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increase was 33 points. Othmer has also found dramatic improvements in visual retention and
auditory memory, and the subjects showed major gains in reading and arithmetic. In a one-year
follow-up study, the trainees showed major improvements in self-esteem and concentration and
significant improvements in such areas as handwriting, school grades, sleep, irritability, organization,
hyperactivity, verbal expression, and headaches…Amazingly the improvements seem to be
permanent. (Hutchison, 1994, p. 360-361).
These results warrant further research and beckon for educational application. How many special
education classes and special education students could benefit from significant improvements in
levels of hyperactivity, irritability, organization, and self-esteem? How many mainstream classes and
students would appreciate and benefit from increased auditory memory and visual retention, IQ gains
of 23 percent and improvements in verbal expression, reading and arithmetic? Pursuit of beta brain-
wave training is clearly warranted for its potential to help students and teachers alike in achieving the
goals of quality education.
Barriers of Cost to EEG Brianwave Training
As a tool to facilitate education, Beta training would seem to hold the same promise as alpha-theta
training does for alcoholism. Indeed considering the proliferation of destructive drug use among
current student populations, alpha-theta training might also be of significant interest in an educational
setting. Unfortunately, in an educational environment financial resources limit making available EEG
biofeedback brain-wave training to those who could benefit from it.
A major limitation in the application of EEG biofeedback training has been the cost of the equipment
and the limited context under which it can be used. It is hard to imagine a classroom where all twenty
students are seated with electrodes on their heads and a biofeedback therapist attending to each of
them. Even as a lab where the students may go for one period a day, the cost would be prohibitive.
The EEG biofeedback equipment can cost between $4,000 and $20,000 (Hutchison, 1994) per
machine. Furthermore, EEG biofeedback requires the one on one attention of highly trained
personnel. Cost for the therapists and equipment precludes EEG biofeedback training from practical
use for most educational settings.
Alternatives to EEG Biofeedback Training
Fortunately, EEG biofeedback training is not the only way to accomplish the EEG training. Audio and
visual driving of brain wave frequencies without a feedback loop has been found to be an effective
method of performing the same brain-wave training. Currently available to the public for prices
ranging from $99 to $350 (Tools for Exploration Vol. V, No. 2 Summer/Fall 1994), are Light and
Sound (LS) machines.
These devices use audio and photic driving to alter the users brain waves to the desired frequency
and amplitude patterns. Dr. Ochs EEG biofeedback device uses an LS machine as the part of the
equipment which drives the alterations in brain-wave frequencies. His device becomes a form of EEG
BWT because of the feedback loop through the computer and EEG machine.
An LS machine consist of set of headphones, blackout glasses with small lights placed over each
eye, and a small computer. The computer controls the strobe frequency of the lights, matching them
with the frequency of auditory monaural and binaural beats. The LS machines are not only cheaper to
purchase than EEG BWT training equipment, but are also cheaper to operate. Unlike EEG
biofeedback BWT training they do not require the one on one attention of highly trained personnel
(Hutchison, 1994).
Comparable Results with Light and Sound Brain-wave Training and EEG Brain-wave Training
Russell, and Carter, have been using LS brain-wave training with learning disabled (LD), and ADHD
children for beta brain-wave training (Russell & Carter, 1990). The purpose of the LS beta training is
to increase the amplitude and frequency of beta brain wave activity in the frontal lobes. ADHD has
been found to be “linked to abnormally slow brain-wave activity in specific parts of the brain, including
the premotor cortex and the superior prefrontal cortex, which are used when people pay attention, or
keep still” (Hutchison, 1994, p. 358).
A significant difference in the verbal and performance subtests of the Weschler Intelligence Scale for
Children is a diagnostic indicator of possible organicity, ADHD or learning disability (Aiken, 1988).
What Dr. Russell and Dr. Howard noted in their LD or ADHD subjects was that whichever subtest was
suppressed in the pre-test was significantly raised in the post-test (after the Beta training).
Groups that began with low verbal IQ scores had pronounced gains in verbal IQ, spelling, and
arithmetic. Groups that began with high verbal but low performance IQ showed significant gains in
non-verbal IQ, reading, spelling and memory…they concluded that the degree of significant
improvement in functioning is related to the number of treatment sessions. (Hutchison, 1994, p. 362)
It can be seen that this intervention is normalizing the spread of the WISC subtest scores and
apparently following Dr. Ochs hypothesis. The brain-wave training is permitting an individual with
impaired functioning to be normalized and enter a state of unimpaired functioning on measures
normally associated with organicity.
Russell and Carter suggest that use of LS devices and EEG training “may stimulate either the
successful establishing of new neural pathways in the brain or re- establishing of old pathways that
have been disrupted” (Hutchison, 1994, p. 363).
