Hidden Brain's host and Executive Editor Shankar Vedantam has been reporting on human behavior and social science research for more than 25 years. In 2010, he published a book further exploring these topics and introducing the idea of “the hidden brain.”

What, exactly, is the “hidden brain”? This is a term Shankar created to describe a range of influences that manipulate us without our awareness.

Some aspects of the hidden brain have to do with mental shortcuts or heuristics; others are related to errors in the way memory and attention work. Some deal with social dynamics and relationships.

The “hidden brain,” in other words, is a metaphor, much like the “selfish gene.” Just as there are no strands of DNA that shout, “Me first!” no part of the human brain is disguised under sunglasses and fedora.

By drawing a simple line between mental activities we are aware of and mental activities we are not aware of, the “hidden brain” subsumes many concepts in wide circulation: the unconscious, the subconscious, the implicit.