Are you always forgetting where you put your keys or your mobile phone? Do you forget a person's name five seconds after being introduced? Do you sometimes feel like you're running around like a headless chicken, without any concept and/or plan? Do not worry. You're not alone and you can do something about it.
Researchers at London's Imperial College Department of Computing have developed a technique called neurofeedback to train people to remember more clearly. The idea is to glue some sensors on your scalp, plug those same sensors into a basic laptop, and watch your own brainwaves do what they do on the screen in front of you. Having a visual of your brainwaves is then supposed to enable you to manipulate them.
It seems simple enough except, let's face it, manipulating your brainwaves (completely without the aid of illegal substances es versteht sich) can be tricky. As I was trying to get my head around the whole concept of neurofeedback, I got in touch with Dr. David Vernon, one of the brilliant brain scientists at Imperial College. I asked him a very simple question and to my surprise, I got a very simple answer. I asked, "Dr. Vernon, how does one manipulate one's brainwaves?" and he replied, "Concentrate."
Ok, so you're looking at your brainwaves and you focus like you've never focused before and the brainwaves move in a slightly different pattern and you hear a bell indicating you've been successful at manipulating your brainwaves and so you get excited and your brainwaves go all rave-manic and you feel like a twenty-first-century Pavlovian dog. This is supposed to help you remember where you put your keys?
According to Dr. Vernon, yes, this will help your memory because it's teaching you to concentrate. Neurofeedback is also helping substance abusers get over their addictions, children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder are being taught to calm themselves down, epilepsy sufferers and people with brain damage are being given a chance to monitor their own brain activity and reclaim some control over their lives.
So, it's yet another positive development in the relationship between humans and computers. I'm off to try some neurofeedback excercises at
neurofeedback.com if I can remember my login password...
Österreich | 4.2.2003 | 11:47 
