Hemi-Sync® Journal 1991-1 (Winter)

(Hemi-Sync® Journal, Vol. IX, No. 1, Winter 1991) SENSORY ORGANIZATION AND ATTENTION: A PERSONAL JOURNEY WITH HEMI-SYNC® by Suzanne E. Morris, Ph.D. Suzanne Evans Morris, a speech-language pathologist and educator in private practice near Charlottesville, Virginia, is nationally and internationally known for her work with children with developmental disabilities. Dr. Morris maintains a practice which includes direct clinical work, continuing-education workshops, development of clinical materials, and clinical research. She is the director of New Visions, which sponsors innovative professional workshops and provides family-oriented clinical services. She has been a Professional Division member since 1984 and is a member of the TMI Board of Advisors. For the past twenty-five years I have worked professionally with children whose lives were influenced by a sensorimotor disability. The specific diagnoses of these youngsters varied, including labels such as cerebral palsy, autism, mental retardation, attention deficit disorder, and specific learning disability. One characteristic was common for the majority—a difficulty perceiving, organizing, or integrating sensory information, and a reduced ability to focus attention for effective learning. These children have been my teachers who have allowed me to learn a great deal about my own ability to process information and to be attentive and focused when I desired to be. They have taught me much about learning environments that reduce or enhance the ability to process information efficiently. I have learned from them because they constantly remind me that all of life is a continuum. What the world labels a disability is simply a behavior at the far end of the continuum that tends to interfere with full participation in life. As I understand the issues and challenges in their lives, I gain greater insight into my own. SENSORY INTEGRATION IN DAILY LIFE Sensory input plays a critical role in brain function. Sensations from hearing, vision, taste, smell, touch, pressure, and movement provide the input to the brain that is organized for movement, cognition, and learning. The richness of the sensory environment and the interactive experience of the individual with the environment contribute to the growth of intelligence. Sensory integration is a term used to describe the way in which the brain sorts out and organizes for our use the many sensations we receive. It enables us to focus attention selectively and reduce awareness of sensory input that is temporarily unimportant. It allows us to “put together” parts to create a whole. It attaches meaning to sensations through comparing them with past experiences. It enables high levels of motor coordination. It is the basis of perception. There is a continuum of skill in sensory processing and integration. Individuals experience varying degrees of sensory organization and integration. None of us organizes sensations perfectly or consistently. A high level of sensory integration may enable an individual to be a skilled gymnast, an artist, or a business entrepreneur. Most of us have average abilities in this area. The normally functioning person with low normal sensory integration may be physically clumsy or dislike being in a noisy environment. Each of us has a range of internal variability in the skill with which we organize and respond to our sensory world. Our language contains expressions which reflect this range of personal experience. Comments such as “I just couldn’t get it all together,” “I felt especially touchy about that,” or “I feel as if I’m on overload,” reflect our experience with the lower ranges of sensory processing and integration. For most of us this is a transient state triggered by fatigue, overwork, or a situation which places high demands on the ability to focus attention and reduce distractions. The threshold for moving into sensory overload with reduced sensory integrative skills varies greatly among individuals. One person may experience a high level of energy and a normal ability to focus the attention at a complex business meeting or a convention. Another person in the same environment may experience fatigue and confusion. When children or adults experience sensory integrative difficulties, the brain does not process or organize the flow of sensory impulses in a way that gives them precise information about themselves and the world. Learning is difficult and individuals often feel uncomfortable with themselves and have difficulty coping with stress and demands. This often results in additional emotional or behavioral difficulties. If this is a temporary situation, the individual may feel frustrated, discouraged, or antisocial. If these experiences recur frequently or in specific situations, situations that are associated with reduced functioning, they may be consciously avoided. NEUROLOGICAL ORGANIZATION AND SENSORY INTEGRATION Sensory integration occurs at all levels of the central nervous system. However, the brain stem (including the midbrain, pons, and medulla oblongata) appears to play the most significant role in sensory processing. The brain stem and the thalamus receive sensory information from every sensory modality. Information passing through these structures is modified, integrated with other sensory information, and directed to the brain’s cortex. As multiple sensory information impinges upon the brain, a finely tuned filter system comes into play. Sensory input pertinent to the individual’s inner needs and goals reaches a level of consciousness. Input which is less important or distracting is dampened down centrally. The reticular formation in the brain stem (which plays the central role in this filter system) is often considered the master control mechanism of the central nervous system. It helps the brain to focus on one type of sensory input by inhibiting other types