Wes Burgess

Joseph Wesley "Wes" Burgess is an American psychiatrist, neuroscientist, and author who has written books on animal behavior (ethology), nonverbal communication, and human consciousness. His main contribution has been to the understanding of the mind and social relationships.

Early life and education

Burgess was born in Dumas, Texas to Wes and Dorothea Burgess. His family moved to St. Louis Missouri where he graduated from Ladue Horton Watkins High School and took classes at the Academy of Science, St. Louis, Washington University, and the St. Louis Zoo. Burgess earned his bachelor's degree and a literary award at Purdue University;[1] he received a Ph.D. in Zoology at North Carolina State University, and an M.D. from the University of Miami School of Medicine. Burgess completed medical internship, psychiatry residency, and chief residency at Stanford University Medical Center, winning the Northern California Psychiatric Society Research Award.[2][3]

Career

Burgess studied social behavior with Peter Witt under a National Science Foundation grant at the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services,[4] and with Evelyn Shaw at the Stanford University Department of Biology.[5] Burgess was then awarded a National Science Foundation research grant at the University of California, Davis where he did neuropsychology research and taught courses in the Department of Psychology.[6] He accepted a National Science Foundation research fellowship with Jaime Villablanca to study brain and behavior and teach classes at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at the UCLA School of Medicine.[7] During his residency, he led a suicide crisis hotline and student psychotherapy groups, and taught classes at Stanford University.[8] Burgess maintained a private medical practice in adult and adolescent neuropsychiatry for over 20 years in Brentwood, Los Angeles, specializing in mood disorders and personality disorders.[9] He was a consultant for the State Bar of California and the Los Angeles Superior Court, and he has been a guest on National Public Radio, television, and films.[10][11][12] Burgess now devotes his time to writing and private consultation in Half Moon Bay, California, where he teaches at the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve.[13]

Scientific contributions

Burgess was the first United States scientist to discover social spiders,[14] which he described in Scientific American and other journals.[15][16] Social spiders challenge theories of social biology because spiders are usually cannibalistic and would not be expected to form social groups. Burgess showed how social spiders modify their environment to be able to live together.[17][18] For example, Mexican spiders called Mallos gregalis spin a web that amplifies the sounds of the flies that they eat and dampens the vibrations made by other spiders, allowing Mallos spiders to live in colonies containing hundreds of thousands of individuals.[19] Another spider called Metepeira spinipes, spins two-part spider webs: individual orbs to catch prey, and vibration-damping tangled webs where spiders coexist peacefully.[20][21] Burgess also described Oecobius civitas spiders who exchange individual webs with each other as part of a unique prober/retaliator social strategy (see evolutionary game theory).[22][23]

Burgess compared the biological forces that produce social groups in shoaling and schooling fish, flocking and territorial birds, monkey colonies, and human social groups; developing techniques of pattern recognition for measuring and displaying proxemic distances between k-nearest neighbor individuals in a social group.[24]

Burgess found similar subgrouping patterns in rhesus monkey colonies in Puerto Rico, while working at the North Carolina Department of Mental Health Research.[25] These patterns change if only a few members receive psychoactive drugs.[26]

Burgess’ studies revealed how the dendrites of brain neurons grow during development.[27][28] Together with Richard Coss at the University of California, Davis, Burgess was the first to show that sensory stimuli, including social stressors, can cause long-lasting changes in brain cell anatomical structure in just a few minutes.[29] Together with Jaime Villablanca at UCLA, Burgess discovered that early brain injury resembling childhood congenital disorders and adult traumatic brain injury can heal naturally and that rehabilitative exercise improves brain healing.[30][31][32][33][34] He helped clarify the rôle of the caudate nucleus in aggression and found that, without input from this nucleus, usually aggressive cats are friendly and affiliative. Burgess also contributed to our understanding of how the nervous system responds to morphine,[35][36][37] especially during early development.[38]

Medical contributions

As a psychiatrist and medical doctor, Burgess studied mental illnesses that impair social relations. He created mental health tests, including verbal and written Mental Health Diagnostic Examinations, verbal and written Cognitive Function Examinations, the Card Test Cognitive Function Examination, and the Personality Inventory Scale for diagnoses of personality disorders.[39][40][41][42] He showed that the pathology of borderline personality disorder, including chronic depression and self harm, is linked to impaired neurocognition—the ability to perform normal thought processes.[43][44][45][46][47]

He has written books for individuals with bipolar disorder[48][49][50][51] and major depressive disorder,[52] their caretakers, and their families; as well as books and clinical articles on DSM-5 and ICD-10 diagnosis, cognitive testing, and psychotherapy and psychopharmacology treatments for use by health professionals.[53][54][55]

