Brain Yapping

By The Cosmic Shambles Network

What's Brain Yapping about?

Brain Yapping – The Podcast; an amusing, entertaining, ramshackle and illuminating look at how science can really work hosted by neuroscientist and author, Dr Dean Burnett (The Idiot Brain, The Happy Brain) and journalist Rachel England. Part of the Cosmic Shambles Network.

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Brain Yapping episodes:

11.15.2021
Sometimes things are just crap. And that's OK
And so we reach the final episode in this series of Brain Yapping, and after 12+ weeks of discussing how the brickbats and misfortunes of life have affected them, what have Dean and Rachel learned? They’ve learned, basically, that...
10.18.2021
A Wake to Possibilities
Since the last episode, Rachel has gone on two trips, and Dean has attended his father’s wake, more than 18 months after his passing. As a result, our hosts discuss the importance of rituals and ceremonies for our wellbeing, the...
10.04.2021
Exercising Restraint
Throughout the pandemic and lockdown, a lot of attention and emphasis was placed on exercise, and keeping fit. Countless people insist that it’s a key facet of good mental health. But, is it? Can regular exercise really be such a...
09.20.2021
Remembering lockdowns… or not
Dean and Rachel return to their podcast after an unplanned hiatus, during which they genuinely forgot they were in the middle of doing a podcast. But problems with memory and thinking are thing that many have complained about during the...
05.31.2021
How's the Weather?
The return to normal life continues apace, and having run out of everything else to talk about, Dean and Rachel fall back on the classic British standby: the weather. But for a good reason; with travel still restricted and indoor...
05.10.2021
Returning to Normalish
With vaccine rollouts proceeding apace, weather improving, and lockdown restrictions easing, it seems like life is returning to some sort of normality. But what’s it like to go from prolonged lockdown to in-person socialising? Are we going back to normal,...
04.26.2021
Haters Gonna Hate: Criticism’s Impact on Wellbeing, in the Era of Covid and Beyond
If there’s one thing that Covid and lockdown hasn’t been stingy with, it’s criticism. All the new rules, regulations and expectations introduced by the pandemic has inevitably led to many more opportunities to condemn people for getting things wrong. Why...
04.12.2021
Climate Change, COVID, and the Anxiety of Global Problems for Individuals
The COVID 19 pandemic is a global problem. Climate change is an even bigger one. But people are individuals, and can rarely make meaningful interventions on such scales. This has many implications for our wellbeing and mental health. To mark...
03.22.2021
The Darker Side of 'Protecting the NHS'
The current mantra of protecting the NHS at all costs is logical and helpful, but nothing comes without cost. A listener reports that he’s been far less rigorous about seeking help for his health issues during the pandemic. This spurs...
03.08.2021
Won't SOMEONE think of the children!
Dean has young children. Rachel doesn’t, but knows many people who do, and it seems they’re all somewhat concerned about exactly what long periods of lockdown, isolation, and lack of school is doing to them, both in the short and...
02.22.2021
Why is Fight-or-Flight Still a Thing?
Why is Fight-or-Flight still a thing? Our brain’s unhelpful primitive reactions to modern stresses. As a listener points out, a lot of the stress we experience in modern times, and the subsequent harm this does to our mental health,...
02.08.2021
Trauma Within Trauma
We’re often told we should reach out and seek help when going through periods of poor mental health. But does this still apply when literally everyone else is in the same situation? This is the reality that the pandemic and...
06.24.2019
Procrastination and... other stuff
We’d write a tag for this episode, but we can’t be bothered… In this final episode for the series (or was that season?) Dean and Rachel talk about procrastination, laziness, risk and reward and the “gift" of emanating mess. Rachel...
06.10.2019
Culture Shocking
Travelling can be rewarding, exciting, mind expanding, and also, a little odd to wrap our brains around. Rachel and Dean talk about the weirdness of culture shock, from small differences (did you know Americans don’t use kettles) to cavernous shifts...
05.27.2019
Whiny Hangry People
In a society where you can summon food at the press of a button, how can anyone be hangry? Dean and Rachel talk about how low blood sugar can make us boil over and why evolutionarily, that's a good thing! Also, the...
05.13.2019
Misophonia and the Irrational Hatred of Clicks
Rachel and Dean discuss misophonia and how to not tackle people to the ground when they do perfectly normal things that make sounds you find infuriating (keyboard clacking, anyone?) Also, finding the sweet spot in the world of sound between...
04.29.2019
Voice Distortion and Selfie Loving
It’s already episode 8 of the Brain Yapping podcast and in this week’s episode, Dean and Rachel cringe at the sound of their own voices and tell us why we’re not who we hear we are… Support the show, and...
04.08.2019
Autopilot, Vaping and the Destruction of Tea
Enjoy this week’s episode all about being in autopilot, which Dean and Rachel assure us they were not when producing it (though they couldn’t for the life of them describe how they got home). Support the show, and everything at...
03.25.2019
Online Hate Mobs vs Rachel
Recently on Twitter, Rachel was set upon on Twitter by some particularly nasty followers of a certain British TV presenter. So this week on Brain Yapping Rachel and Dean talk about tribes and jibes, memes from the mean and why...
03.11.2019
Forbidden Thoughts and Punting Children
In this week’s episode of Brain Yapping, Rachel and Dean stand on the precipice of compulsion as they discuss what happens in the brain when we have intrusive thoughts (no cats were put in bins during the making of this...
02.25.2019
Sleeping, Rhythm and Big Wees
It's episode 4 of Brain Yapping and Dean and Rachel talk about how light helps us comprehend time passing, our bodies' circadian rhythms and why being able to see a bit of green outside makes for much better shuteye. Also,...
02.11.2019
Jump Scares and Spidercide
In this episode, Dean and Rachel continue their chat about Clippy, the Microsoft word assistant, and his contemporaries like Alexa,and how we may react to the “gender” they are programmed with . They also express their disparagement for spontaneous ceilidhs...
01.28.2019
Shower Gel and Meryl Streep
Welcome to Brain Yapping, a brand new podcast hosted by neuroscientist and author Dr Dean Burnett and journalist Rachel England. Each week Rachel will lob a question about the human brain at Dean and with no prep, he'll try to...
01.28.2019
Cute Aggression and the Return of Clippy
In this episode Rachel wants to know why she wants to crush Dean's children. Not literally, but in that way when you see a cute kitten you might want to hug it till it explodes. It's complicated. Dean also floats...

What's Brain Yapping about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

Brain Yapping episodes:

Sometimes things are just crap. And that's OK

A Wake to Possibilities

Exercising Restraint

Remembering lockdowns… or not

How's the Weather?

Returning to Normalish

Haters Gonna Hate: Criticism’s Impact on Wellbeing, in the Era of Covid and Beyond

Climate Change, COVID, and the Anxiety of Global Problems for Individuals

The Darker Side of 'Protecting the NHS'

Won't SOMEONE think of the children!

Why is Fight-or-Flight Still a Thing?

Trauma Within Trauma

Procrastination and... other stuff

Culture Shocking

Whiny Hangry People

Misophonia and the Irrational Hatred of Clicks

Voice Distortion and Selfie Loving

Autopilot, Vaping and the Destruction of Tea

Online Hate Mobs vs Rachel

Forbidden Thoughts and Punting Children

Sleeping, Rhythm and Big Wees

Jump Scares and Spidercide

Shower Gel and Meryl Streep

Cute Aggression and the Return of Clippy