Brainwave training boosts brain network for cognitive control
October 25, 2012
Topographic plots of mean EEG amplitude change during feedback (relative to rest). Upper and lower panels represent NFB and SHAM groups, with different EEG bandwidths
featured from left to right. Dark red and dark blue colors indicate statistically significant positive and negative changes respectively. (Credit: Tomas Ros et al./NeuroImage)
Researchers at University of Western Ontario and the Lawson Health Research Institute have found that functional changes within a key brain network occur directly after a 30-minute session of noninvasive, neurofeedback training.
Background
Dysfunction of this cognitive-control network has previously been implicated in a range of brain disorders including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, schizophrenia, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder.
During neurofeedback, users learn to control their own brain activity with the help of a brain-sensing device. In the simplest case, this consists of a computer that records brainwaves through surface sensors on the scalp, known as an EEG (electroencephalogram).
The system is then able to process and simultaneously represent a user’s real-time brain activity, displayed from moment-to-moment during a training game on a computer. This setup is known as a neurofeedback loop, because information on brain activity is continually fed-back to a user.
Such real-time feedback allows users to reproduce distinct brain states under physiologically normal conditions, promising to be an innovative way to foster brain changes without adverse effects. This is possible because of neuroplasticity, a natural property of the brain that enables it to reorganize after continual training, resulting from adjustments to its own activity.
Neurofeedback experiment results
“The effects we observed were durable enough to be detected with functional MRI up to 30 minutes after a session of neurofeedback, which allowed us to compare brain and behavioral measures more closely in time,” says Tomas Ros, PhD, lead author of the study, now at University of Geneva.
“We were excited to find that increased metabolic coupling within a key cognitive network was reflected in the individual level of brainwave change provoked by neurofeedback. The same measures were found to be tightly correlated with reductions in mind-wandering during an attention task.
Amazingly, this would imply that the brain’s function may be entrained in a direction that is more attentive and quiet. In other words, our findings speak for the exquisite functional plasticity of the adult brain, whose past activity of little more than 30 minutes ago can condition its future state of processing. This has already been hinted at in meditation research, but we arrived at a direct and explicit demonstration by harnessing a brain-computer interface.”
Senior author Dr. Ruth Lanius, a professor in the Department of Psychiatry at Western’s Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry and a scientist with Lawson Health Research Institute adds: “Compared to the lack of significant findings in the control group that received training with false feedback, our findings are unambiguously supportive of a direct and plastic impact of neurofeedback on a central cognitive-control network, suggesting a promising basis for its use to treat cognitive disorders.
“We hope that our observations will stimulate more research by the science community in order to fully evaluate EEG neurofeedback as a viable and potentially revolutionary approach for the treatment of brain disorders. We are very excited by this promise and anticipate a host of new studies in this direction, particularly for cognitive disorders. Our current work has now moved into the clinical domain to examine whether patients with post-traumatic stress disorder may benefit from this advance.”
Comments (15)
by Sno
Very interesting, I would like to add that you can train you brain for plasticity without an EEG, some types of meditation do just that.
This article really speaks to me, as i noticed that i am able to control a bit more about my brain than most people. For instance, i can induce at will short bursts of euphoria (though it seems to also cause something akin to bipolar disorder if overused), i can inhibit most emotions at will too, or encourage them, create a state of mind where i am very empathic, and even create “ghost” tactile sensations on my body.
And i think we all are able to do that, most people just never try, i guess. The trick for me is to remember how it feels when something happens in my mind and then recreate that. For instance, i learned how to inhibit emotions when i was in high school, i was laughing quietly in the back of a teacher, and when he turned around i had to instantly recover my composure, which i did intuitively, but at the same time a part of me recorded the process and i was able to reproduce it at will later on. And i noticed that the ability to create tactile illusions was greatly increased in intensity when i’m half asleep, bordering on potentially painful when in sleep paralysis.
