Brainwave Synchronization and the iPod nano
Mental states can be altered through the use of specially designed audio recordings, such as binaural beats, or other technical means in order to manipulate human brainwave patterns to achieve a desired mental state such as alertness, relaxation or meditation.
One approach which has been developed and refined over many years by the Monroe Institute is called Hemispheric Synchronization, or Hemi-Sync. The human brain can be thought of a being composed of two different minds making up each hemisphere of the whole brain. Generally, higher level brain functions tend to prefer one side or the other, and in standard mode the brain exhibits an unbalanced level of activity across different regions.
By listening to Hemi-Sync recordings through stereo headphones, it is intended that the different regions of the brain are encouraged to operate in a more coherent manner. The idea is that whole-brain functioning combines the best aspects of the various regions. For example, decision-making could potentially be improved by being able to simultaneously use the intuitive, logical, emotional, verbal and mathematical areas.
I had been familiar with this concept for a while, but only within the past several months have I been regularly performing this type of brainwave entrainment. The catalyst turned out to be the iPod nano. Since getting a nano, I have typically been doing between one to two hours per day of brainwave synchronization through the use of Hemi-Sync recordings or binaural beats. This has had a measurable effect on my life; measurable because my thought patterns have been altered to the extent that my behavior has changed, but that is another story.
I have to admit that previously I had downloaded some MP3 files with this type of recording from file-sharing networks just to try them out. I listened to them on an iPod shuffle but because the shuffle does not have a display it was difficult to control the selection of tracks. Since some of the recordings put the listener into a deep relaxation state and can cause sleep, I did not want to use the hard-disk based “regular” iPod for fear that I might roll over on top of it after nodding off. The iPod nano solved this dilemma because it made it easy to select specific sessions for inducing certain mental states, and because it doesn’t have any moving parts or hard-drive, I could fall asleep on top of it and not worry.
Once I started listening to the MP3s regularly, however, I noticed that they were not the best quality recordings. One of the ways to tell if the audio is being played back as intended is to listen to one stereo channel at a time; each stereo channel should sound like a steady tone, but when the two steady tones are combined in your mind, a different, wavering tone is generated entirely in your mind. The MP3s I downloaded from file-sharing networks did not seem to have retained this processing because of the compression used to rip the audio track from CD. For this reason, but also because I realized that it’s kind of silly to copy/steal something that you then use for self-improvement, I don’t think it’s a good idea to depend on these MP3s, even if you just want to try them out. You will probably not get the intended effect from listening to them, and anyway it’s bad karma.
In order to experience the full effect of these recordings (which were still interesting) I purchased some original CDs directly from the Monroe Institute and experimented with different formats for importing them into iTunes and my iPod nano. I’m not an audiophile by any means but for my purposes the best balance between file size and sound quality seemed to be found by importing as AAC files with a bit rate of 192 kbps. Anything below that and there was a noticable drop in quality, and I assume the intended brainwave entrainment would not nearly be as effective.
Written by Parker on August 6th, 2006 with
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