been described as the most highly organized apparatus in the universe, consisting of some 10 billion nerve cells, or neurons, with countless interconnections with other parts of the body. The human brain provides a fantastic communication and computing network with tremendous capabilities for learning and storing experiences; for reasoning, imagining, and problem solving; and for integrating the overall functioning of the organism. The human brain makes possible our enourmous adaptability to various and changing conditions of existance, but it often does so at a price - a price being paid mostly by those people with mental disorders. The nervous system of lower organisms are not nearly so flexibly adaptive, but they are also much less likely to go awry or lead to behavior that is maladaptive."
-Carson, R.C., & Butcher, J.N., (1992) Abnormal Psychology and Modern Life (9th ed.). New York: Harper and Collins, p. 108.

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