Brainwave entrainment is a method to stimulate the brain into entering a specific state by using a pulsing sound, light, or electromagnetic field. The pulses elicit the brain’s ‘frequency following’ response, encouraging the brainwaves to align to the frequency of a given beat.
beta waves | meditation music mp3 free download
How a Little Known Brain Technology Can Change Your Life
If you’ve spent any considerable amount of time on the Internet, you’ve very likely come across websites selling meditation or hypnosis CDs using a technology called “binaural waves,” which are claimed to be able to guide your brain into very deep states of meditation. And like many people, you may have asked whether or not the use of binaural waves is a pseudoscience. To help solve the puzzle of binaural waves, we’ll first take a quick but compelling look at the scientific evidence for the capacity of binaural waves to shift brain functioning, and afterward explore how they are able to do so.
In 1997, D. Brian Brady of Northern Arizona University found that the use of binaural waves was positively correlated with higher degrees of theta-band activity (4 – 7 Hz) in five out of six participants. R. C. Kinnerly conducted a double-blind study in which binaural waves in the beta range (15 – 35 Hz) were found to be effective for facilitating memory recall, attention span and motor task endurance. Likewise, J. D. Lane and associates of Duke University Medical Center and University of Virginia found binaural waves in the beta range to be correlated with greater attentional arousal and control as well as enhanced human performance. Finally, H. C. Ossebaard found that, by using brainwave entrainment for relaxation, long-term stress was significantly decreased.
So how can something as abstract as “phantom tones” have such a positive impact on your brain? First, it’s helpful to realize that the brain is rhythmic in nature, which means that neuronal groups in the brain fire on and off in rhythmic fashion. And by using sound pulses in a similar rhythmic fashion, it is possible to gently entrain the rhythms of the brain to align with the rhythms of the sound source. For centuries various cultures have intuitively recognized this phenomenon in their diverse uses of music to evoke altered states of consciousness, as in shamanic drumming and Gregorian chant.
Brainwave entrainment programs are especially able to affect the brain’s electrical rhythms because of the unique manner in which they are formed. When two slightly different tones are introduced, one to the left ear and the other to the right ear, the phase difference produces standing waves in the form of amplitude-modulated pulses. In other words, the standing waves are actually created inside the human brain, which in turn influences the brain’s electrical activity. And by strategically using these waves to evoke healthy brainwave states, significant improvements can be made to attentional disorders, wellbeing and human performance.
Brainwave entrainment is a method to stimulate the brain into entering a specific state by using a pulsing sound, light, or electromagnetic field. The pulses elicit the brain’s ‘frequency following’ response, encouraging the brainwaves to align to the frequency of a given beat.
This ‘frequency following’ response of brainwave entrainment can be seen in action with those prone to epilepsy. If a strobe flashes at their seizure frequency, the brain will ‘entrain’ to the flashing light, resulting in a seizure.
On the positive side, this same mechanism is commonly used to induce many brainwave states; such as a trance, enhanced focus, relaxation, meditation or sleep induction. The brainwave entrainment effectively pushes the entire brain into a certain state.
Brainwave entrainment works for almost everyone. It is a great way to lead your mind into states that you might usually have difficulty reaching, allowing you to experience what those states feel like.
THE HYPE
There is a lot of marketing hype around brainwave entrainment. It is sold with promises of increasing IQ, promoting weight loss, ‘mind-tripping’, enhancing creativity, concentration, inducing spiritual states and more.
While these claims are not entirely true, they are not altogether false either. In practice, the claims are based on an overly-simplistic view of how the brain and the brainwaves function.
THE RUB
People are very seldom deficient in a certain brainwave type in all areas of their brain. Usually the distribution is much spottier, with an excess in one area and a deficiency in another.
We are all different, especially when it comes to the distribution of our brainwaves. Boosting a certain brainwave state may be beneficial for one person, and emotionally uncomfortable for another. Without knowing each person’s starting position, entrainment can be rather ‘hit and miss’.
If brainwave entrainment leaves you with unwanted side-effects (see below) or discomfort, you’re probably encouraging a range of brainwaves that are already excessive in some area of your brain. The way around this is to get a brain map to see what your brain’s strengths and weaknesses are, and see what (if any) brainwaves could use some encouragement.