INTRODUCTION:
The VIZR™ is personal Wellness device and not a medical device. It is a wearable headset that integrates both light and sound signal stimulation. The light signaling is provided by uniquely configured LEDs and experienced with eyes closed. The sound signaling is integrated into the light signaling and is delivered by headphone/earbuds. The VIZR™ Experience is controlled by an original app loaded into a smartphone.
SCIENCE BASED DESIGNS:
The VIZR™ and its specific light/sound compositions have not been assessed in formal clinical studies at this time. Such studies are under consideration for review.
The VIZR™ design and light/sound composition formats however are based on a number of previously verified principles and as such have the weight of a range of well-accepted scientific applications.
LIST OF ITEM SUMMARIES:
- VIZR™ HARDWARE:
Summary: The physical design of the LEDs maximizes the optometric requirements for a unique type of MACRO pattern stimulation of the central and autonomic nervous systems.
- VIZR™ TRIPLE SIGNAL DYNAMICS:
Summary: The VIZR™ utilizes three integrated types of light signaling simultaneously resulting in unusually rich and meaningful brain information messaging.
- BRAIN ENGAGEMENT & NEUROPLASTICITY:
Summary: The VIZR™ light/sound signaling processes are built upon the core factors that are known to engage and enhance positive neuroplasticity.
- SENSORY ENRICHMENT:
Summary: The cardinal sensory enrichment factors that stimulate generalized neuroplastic processes are fundamentally incorporated into the VIZR™ light/sound signaling designs.
- BRAIN PRIMING:
Summary: The VIZR™ light/sound experience serves as an effective Brain Priming stimulation and thereby improves the outcomes of a wide variety of associated techniques and therapies.
- EMDR & VIZR™:
Summary: The EMDR psychological process is enhanced by the application of alternating bilateral photic stimulation also found throughout the VIZR™ light/sound sessions.
- Entropic Brain/Psychedelic Information Theory:
Summary: Advanced brain research utilizing psychedelic compounds creates a roadmap for VIZR™ light/sound signaling designs that have integrated periods of de-stabilization and re-stabilization for optimum information processing.
- REBUS & ANARCHIC BRAIN:
Summary: The combination of Certainty and Uncertainty of signaling in the VIZR™ light/sound experience promotes a softening or relaxing of rigid neurological patterns which enhance the acquisition of new adaptive behaviors.
VIZR™ HARDWARE:
Summary: The physical design of the LEDs maximizes the optometric requirements for a unique type of MACRO pattern stimulation of the central and autonomic nervous systems.
When inspecting the VIZR™ hardware headset, it is immediately obvious that the LEDs are in a unique configuration and placement away from the eyes. The design is very much unlike conventional “Mind Machine” Brain Entrainment devices both current and historically that use goggles/eyeglass frames.
This distinct design is an expression of highly specific optometric parameters required for the successful application of so-called MACRO stimulation patterns and movements of the LED light signaling. In simplicity, the horizontal and vertical (H/V) limits must match the H/V of the average human visual field and present a normative binocular vision spectrum. This same H/V parameter set is well known in Virtual Reality devices and applications.
These MACRO LED signal positions and movements are known to affect the autonomic nervous system in relation to either sympathetic excitation or parasympathetic sedation as well as various cognitive functions such as memory and visual/auditory imagination. Advanced neuro-psychological studies also illustrate such factors as applied to EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitizing & Reprocessing – see EMDR section below).
VIZR™ TRIPLE SIGNAL DYNAMICS:
Summary: The VIZR™ utilizes three integrated types of light signaling simultaneously resulting in unusually rich and meaningful brain information messaging.
In the section above (VIZR™ HARDWARE), the concept of MACRO signaling is introduced. Here we shall expand the signaling dynamics to include all three of the approaches found in the VIZR™. The three are:
- MACRO
- MESO
- MICRO
MACRO:
As described above, MACRO signals involve specific LED activity in terms of various static positions on the LED template as well as a variety of moving patterns. Such static/moving patterns have a generalized effect upon the nervous system and create a foundational disposition in the neurological responses to the overall signaling.
MESO:
The MESO signaling refers a very special range of LED “pulsing” rates (to be distinguished from the MICRO “flickering” rates). Advancing neurological research is increasingly recognizing that physiological oscillatory rates throughout the human body express themselves in rhythms that ideally constitute an overall “resonance”. Therefore, brain wave oscillations will exist in harmonic relationship to many more somatic oscillations throughout the soma or body. Heart rate, breathing rates, cerebral-spinal pulsations, peristaltic contractions and so on seek resonance with the ideal goal of coherence. Think of MESO pulses as being like music rhythms that you can dance to. Let’s face it, no one can dance to the “flicker” rates of brain waves.
MICRO:
The LEDs also turn off and on (flicker) at rates within the second. These MICRO signals have the fine-tuning effects in the brain messaging. Micro controllers can easily manage such rates which constitute the MICRO level of the VIZR™ TRIPLE SIGNAL DYNAMICS. Such MICRO signaling has a compositional set point that enables different “strengths” in the flicker by adjusting the “duty cycle” of each flicker. Furthermore, series sequencing and rates of change play a critical role in the effects of the MICRO flicker signals. The effects can be reasonably compared to the core significance of sound compositional structures common to all musical styles and genres.
