Online Neuroscience Course — Psychoanalytic Approach

Brain and mind in dialogue.

The Online Neuroscience Course — Psychoanalytic Approach, by Academia Enlevo, was designed for those who want to understand the human mind from an integrative perspective, connecting findings from neuroscience with fundamental concepts of psychoanalysis.

The course grows out of the Neuropsychoanalysis: Intertwining Minds and Brain program. The central idea remains: to study the relationship between brain processes, emotions, memory, trauma, the unconscious, behavior, drives, neuroplasticity, psychopathologies and psychic transformation.

When neuroscience and psychoanalysis enter into dialogue, the point is neither to reduce psychoanalysis to the brain nor to turn subjectivity into simple biology. The challenge is to build a bridge: to understand that the human being is body, brain, history, language, bond, affect, trauma, fantasy, memory and desire.

Academia Enlevo presents this certification as a non-degree professional development course, with 160 class hours and a certificate recognized by the RNTP. The course does not replace an undergraduate degree, medical or psychological assessment, diagnosis, prescription, the issuing of clinical reports, or practice beyond the student’s prior training.

What is neuroscience from a psychoanalytic perspective?

It is a way of studying the human being that considers brain processes and psychic processes at the same time. Neuroscience investigates brain structures, emotions, memory, learning, trauma, sleep, neuroplasticity and the nervous system. Psychoanalysis listens to the subject in their history, symptoms, desires, defenses and unconscious conflicts.

A psychoanalytic approach to neuroscience does not treat the brain as an isolated machine, nor subjectivity as something separate from the body. It seeks to understand the relationship between lived experience, neural processes, emotions, language, memory and psychic suffering.

This field is known internationally as neuropsychoanalysis — a bridge between the scientific investigation of the brain and the clinical listening to subjectivity. Emotions, dreams, traumas, symptoms, affects and defenses can be studied without abandoning either biology or the subject’s singular experience.

The human mind is not just brain chemistry, nor just a subjective narrative. It is an embodied, historical, affective, symbolic and relational experience.

Neuroscience and psychoanalysis: conflict or dialogue?

For a long time, neuroscience and psychoanalysis were treated as distant fields. Today, this separation can be rethought. Neuroscience has advanced in the study of emotions, memory, trauma, sleep, attachment, pain, pleasure and brain plasticity; psychoanalysis has always been concerned with suffering, affects, repetitions, symptoms and subjective history.

Dialogue does not mean that one field should swallow the other. Neuroscience does not replace psychoanalysis; psychoanalysis does not replace neuroscience. The value lies in the articulation: bodily and brain foundations on one side, meaning, conflict, desire and singularity on the other.

Studying neuroscience with a psychoanalytic approach makes it possible to move away from two extremes: biological reductionism, which tries to explain everything through the brain, and subjectivist reductionism, which ignores the body. The human being needs to be understood as a whole.

Four entry points.

Each person comes to the dialogue between neuroscience and psychoanalysis through a different door — career change, a calling for listening, professional development or the pursuit of excellence.

Career change
An entry point that unites scientific language and subjective listening — brain, emotions, trauma, memory, the unconscious, drives and psychopathologies.

A calling for listening
For those who perceive that not everything is resolved by conscious decision: emotions, implicit memories and bodily patterns can operate before words.

Health and humanities professionals
Psychologists, psychoanalysts, therapists, physicians and educators seeking an interdisciplinary language on emotion, memory, trauma and plasticity.

Seekers of excellence
For those who reject neuroscience as a marketing slogan — integrating the fields responsibly and recognizing their limits.

What you will expand.

The central objective is to offer an introductory and applied understanding of the relationship between neuroscience and psychoanalysis. By the end, the student is expected to have expanded their ability to:

• Understand neuropsychoanalysis as an interdisciplinary field between neuroscience and psychoanalysis.
• Recognize the importance of the brain, the body, emotions and subjective history in the formation of suffering.
• Study brain structures and their possible relationships with psychic functions.
• Understand the relationship between neural development, bonds and psychodynamics.
• Reflect on the unconscious, emotions, feelings and brain processes.
• Study memory, trauma and their effects on psychic life.
• Understand consciousness and psychic processes from an interdisciplinary perspective.
• Study psychopathologies in the light of neuroscience and psychoanalysis.
• Reflect on drives, impulses, sexuality and neurotransmitters.
• Understand neuroplasticity as a possibility of transformation and reorganization.
• Study psychopharmacology from an educational perspective, without prescription or medication guidance.
• Recognize ethical limits: studying neuroscience does not authorize diagnosis, clinical reports, prescription or practice beyond one’s prior training.

