Re: an announcement for an upcoming conference

As a follow up, and for those of you who are somewhat new to the field, there is
an important and interesting aspect to this "story" and I thought it might be
interesting to post it here now.

In the "old days" there was enormous pressure brought to bear by some in the
field to make the use of QEEG as a mapping procedure THE gateway to ANY use of
neurofeedback. Let me say this another way: There was an enormously powerful
campaign in process the purpose of which was to mandate the use of QEEG as a
necessary precursor to each and every use of QEEG.

This was clothed in the language of science: ie it was presented AS IF using
QEEG was the only way to "really know" what you were doing and, perhaps more
imortantly for this thread, the only way to "really know what NEEDED to be done"
and whether or not it had actually happened as a result of the training. It was
an enormous fight and fortunately for all of us, those efforts failed. And
what did that mean for the field? One of the most important things is that it
meant that porviders of neurofeedback training did not have to engage in
something that was not needed -- and so did not have to charge their clients
additional fees -- and this allowed those who were intersted in QEEG to actually
explore its potential usefulness in terms of what "value added" it brought -- or
didn't -- to individual cases.

There is an analogy to this in the history of Psychology re: the use of
"Psychological Batteries" of tests for determining personality structure,
general intelligence, etc. Originally some Psychologists battled long and hard
to mandate the use of such Psychological Batteries but it became clear over time
-- as it has in re: to QEEG -- that such GENERAL efforts do NOT yield real,
tangible benefits to ALL clients, even if there are occasions when SOME benefit
accrues in an individual case. So Psychology shifted to the idea that
Psychological Testing should ONLY be done when other processes have been used in
order to specify to some degree what specific test might be done and what
specific information might be derived from that test for what specific purpose
vis-a-vis THIS specific client.

So finally, and after many years of quite arduous work, we have come as a field
to the same conclusion in re: to QEEG -- ie it should NOT be done "in general"
but only in certain instances where there is a specific benefit to be derived
from its use, probably after other "more general" ways of using neurofeedback
training had not showed as much benefit as is desired.

Various estimates have revealed that it's quite likely that 80% or more of ALL
USES of NF involve at least an initial period of training that orients towards
"fundamental" issues of self-regulation, such as sleep-wake cycles. This
dovetails quite closely with therecognition that virutally every diagnosable
disorder in the DSM-IV also carries with it disturbances in sleep-wake cycles,
sleep integrity and sleep's restorative value.

Now, if we put all of these threads together, it becomes pretty reasonable to
consider that NF training ought to -- at least as a starting point -- be
initiated with "more general" training aproaches that support the process of
change in re: to these fundamentally important and critical self-regulatory
processes -- esp in re: to sleep. in other words, it probably makes the most
sense to help the client make whatever changes are involved in having a return
of restful, integral sleep. This allows for maximal learning in any event, and
it will assist in bringing the person's entire ensemble of psychophysiological
and other intrinsic health-promoting processes to come "on line" and add in
their own contribution.

So, how does this relate to the upcoming Conference?

If all of the above is at all accurate then it becomes clear that the idea of
targeting SPECIFIC "problems" or "processes" should, in general, be a secondary
focus; and that front and center, so to speak, are orientations that promote
basic self-regulatory restoration. Whatever value can accrue -- and be
sustained -- with more specific training is actually best "built upon" a strong
foundation of fundamental self-regulation.

It remains easy for that focus to be lost in the excitement over "specific"
trainings and such.

val