"The aim of the research project is to evaluate the hypothesis that the emerging field of 'the new brain sciences' is having as significant a social, political and personal impact in the 21st century as did the birth of psychological conceptions of personhood and their associated ways of thinking and acting in the 20^th century."

Nikolas Rose, 2007

BSS is a three-year project located within the BIOS Centre at LSE and funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). Its goal is to map the social and political impacts the ‘new brain sciences’ are having on our understanding of selfhood, personhood, and identity and with what consequences and implications.

Discoveries and advances in the neurotechnologies, neurogenetics and psychopharmacology just to mention a few branches of the neurosciences are already impacting upon educational practices, in diagnosis and treatment of children's problems at school, on the criminal justice system and judgments of risk, and of course on mental health practice and policies.

There has been much speculation about these issues but less empirical sociological research. This project will chart the emergence and spread of this way of thinking about human beings, their minds and brains, and the new techniques of intervention that are being developed.

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