The re-establishment of old disrupted neural pathways sounds in essence the same as the primary
mode of action for brain wave training hypothesized by Ochs. But if beta, and perhaps all brain-wave
training, is doing more than just re-establishing old pathways (if it is actually creating new neural
pathways as Russell and Carter suggest) then might it also be of value to expand normal mental
capacities?
In the study of ADHD children conducted by Russell and Carter, significant increases in IQ scores
were noted as the result of beta training raising the depressed subtest on the WISC. Othmer also
found in his beta training biofeedback that ADHD subjects IQ scores rose significantly. These were
both populations with impaired functioning whose rise in IQ scores can be viewed as the probable
result of gaining an unimpaired level of functioning where before there had been an impaired level of
functioning.
But if beta, and perhaps all brain wave training, is actually creating new neural pathways as a
secondary mode of action, and if, as a tertiary mode of action, is stimulating the production of
beneficial neurotransmitters as suggested by the work of Dr. Meg Patterson and Dr. Ifor Capel, then it
would be reasonable to assume that brain-wave training might actually increase the level of
functioning of an unimpaired subject.
Cranial Electrical Stimulation
Research suggestive of just such a hypothesis may be found in the investigation of cranial electrical
stimulation (CES). CES is a technique which introduces the desirable frequencies by low level
electrical currents applied to the cranium. The medical college at the University of Wisconsin
conducted a study on a commercially available CES device, the BT-5. The purpose of the study was
to determine if the BT-5 would reduce student anxiety during final exams. The unexpected results
were increases in IQ by twenty to thirty points and a conclusion by the researchers that the “BT-5
(CES) stimulation appears to enhance neural efficiency…” (Ostrander & Schroeder, 1991, pp. 265-
266).
As with the other forms of brain wave training, CES has a history of research showing significant
improvements in individuals with an impaired level of functioning. Like the Peniston protocol, CES
brain wave training has had profound beneficial effects on the impaired mental and social functioning
of alcoholics and addicts. CES has enabled some addicts and alcoholics to go cold turkey without any
withdrawal symptoms, apparently through the stimulation of the production of beneficial endorphins
(Ostrander & Schroeder, 1991). CES brain wave training has been found to be effective in the
treatment of impaired short term memory in alcoholics. With severe alcoholism, it can take as long as
eight years of total abstinence before short term memory returns to its unimpaired level of functioning.
With CES brain wave training, it can take as little as five days (Ostrander & Schroeder, 1991).
If neural efficiency is increased, if new neural pathways can be created and if an impaired state of
homeostatic functioning can be reset to a fully functional one, then all of these technologies and
interventions represent a staggering opportunity to improve the opportunities and quality of life for
broad populations of individuals through brain-wave training.
The results that Russell and Carter have obtained with a form of beta brain-wave training which does
not involve EEG biofeedback is apparently of the same calibre as Othmer has received with beta
brain-wave training involving EEG biofeedback. The demonstrated effectiveness of both approaches
validates that one does not need the EEG feedback loop for the brain-wave training to be effective.
This demonstration of comparable results means that the significant potential of brain-wave training
does not have to be limited by the fiscal constraints of EEG biofeedback brain-wave training. Despite
the lowered cost of the LS brain-wave training devices verses the EEG biofeedback equipment, the
LS machines are expensive enough that in an educational setting access may be a significant
problem.
There is one other more cost effective method of conducting brain-wave training: binaural- beat audio
signals. In the LS machines, the brain waves are altered through the use of light and sound drivers. In
binaural-beat audio signal brain-wave training, only sound driving is used to alter brain waves.
Binaural-beat audio signals are the final technology we will discuss and the technology under
investigation in this study.
Binaural-Beat Audio Signals
Binaural-beat signals utilize a powerful form of audio driving to alter brain- wave frequencies. In
specific forms of intervention, frequencies could be presented to individuals for brain-ave training in
essentially the same manner as LS brain wave training.
Binaural-beats signals (BBS’s) were first observed by the German scientist H.W. Dove in 1839. In its
simplest form BBS’s consist of two pure tones of different pitch being presented to each ear. Before
the advent of electronic occilators, researchers used tuning forks to produce the tones. Heard in the
open air (monaural beats), the sound will wax and wane due to wave interference. A subject can hear
these monaural beats with just one ear if need be. Binaural beats occur when the tones are
presented separately to each ear. The sound no longer waxes and wanes in the room, but is heard
inside the subject’s head as a tone synthesized by the brain which does not exist outside of the
subject’s head (Oster, 1973).
The brain synthesizes the two sounds into a single experienced tone which seems to originate from
the center of the subjects head. The synthesizing of the two tones into one experienced tone
produces a phenomena known as hemispheric synchronization, where the electrical activity of the
two hemispheres of the brain unite into a single synchronous pattern with an overall frequency at the
frequency of the difference between the two original tones. If the difference between the two tones
matches a particular brain wave state, such as 4-8 Hz (Theta), then the overall brain activity will tend
to match that frequency, and hence enter that brain wave state. This phenomena is referred to as the