Competencies throughout the program.

Integrated mind-brain view
Psychic and brain processes as different dimensions of human experience, not as enemies.

Understanding emotions
Emotions, feelings and the brain circuits of affective life, always linking the body with subjective history.

Trauma and memory
Memory, trauma, emotional traces, repetition and the psychic effects of significant experiences, connecting neuroscience and psychoanalysis.

The unconscious in dialogue
Thinking about the unconscious without reducing it to a simple brain mechanism, but without denying its relationship with the body and affects.

Neuroplasticity
The capacity for reorganization and transformation, without promising instant changes or simplistic cures.

Integrated psychopathologies
Psychic suffering in the light of neuropsychoanalysis: neural processes, bonds, symptoms and subjective history.

Educational psychopharmacology
Notions about medication and mental health — prescription and management are acts reserved for qualified professionals.

Ethics and professional limits
Studying neuroscience and psychoanalysis does not authorize diagnosis, technical documents, prescription or care beyond one’s training.

How the platform works.

The course takes place in Academia Enlevo’s virtual learning environment, with recorded video lessons, support materials, readings, PDFs, books, podcasts, assignments, assessments and performance tracking.

The platform organizes the study journey and lets you progress within the expected timeframe. Being 100% online, the course can be taken from anywhere with internet access.

The intensive program was structured for completion in 8 weeks, with the possibility of completion within up to 6 months, according to the platform’s academic rules.

Access to the course is released after the enrollment is confirmed by the banking institution. Boletos (Brazilian bank payment slips) and other payment methods may have their own clearing times.

160 hours, certificate and transparency.

The course has 160 class hours, with an intensive program of 8 weeks and a maximum completion period of up to 6 months. No final thesis (TCC) is required; completion requires approval in a final assessment. Upon completion, the student receives the certificate issued by Academia Enlevo, presented as recognized by the RNTP.

This is a non-degree professional certification and development course. It is not an undergraduate degree, it is not a lato sensu postgraduate program accredited by the MEC (Ministério da Educação, Brazil’s Ministry of Education), and it does not replace higher education, professional registration, supervision or the legal requirements of regulated professions.

This course does not make the student a neuroscientist, psychologist, physician or psychoanalyst, and does not, by itself, authorize diagnosis, the issuing of clinical reports, the administration of psychological tests, the prescription of medication or autonomous clinical practice.

Academia Enlevo does not promise the cure of disorders, full mastery of complex cases, employment, patients or accreditation. Practice must respect each profession’s prior training, legislation and ethical limits.

16 modules: intertwining mind and brain.

Curriculum of the “Neuropsychoanalysis: Intertwining Minds and Brain” course, structured for an interdisciplinary understanding. It may be updated by the coordination team according to pedagogical objectives.

1 new module per week — gradual, guided release.

What the course allows — and what it does not promise.

This course allows you to study neuroscience, psychoanalysis, neuropsychoanalysis, brain structures, psychic functions, neural development, the unconscious, emotions, memory, trauma, consciousness, psychopathologies, drives, neuroplasticity, sexuality, neurotransmitters, psychopharmacology and brain connectivity.

It can contribute to the professional development of psychologists, psychoanalysts, therapists, physicians, educators, social workers, mental health professionals and students.

The course does not promise to train neuroscientists, does not qualify you to diagnose, does not authorize the prescription of medication, does not permit the issuing of clinical reports, does not replace medical, psychological or psychiatric care, does not replace supervision and does not guarantee employment, patients or accreditation.

The professional use of this knowledge must respect the student’s prior training, current legislation, the ethical limits of practice and the need to refer to qualified professionals when necessary.

Questions about the course in neuroscience.