Books
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References
  1. Lafayette Indiana Journal and Courier, April 15, 1974, pp 19-20
  2. Burgess, J. Wesley. Cognitive information processing in borderline personality disorder: A neuropsychiatric hypothesis. Jefferson Journal of Psychiatry, vol 8, no 2, pp 34–49, 1990.
  3. The Psychology of Entomology, Entomology at Purdue Newsletter, Fall, Department of Entomology, Purdue University 2003, p 7.
  4. Burgess, J. Wesley and Witt, Peter. Spider webs: Design and engineering. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, vol 1, pp 322–335, 1976.
  5. Burgess, J. Wesley and Shaw, Evelyn. Effects of acoustico-lateralis denervation in a facultative schooling fish: A nearest neighbor matrix analysis. Behavioral and Neural Biology, vol 33, pp 488–497, 1981.
  6. Burgess, J. Wesley, and Fordyce, Wendy K. Effects of preschool environments on nonverbal social behavior. Child Psychology and Psychiatry, vol 30, pp 261–276, 1989.
  7. Burgess, J. Wesley. Do humans exhibit "species-typical" group size? Age, sex, and environmental differences in the size and composition of natural groups. Ethology and Sociobiology, vol 4, pp 149–155, 1984.
  8. Burgess, J. Wesley, and Zarcone, Vincent P. Cognitive Impairment in dramatic personality disorders. American Journal of Psychiatry, vol 149, p 136, 1992.
  9. Burgess, Wes. Clinical Case Conference: A monthly featured column on diagnosis and treatment. Southern California Psychiatrist, 2003–2009.
  10. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/246593/wes-burgess
  11. https://www.sourcebooks.com/store/depression-answer-book.html
  12. Burgess, Wes. The Mental Status Examination for Personality Disorders. Volume 2 of the Mental Status Examination Series. CreateSpace, 2013.
  13. Between the Tides, June, p 4, 2017<
  14. Burgess, J. Wesley. Social Spiders. Scientific American, vol 234, pp 99–106, 1976.
  15. Burgess, J. Wesley. Social spiders. In Howard Topoff, editor, Animal Societies and Evolution. Freeman Press, San Francisco, 1981.
  16. Burgess, J. Wesley. Social behavior in group-living spider species. In Peter Merrett, editor, Arachnology. Symposia, Zoological Society of London, Number. 42. Academic Press, London, 1978.
  17. Witt, Peter N. and Burgess, J. Wesley. Spider webs: Design and engineering. Naturwissenschafteliche Rundschau, vol 31, pp 269–282, 1978.
  18. Burgess, J. Wesley and Witt, Peter. Spider webs: Design and engineering. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, vol 1, pp 322–335, 1976.
  19. Burgess, J. Wesley. Web-signal processing for tolerance and group predation in the social spider Mallos gregalis. Animal Behavior, vol 27, pp 157–164, 1979.
  20. Burgess, J. Wesley, and Uetz, George. Social spacing strategies in spiders. In Peter N. Witt and Jerome Rovner, Editors, Spider Communication: Mechanisms and Ecological Significance. Princeton University Press, pp 317–352, 1982.
  21. Uetz, George and Burgess, J. Wesley. Habitat structure and colonial behavior in Metepeira spinipes. Psyche, vol 86, pp 79–89, 1979.
  22. Dawkins, Richard. The Selfish Gene, Oxford University Press, 2006.
  23. Burgess, J. Wesley. Social Spiders. Scientific American, vol 234, pp 99–106, 1976.
  24. Burgess, J. Wesley. Measurement of spacing behavior. Behavioral and Neural Biology, vol 26, pp 132–160, 1979.
  25. Burgess, J. Wesley. Group spacing in rhesus monkey troops: Environmental factors. Behavioral and Neural Biology, vol 30, pp 49–55, 1980.
  26. Burgess, J. Wesley, Witt, Peter N., Phoebus, E., and Weisbard, Charles. The spacing of rhesus monkey troops changes when a few members receive THC or amphetamine. Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior, vol 13, pp 121–124, 1980.
  27. Burgess, J. Wesley, Monachello, Mark, and McGinn, Mike. Early development of spiny neurons in fish and mouse: Morphometric measures of dendritic spine formation. Developmental Brain Research, vol 6, pp 123–129, 1982.
  28. Berard, Dale, Burgess, J. Wesley, and Coss, Richard. Plasticity of dendritic spine formation: A state-dependent developmental process. International Journal of Neuroscience, vol 12, pp 93–98, 1981.
  29. Burgess, J. Wesley, and Coss, Richard. Rapid effects of biologically relevant stimulation on tectal neurons: Changes in dendritic spine morphology after 9 minutes are retained for 24 hours. Brain Research, vol 266, pp 217–233, 1983.
  30. Burgess, J. Wesley, Villablanca, J. R., and Levine, Micheal. Recovery of function after neonatal or adult hemispherectomy: Complex functions. Behavioural Brain Research, vol 20, pp 217–230, 1986.