of input. This allows the individual to focus attention, and reduces the level of distraction. Children who have been labeled hyperactive or individuals temporarily on sensory overload are unsuccessful in filtering out irrelevant information. They are pulled from one experience to the next and are unable to maintain the focus of attention needed for successful learning. If the overloading situation is sustained or occurs frequently, the individual usually discovers ways of reducing or deadening the sensory input. An autistic child may retreat to an inner world through organizing or hypnotic activities such as rocking, rhythmical spinning of objects or flapping fingers, avoiding eye contact, or hyperventilating breathing patterns. A normal adult, experiencing a reduction in the ability to filter sensory input and poor sensory integration may use variations of the same strategies. They may find eye contact more difficult, move to an inattentive world of daydreaming, or use alcohol or drugs to deaden the senses and find greater internal calmness. HEMI-SYNC® AND SENSORY INTEGRATION Hemi-Sync is an excellent example of the sensory integrative process of the brain. Two independent auditory signals are integrated in a way that produces a whole (i.e., Hemi-Sync,) which is different from each of the separate parts. Initial processing and integration occurs in the brain stem. In addition, the tendency toward synchronization of the right and left hemispheres appears to enhance attention, sensory and extrasensory awareness, and intuitive processing, and to increase successful adaptation to personal experiences. Since 1981 I have been using Hemi-Sync with young children who experience sensorimotor and sensory integrative disabilities. Both clinical experience and preliminary research indicate that the addition of Hemi-Sync signals (containing frequencies which produce more theta patterns in the brain) to background music increases the child’s focus of attention, calms the emotions, and creates a mental set of open receptivity. These responses are consistent with those reported by adults using Hemi-Sync tapes during their GATEWAY VOYAGE® experience. However, an unexpected response was seen in children who, prior to Hemi-Sync therapy, experienced severe difficulties with sensory organization and integration. These children showed major difficulties accepting touch to their bodies. Gentle hugs, light calming strokes or pats, or accidental touching usually elicited strong aversive reactions. The child would push the touching person away, screech or cry, hit the person, or withdraw and begin a series of stereotyped self-stimulatory behaviors. They did not like to get their hands messy, have their hair washed or combed, or sit outside in the wind and grass. Many of the children became frightened and disoriented with movement or changes of position. They tended to increase these behaviors in complex sensory environments. A busy household, a school classroom or cafeteria, or a trip to the grocery store would reduce the child’s ability to function and would increase the frequency and strength of the behaviors used to cope. Because of the intensity of their reactions to their environment, most of these children were labeled autistic, profoundly retarded, or emotionally disturbed. When Hemi-Sync was added to therapy and classroom environments, these children responded in a totally different way. Eye contact increased. They accepted touch and became curious and interested in the sensory input. They were no longer startling and putting their hands over their ears to sounds that were previously upsetting. The amount of frustrated screeching and crying was reduced, and more functional communication emerged. There was a reduction in behaviors previously used by the child to cope with sensory overload. The children stopped rocking, spinning, and flapping and began to pay attention. A new set of questions emerged from these experiences. It appeared that the Hemi-Sync signals enhanced the child’s ability to organize and integrate sensory information. This resulted in an increase in the ability to focus attention, to discriminate specific sensory properties, and to filter unwanted sensory input. What were these children telling us about the use of Hemi- Sync in our own lives? A PERSONAL EXPERIENCE: HEMI-SYNC AND SENSORY ORGANIZATION For most of my life I have experienced sharp swings in my ability to organize the sensory environment. I have always functioned best in quiet spaces. When sensory complexity is reduced, I am able to think more clearly, and to be more creative. It is as if a reduction in external stimulation allows inner connections to be stronger, and increases my awareness of inner messages and intuitive insights. Many noisy and complex experiences caused fatigue and internal frustration as I was growing up. The noise and natural exuberance of a football game, the chatter of a party, the external complexity of a business meeting or convention triggered an intense experience of overload. I was painfully aware of inner confusion, of misunderstanding what people said, of poor memory, of reduced eye contact, of being physically and emotionally touchy, and of the body-aching fatigue that usually resulted from such encounters. The fatigue and a desire to go to sleep were always present, and as they became stronger, I was aware of even poorer abilities to cope with the situation. I participated in a limited way in these activities, but was always the first to go home, or the one who fell asleep in the middle of a party. I was painfully shy, and very much of an introvert. Some people described me as antisocial. In quieter situations I was comfortable and outgoing. The world seemed to make more sense, and relationships with other people were easy and pleasurable. My initial participation in the GATEWAY VOYAGE® in the spring of 1981 facilitated a different