RE: Re: daydreaming during neurofeedback sessions...

[Guest guest]

I'm wondering whether a dilution of the "overfocus" that is sometimes part and parcel of ADD would be experienced as daydreaming??? Also, it's my observation that sleepiness that occurs during HEG training is often a sign of fatigue. My personal practice is to discontinue if someone gets sleepy - I like thinking about the sleeping HEGer!

-------------- Original message from "Wheelihan-Dasher" : --------------

It's interesting that you feel you do better while daydreaming.My son calls HEG "the relaxing brain training." Once he fell asleep early in a short segment while training and I let him go on for a while and his HEG level increased the whole time, better than ever! I wonder if it's a brain style thing.Rah>> ...> > what's interesting, is that i tend to do better (achieve higher > segment HEG gain %)while daydreaming than when i'm focused on the BE > design, ...

[Guest guest]

What is HEG training?

From:

braintrainer [mailto:braintrainer ] On Behalf Of Merrifield, Ph.D.

Sent: Thursday, January 10, 2008

6:38 PM

To: braintrainer

Subject: Re: Re:

daydreaming during neurofeedback sessions...

I'm

wondering whether a dilution of the " overfocus " that is sometimes

part and parcel of ADD would be experienced as daydreaming??? Also,

it's my observation that sleepiness that occurs during HEG training is often a

sign of fatigue. My personal practice is to discontinue if someone

gets sleepy - I like thinking about the sleeping HEGer!

--------------

Original message from " Wheelihan-Dasher " <wheelihan82hotmail>:

--------------

It's interesting that you feel you do better while

daydreaming.

My son calls HEG " the relaxing brain training. " Once he fell asleep

early in a short segment while training and I let him go on for a

while and his HEG level increased the whole time, better than ever!

I wonder if it's a brain style thing.

Rah

>

> ...

>

> what's interesting, is that i tend to do better (achieve higher

> segment HEG gain %)while daydreaming than when i'm focused on the BE

> design, ...

[Guest guest]

Thanks

From:

braintrainer [mailto:braintrainer ] On Behalf Of Van Deusen

Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008

4:13 AM

To: braintrainer

Subject: Re: Re:

daydreaming during neurofeedback sessions...

Kris,

HEG stands for Hemo EncephaloGraphy--training to increase blood

levels and blood oxygenation, which improve the metabolic capacity of parts of

the brain. It is primarily done on the pre-frontal cortex, the area

behind the forehead, which is the executive center of the brain. One of

the greatest benefits of HEG compared with EEG training is that it does not

measure electrical signals. Training with EEG in the front of the head

places the electrodes/sensors very close to the eye muscles, which produce

large electrical signals when a client blinks or moves his/her eyes (muscles

work with bio-electric signals just like the heart and brain). The EEG

amplifier and/or software can't tell the difference between eyeblink signals

and brain signals, so it includes these eyeblinks in the EEG we are

training. It is called " artifact " because it is not really from

the brain. It is difficult to avoid this eyeblink artifact when

electrodes are placed hear the front of the head--and especially when they are

on the forehead/prefrontal area.

HEG, since it measures blood perfusion or oxygen levels, is not

affected by electrical activity, so you can blink as much as you wish and have

no effect on the signal. Hence, for the many people who seek brain

training who have a lot of slowing in their prefrontal areas, and thus have

difficulty with planning, organizing, attention, impulse control or other

executive functions, HEG can be a very helpful training approach. The

more easily brain cells can get their blood supply, the more oxygen and glucose

they have available to them, the faster they are able to fire when needed.

EEG has a fairly steep learning curve: there is a lot to learn about

finding sites, placing electrodes to get a good signal, all the various

different training options, performing assessments, etc. HEG is pretty

simple to get started with, and it's hard to make many mistakes in working with

it. So it can be an excellent place for a new trainer to start--or an

excellent addition for an experienced EEG trainer.

There are two HEG systems available: pIR (stands for Passive

InfraRed), developed by Jeff Carmen, and nIR (stands for near InfraRed),

developed by Hershel Toomim. pIR measures the infrared temperature

changes on the forehead (higher infrared temperatures indicate more metabolic

activity) and is almost always done at Fpz in the center of the forehead.

nIR measures the degree of red blood at the surface of the brain (indicating it

is oxygenated) and it also measures infrard temperature changes. It is

often used in 2 or 3 different sites in a single training session.

The main thing to remember when you do HEG is that oftentimes less is

more. Over training--training too long--can stress the prefrontal area

and result in headaches, agressive behavior, sleepiness, etc. Usually

trainers start with around 10 minutes in a session and work up to around 30

minutes. There is some evidence that training once every 4 days is the

optimum frequency for HEG>

You can find some HEG equipment at http://www.brain-trainer.com/equipment/ (look

at Pocket A3 and Pendant-HEG).

Pete

On Jan 10, 2008 11:13 PM, Kristiansson Roth <kristiansculptbellsouth (DOT) net>

wrote:

What is HEG training?

..

--

Van Deusen

pvdtlcgmail

http://www.brain-trainer.com

305/433-3160

The Learning Curve, Inc.