The Brain Moves
Traumatic Brain Injury in 21st Century Athletes and Combat Veterans
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
Four years ago, the Department of Defense (DOD) recognized that while TBI resulted in physical impairment, the more problematic consequences involved individual cognition, emotional function, and behavior (Jaffee et al., 2009, p. 663). In cases of CBFT to the cranium, similar rotational forces that altered the brain's resting position in a helmet-to-helmet collision between two football players resembled blast-impact brain movement experienced by soldiers and marines on the battlefield when exposed to rocket propelled grenades (RPGs), improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and fragmentation ordinance. During an explosion in battle, blast waves had been able to penetrate the Kevlar helmet into the skull causing injurious biomechanical activity in the brain leading to an immediate and abrupt change in physiological function. Doctors had pointed out that blast waves could enter through the lungs. Depending on the extent of cerebral re-arrangement, transitory movement in the brain had caused immediate and long-term neurological deficiency. Once referred to as shell-shock, the study investigated the possibility of post-combat TBI problems in degree-seeking student veterans attending a four-year college. The researcher became interested in knowing what academic, cognitive, and social difficulties existed among student veterans because of previous combat exposure. The study built on previous 2012 work regarding head trauma among student athletes who played varsity football. The recalcitrant nature of TBI could no longer be silenced. Football players and combat veterans had been two populations experiencing radical increases in TBI. Our heroes had returned from war looking for a new sense of belonging. Combat to college purported to be an important adaptive period in military veterans’ lives. The proposed subjects in the study were male and female undergraduate and graduate student veterans enrolled at an Oklahoma public university during the 2013-2014 academic year. Identified as action-research, the study employed a cross-sectional approach using an extensive survey designed to investigate key areas of TBI and the social and academic success of student veterans on campus. By way of detailed questioning, the research had hoped to reveal how colleges and universities were helping or hurting student veterans. The inquiry focused on being able to identify problems student veterans perceived as important so that professors and university leaders could assist them more effectively in the future.
Formats
Book Details
About the Book
In his 2014 book, The Brain Moves, author C. Mark Riden, M.Ed., B.A., B.A. provides the artillery needed to repel the epidemic of brain trauma sweeping through American athletic and military culture like an Oklahoma storm ripping and tearing its way across a landscape. Riden's investigative work in traumatic brain injury (TBI) looks at two distinct populations affected by closed blunt force trauma (CBFT): Current and former athletes who play or have played contact sports and military combat veterans home from war looking for a new sense of belonging. CBFT refers to an object or person impacting the head or helmet causing the brain to move inside the cranium. When the brain becomes overwhelmed by closed blunt impact, ungovernable acceleration and deceleration forces inside the cranium obtrusively contort the brain causing immediate and long-term neuronal damage. Riden's work covers detailed collegiate research studies and an extensive interrogation of scholarly and non-scholarly evidence. Beginning with discussion on biomechanics and the physiological makeup of what Riden calls the twenty-first century biological super-athlete, the author deposits eight dynamic chapters of TBI information on problems discovered in youth, college, and professional sports as well as the United States military. Passionate about providing empirical confirmation on TBI during a time of injurious uncertainty in sports where athletes and soldiers are bigger, stronger, and faster, Riden's propositions, solutions, and theories are directed at reducing CBFT frequency, social maladaptation, and cognitive disruption. Supported by data, Riden's book delivers a unique synthesis on the underpinnings of TBI associated with social competition, human nature, and cultural history. Drawn to amphitheaters of opposition, awkwardly the environments in which we have selected to compete are now killing us. Clearly, it is a gladiator's future we have chosen for ourselves. Confronting and adapting to TBI through education will be part of that future.
About the Author
Anthropologist and Author, C. Mark Riden, M.Ed., B.A., B.A. studies traumatic brain injury (TBI) in student athlete and student military veteran populations. A veteran himself of the United States Marines, Riden is currently pursuing a Doctor of Philosophy in Biological Anthropology. Riden possesses a M.Ed. from the University of Central Oklahoma, a B.A. in Anthropology with biological emphasis from the University of Oklahoma, and a Double Major B.A. in History and Social Science also from the University of Oklahoma. Riden completed laboratory studies in cell biology, chemistry, and physiology at Rose State College. While serving in the Marines, Riden received professional leadership and management training at Xerox University. With certifications from the National Institute of Health, National Federation of State High School Associations, and the Oklahoma State Department of Education, Riden tutored elite male and female collegiate student athletes for the Oklahoma Sooners. An experienced teacher and orator, Riden presents TBI information to athletes, parents, coaches, athletic directors, and school districts along with numerous military organizations that support student veterans seeking a college degree. A member of the National Scholars Honor Society, Student Veterans of America, Gamma Beta Phi Society, and Tau Kappa Epsilon, Riden's approach utilizes action-oriented research and theory. Riden is the great nephew of 1920s Leatherhead, James Herbert "Speedy" Collins of Stockton, Missouri.