Hypomania Hypomania would theoretically be related to an excessive activation of the left side of the brain relative to the right, as depression would be related to excessive activation of the right.  I teach that HEG should be used at least on both sides of the forehead in every session. Activating the left tends to help brighten mood.  Right tends to help with emotional stability and social integration (around F8).  The only thing I’m especially aware of is that training […]

Immune Response There’s a fair amount of evidence that autoimmune and immune issues are related to alpha levels. Check them to see if they are high or low and train to move them. There is some research (Val Brown’s only published paper, I believe) linking effective alpha production with improved immune function.  His was a case study of Lyme Disease in which he got good results.

Sampling Rate (samples per second) The sampling rate is the number of times each second the amplifier grabs a sample of brain activity and brings it to the software.  It shouldn’t affect the frequency (Hz) or amplitude (microvolts) at all, except that perhaps in very high frequencies a very low sampling rate might show less detail or, in extreme cases, cause a problem called aliasing. In electrical engineering there is the Nyquist Sampling Theorem, which states that a filter can […]

Two-Person Synchrony Training This is not something done very often, but training two people together to increase their brainwave synchrony can be done. Keep in mind, though, that there’s a big difference between doing alpha training or alpha theta training with two people and doing synchrony training. You’ll need something that allows you to send the same stereo signal to each of two headphones at the same time. Alpha training–or any frequency-band training–is easily be done with the FRE2C design. […]

Impulse Control For impulse control problems, I would also work at Cz, using the Frequency 1C design, training down 2-38 Hz and perhaps one other band that is dominant (e.g. alpha) and training to increase 9-13 Hz or 12-16 Hz, depending on where SMR appears to be.  It’s likely you’ll have to slide the frequency down to find an exact frequency for SMR.

Intuition In my approach to the EEG, I see beta (neuron-based) activity as being conscious and more likely logical/rational/sequential. When beta stays off and the cortex receives more freely the frequency of the subconscious, intuitive thought tends to occur more frequently. To train to “produce” intuitive thought, however, may be counter-productive. You can work an algebraic theorem most any time, but you have to leave the door open and allow intuitive flashes to arrive–and value them enough not to shove […]

Irritable Bowel Syndrome IBS is an autonomic rebound effect, related to excess tone in the autonomic nervous system. I would look at the assessment and train for whatever basic level issues you find. You need to bring down the stress level and unwind the parasympathetic system, and the problem (in my experience +/- 5 cases) goes away.

Jet Lag From 2001 through the beginning of 2007, I traveled about half of each year, pretty much all around the world doing workshops. The longest trip was three months without returning home. It was not uncommon for me to do west coast Alaska, then Washington, then Zurich, then Sydney and then Seoul. I would leave a place after the workshop that ran that day, travel and arrive, then start the first of 8-10 days the day after I arrived. […]

Learning Disabilities In the back of the head, especially at P3 and P4 and T5 and T6, the brain is integrating sensory information before sending forward to the prefrontal cortex to be processed.  Dominance of slow activity there can be related to problems with sensory integration and learning problems.  Some functions of working memory are also handled in the parietals.  My inclination is to look at the sites and see what appears to be blocking activation (sometimes alpha, sometimes theta and […]

Meditation Meditation is a process of allowing the brain to enter into the highly-efficient phase-synchrony state and stay there.  Alpha synchrony has long been recognized as the state of still mind/present in the moment–the meditative state, but also a peak performance, zone or flow state used by athletes, performers or others to perform tasks over which they have achieved mastery.  Gamma synchrony has more recently been identified as a state in which intercommunication among areas of the brain happens rapidly […]