So basically i’d love to play with EEGs :p
by someday69
The Head’set’- eeg’,,unit…we’ve seen’,,(just ah day’or two’ah’go.) Put One of the EEG’-head’sets ..on….Slip it on’ this model has the wire’less conection to the inter’net’an’You can.,move the curse’r…with Your mind’/brain,,,
Oh’and there’s this super’hyper intel”live’in,,,On the net…..She might’contact’you…or’not…..
by Ralph Dratman
I am trying to concentrate long enough to write “WHERE DO I GET ONE OF THOSE?”
by Uri
how do i have this training ?
by asiwel
Yes, this is a very exciting study. This sort of thing has been theorized about for years and evidence of neuroplasticity has been obvious. It is the ability to actually, observe, understand, and influence the actual mechanisms in play that is more remarkable very day. This kind of almost “direct” biofeedback has, for example, clear applications for prosthetic control interfaces .. and in helping to facilitate the brain’s ability to use these devices in the same way it previously used muscles and sensed tactile feddbacks. This sort of “training” more or less equates with instruction to guide the brain in “growing” new appropriate neural networks for specific peripheral control purposes.
by Shawn
With enough time and training you can alter your brain state from one of perpertually being X to something else. As mentioned, meditation has done this without the quantitatively visible neurofeedback as seen on a computer monitor.
by Dan
I read the info about Muse on its website, and I still don’t see clear guidelines on how to use it. Are there any other devices available on the market that could be used to improve cognitive functions based on this kind of research? I completely unaware of their existence and I’d like to know if there’s more to it that Muse
by Ian Clarke
They will be releasing more details about Muse on Monday. As for how to use it? Errm, you put it on. :-) Any other instructions will depend on the software used with it.
by Bernard Garner
Can we have a link to some vendors of this stuff, please?
by Ian Clarke
Coupled with Muse, this presumably could help people at home achieve desired states of mind, or heighten their cognitive function. Perhaps even diagnose disfunction.
by Delta
Seems like such an obvious thing to have been done decades ago? Why was it not done then? Am I missing somethig?
by Editor
Neurofeedback (a.k.a. biofeedback) has been used for decades. This study focused on whether it could in fact cause functional changes in the brain.
by Bri
When people use those EEG sensing headsets, are they forming constructive feedback loops, or are they promoting random brainwave training? In other words. This system creates constructive brain development. Is using EEG as a device controller akin to junk food for the brain?
by Sam Wallace
This is a very interesting study about how direct neurofeedback can improve your behavior and cognitive functioning. I think getting feedback in any form (even verbal work performance from your boss) makes you rethink and modify your behavior in a way that ends up making functional changes to your brain. But this is definitely an approach that is a significant improvement over traditional methods.
I think Internet glasses like the ones that Google is developing could incorporate such a system. It could possibly even be added into a dashboard overlay or included in a more subtle form where AI tracking programs alert you that you are surrounded by people or in an environment that will distract you from past experiences. Nevertheless, I would not want to have the ADHD part of my brain completely removed, and I can totally think of some evil totalitarian uses for that as well.
I can’t speak for the other disorders, but there are both good and bad aspects of ADHD that I think business leaders who have been diagnosed like David Neeleman and Paul Orfalea clearly exemplify. I am not one of those people with ADHD that pretends that it is not a disorder or a magic creativity gift, but I definitely think different than other people. I think the abnormal way in which a minority of people with ADHD have successfully learned how to cope with the disorder and utilize the divergent thinking process to there advantage should be studied by neuroscientist before the disorder is able to be completely cured.
I think people with normally functioning brains could benefit from similar methods geared at making them temporarily think out side of the preverbal box as well. A human machine interface with AI technology from a few years our with a well designed architecture and overlays could be an alternate route to the singularity as predicted by Verier Vinge. What do you think?
by Lee Garlilngton, PhD
As the Founder of the Largest Company making experimental Biofeedback devices in the period 1970-1977, We never observed any researchers who found applications for EEG feedback. EMG and Temperature were marginally successful but we closed our doors with huge losses in 1977!