From: peterson_at_d...
Date: 2001-04-14 00:58:21
Again I would like to share my response to a back-channeled query
with the group. I was asked about peak performance protocols, and
replied:
I'm not really an expert in the peak performance area, and I suggest
that you repeat your query to Rob Kall in the buildcheapeeg group and
see what he has to say. I think he knows more than I do, since he
focuses pretty heavily on the whole EEG area, whereas I'm a
psychologist who mostly uses alpha-theta training with post-traumatic
stress disorder and other clinical cases. However, I'm glad to share
what I do know. First, a technical point: entrainment is not the
same thing as training. Entrainment devices, such as light/sound
machines, hemi-sync tapes, etc. induce the brain to put out the
desired frequency patterns (for as long as the stimulus is
presented), whereas biofeedback training involves teaching the person
to put out the desired pattern at will.
For peak performance, alpha training is no doubt the most common as
well as the simplest. I seem to recall that the Colorado State
Patrol made Lexicor PODs available to their troopers and found it
very useful, although I doubt that they continued to offer it after
the study was done.
If you have a BrainMaster, it has the side-by-side bar display that I
mentioned in one of my postings. Anna Wise wrote a book called "the
High Performance Mind" in which she discussed how to use this pattern
in training for various purposes, including different kinds of peak
performance. In fact, if you can get the two sides of the display to
look symmetrical, that is synchrony: both sides of the brain doing
the same thing. If you can get the two alpha bars to stick out
further to the right and left than the beta bar above and the theta
bar below, that is enhancing alpha synchrony. The Wise book is quite
widely available, and I believe I saw it in a paperback edition not
too long ago. I bet Borders or Amazon would have it.
The alpha synchrony/peak performance target might look something like
this (If formatting differences don't turn the little diagram into
garbage):
XX|XX beta
XXXXXXXX|XXXXXXXX alpha
XXX|XXX theta
XXXXXXXXX|XXXXXXXXX delta
--Jim
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