Interestingly, ADD can manifest many of the same symptoms as head injuries. Some of the common symptoms are: hyperactivity, high distractibility, impulsivity, poor judgment, short attention span, memory impairment, stimuli boundedness and poor motivation. These two conditions also share similar EEG irregularities (-i.e. excessive slow wave activity). Of even greater interest is the fact that EEG training can improve these very symptoms whether the cause is ADD or head injury even though in the latter there is actual structural damage to the brain. The implication is that there is some fundamental form of disregulation within the brain resulting from either condition which manifests these common behavioral symptoms. Regardless of the cause, disordered behavior is highly correlated with a disorderly EEG pattern. In terms of the actual EEG, the signature of disorder is characterized by excessive slow wave production coupled with a lack of midrange activity.
One might get the impression that changing something as fundamental as brain regulation should be left to medical science. The fact is we alter our brain wave activity all the time without thinking about it. Any time we shift our attention from one task to another, interact with people, relax, yawn, become anxious, eat or experience any kind of a change in our consciousness, it is registered in the brain wave activity. EEG training merely brings the ordinarily unobservable aspects of brain function into the realm of observability for the purpose of learning to consciously control them. When actually doing EEG training, the child or adult simply sits in a chair and plays a video game. The primary difference between an arcade game and EEG training is that when training brain wave activity, one scores a point by consciously altering the various frequencies in the brain rather than manipulating a joy stick (-i.e. you don't use your hands). Electrodes are attached to the scalp with a harmless electrode paste and the person is given verbal instructions such as "get Pacman to move" (Pacman is one of the video games used in EEG biofeedback). We will often coach the child by instructing them to "remain wide awake and completely relaxed". In this state the brain wave activity moves toward the desired pattern of reduced theta activity and increased midrange activity whereby the trainee scores points on the game. Thus in continuing to play the game, the trainee gets progressively more familiar with this new state of consciousness, namely, that of being alert and completely relaxed at the same time. To many children and adults this is a totally new experience! For many people, the only time they are completely relaxed is during sleep.
The following is a summary of some of our work with 12 children in one of the residential treatment centers in Los Angeles. Working in out patient settings brings with it some very special complications. First of all, many of these kids came from very dysfunctional and chaotic homes characterized by physical and/or sexual abuse as well as severe neglect. The problem becomes compounded when several children with similar backrounds and dysfunctional behaviors are housed under one roof. What you end up with is a behavioral management "greenhouse effect" where each child is continually reacting to the collective agitation in the home.