  31. Burgess, J. Wesley and Villablanca, J. R. Recovery of function after neonatal or adult hemispherectomy. Motor deficits: limb bias and development, paw usage, locomotion, and rehabilitative effects of exercise. Behavioural Brain Research, vol 20, pp 1–18, 1986.
  32. Villablanca, J. R., Burgess, J. Wesley, and Benedetti, Fabricio. There is less thalamic degeneration in neonatal-lesioned than in adult-lesioned cats after cerebral hemispherectomy. Brain Research, vol 368, pp 211–225, 1986.
  33. Villablanca, J. R., Burgess, J. Wesley, and Olmstead, Charles. Recovery of function after neonatal or adult hemispherectomy in cats. Time course, movement, posture and sensory tests. Behavioural Brain Research, vol 19, pp 205–226, 1986.
  34. Villablanca, J. R.; Burgess, J. Wesley; and Sonnier, B. J. Neonatal cerebral hemispherectomy: A model for post lesion reorganization of the brain. In C. Robert Almli and S. Finger, Editors, The Behavioral Biology of Early Brain Damage, Volume II. Academic Press, New York, pp 179–210, 1984.
  35. de Andres, Isabel, Villablanca, J. R., and Burgess, J. Wesley. Reassessing morphine effects in cats: Protracted effects on sleep-wakefulness and EEG. Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior, vol 21, pp 922–928, 1984.
  36. Harris, Cynthia, Villablanca, J. R., Burgess, J. Wesley, and de Andres, Isabel. Reassessing morphine effects in cats: Responses of intact, caudate nuclei-lesioned and hemispherectomized animals following chronic administration and precipitated withdrawal. Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior, vol 21, pp 929–926, 1984.
  37. Villablanca, J. R., Harris, Cynthia, Burgess, J. Wesley, and de Andres, Isabel. Reassessing morphine effects in cats: Specific neurobehavioral responses in intact and unilaterally brain-lesioned cats. Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior, vol 21, pp 913–921, 1984.
  38. Burgess, J. Wesley, and Villablanca, J. R. Ontogenesis of morphine-induced behavior in the cat. Journal of Brain Research, vol 1134, pp 53–61, 2007.
  39. Burgess, Wes. The Mental Status Examination. 2nd Edition. Volume 1 of the Mental Status Examination Series. CreateSpace, 2013.
  40. Burgess, J. Wesley. Examining the mental status examination: Questions that discriminate major depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and personality diagnoses. Psychiatric Services (Hospital and Community Psychiatry), vol 43 (9), pp 937–939, 1992.
  41. Burgess, Wes. The Mental Status Examination for Personality Disorders. Volume 2 of the Mental Status Examination Series. CreateSpace, 2013.
  42. Burgess, J. Wesley. The personality inventory scale: A self-rating clinical scale for the diagnosis of personality disorders. Psychological Reports, vol 69, pp 1235–1246, 1991.
  43. Burgess, J. Wesley, and Zarcone, Vincent P. Cognitive Impairment in dramatic personality disorders. American Journal of Psychiatry, vol 149, p 136, 1992.
  44. Burgess, J. Wesley. Neurocognitive impairment in personality disorders. Psychiatry Research, vol 42, pp 283–290, 1992.
  45. Burgess, J. Wesley. The relationship of depression and cognitive impairment to self-injury. Psychiatry Research, vol 38, pp 77–87, 1991
  46. Burgess, J. Wesley. Neurocognition in acute and chronic depression. Biological Psychiatry, vol 30, pp 305–309, 1991.
  47. Burgess, J. Wesley. Cognitive information processing in borderline personality disorder: A neuropsychiatric hypothesis. Jefferson Journal of Psychiatry, vol 8, no 2, pp 34–49, 1990.
  48. Burgess, Wes. The Bipolar Handbook for Children, Teens, and Families. Avery/Penguin Press, 2008.
  49. Burgess, Wes. Transtorno Bipolar. Perguntas da Vida Real com Prespostas Atualizadas. Editora Gaia, São Paulo, Brazil, 2010.
  50. Burgess, Wes. Wes Burgess. The Bipolar Handbook. Avery/Penguin Press, 2006.
  51. Burgess, Wes. Guia del Bipolar. Ediciones Robinbook, Barcelona, Spain, 2007.
  52. Burgess, Wes. The Depression Answer Book. Sourcebooks, 2009.
  53. Burgess, Wes. The Mental Status Examination. 2nd Edition. Volume 1 of the Mental Status Examination Series. CreateSpace, 2013.
  54. Burgess, Wes. The Mental Status Examination for Personality Disorders. Volume 2 of the Mental Status Examination Series. CreateSpace, 2013.
  55. Burgess, Wes. Clinical Case Conference: A monthly featured column on diagnosis and treatment. Southern California Psychiatrist, 2003–2009.
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