COMBINING MACRO-MESO-MICRO:
The ability to compose and adjust simultaneously three distinct yet integrated levels of light signaling yields a unique and unusually rich visual messaging experience. Each level of light signaling is effective in its own right so when combining them the information output is drastically enhanced much like combining three separate musical instruments into a jazz ensemble.
BRAIN ENGAGEMENT & NEUROPLASTICITY:
Summary: The VIZR™ light/sound signaling processes are built upon the core factors that are known to engage and enhance positive neuroplasticity.
It is impossible to avoid the term neuroplasticity when considering our brain wellness. The VIZR™ light/sound experience incorporates at a fundamental level proven elements of successful neuroplastic stimulation techniques. As such, the new term Brain Engagement is applied to the VIZR™ methodology.
Four factors are required to successfully “ENGAGE” our brain in directed neuroplastic growth and adaptation:
- Sustained focus attention;
- Marginal demand;
- Open-minded belief or willingness;
- Enjoyment of the process (the “secret sauce”).
The VIZR™ checks off all four of these factors.
One can note that conventional Brain Entrainment (Frequency Following Response) fails in a number of the four outlined above. In Brain Entrainment, because the signals are superimposed upon the brain, the brain will surrender to the periodicity of the signals and follow along automatically. This is the very nature of “entrainment”. The neuroplastic phrase “The brain changes what matters” points to the fact that “sustained focus attention” is the primary trigger to engage the neuroplastic adaption process which is absent in conventional Brain Entrainment.
Continuing, the “just a little bit challenging” quality of “marginal demand” is also absent in conventional Brain Entrainment. For the brain to grow and change, there must be an appropriate amount of “demand” or challenge. In current “flow” processes (adapted from the pioneering work of Mihaly Csikszentmihaly), there is also the recognition of states of “friction” that can help catapult the mind into “flow”.
Lastly, basic Brain Entrainment signaling is famously boring if not irritating hence all of the attempts at masking the signals with ambient sounds and music in an attempt to make the experience more enjoyable and tolerable. This is especially a challenge when the sessions require 20 to 60 minutes of exposure in order to impact the brain. Many devices boast the use of binaural beats for brain entrainment despite the fact that such signals are less effective than the standard isochronic signals. The choice of binaural beats is obvious – they can be easily masked with attractive ambient sounds/music.
SENSORY ENRICHMENT:
Summary: The cardinal sensory enrichment factors that stimulate generalized neuroplastic processes are fundamentally incorporated into the VIZR™ light/sound signaling designs.
It is fascinating that the person credited with the early recognition of basic brain neuroplasticity is also the same person to successfully demonstrate the neuroplastic results of Sensory Enrichment processes. Donald Hebb, a Canadian researcher, performed impressive rodent research back in the late 1940’s in “environmental enrichment” experiments. (Sensory Enrichment is an extension of Environmental Enrichment principles.) It was clearly evident that such “enrichment” promoted generalize neuroplastic growth in the brain. When examining the physical brains of “sensory enriched” rodents, surprisingly these brains were actually larger and more developed as a result of the enrichment processes. During the decades that followed (and preceding our current period) what we now call ‘neuroplasticity” was called “Hebbian Learning”.
The VIZR™ light/sound experience uses Sensory Enrichment methodology to stimulate generalized neuroplastic responses. Five factors are required to successfully “ENRICH” our brain in generalized neuroplastic growth and adaptation:
- Combine two different sensory types of stimulation;
- The sensory experience must be novel/unique and unlike common experience;
- The experience must be isolated and free from distraction;
- The user must be of free will and not forced;
- The experience optimally should be enjoyable (more “secret sauce”).
The VIZR™ checks off all five of these factors.
BRAIN PRIMING:
Summary: The VIZR™ light/sound experience serves as an effective Brain Priming stimulation and thereby improves the outcomes of a wide variety of associated techniques and therapies.
The Brain Priming characteristics of the VIZR™ make the experience “everybody’s best friend”. Regardless of what neuro-stimulatory techniques one employs, doing the VIZR™ first tends to make the outcomes of the techniques better.
Priming, applied in both physiological and psychological tasks, is a technique whereby exposure to one stimulus influences a response to a subsequent stimulus, without necessarily induced conscious guidance or intention.
“Priming” is a type of implicit learning wherein a stimulus prompts a change in behavior. Priming, which may occur after a single learning episode, is a type of implicit learning and is known as being capable of inducing neuroplasticity.
“Studies of priming originated in psychology, but have since been investigated in neuroscience, neurorehabilitation, and cognitive neuroscience using behavioral and brain mapping techniques. These studies, both translational and clinical, have been examining … priming as a tool for inducing neuroplasticity…”. (Stoykov and Madhavan,)
The general theory underlying priming is that the brain, which has been primed by a prior method of activation, is generally more responsive to the accompanying training. Priming presupposes that enhanced neural activity prior to or during training can facilitate the acquisition of long-term potentiation- (LTP) or long-term depression- (LTD) like mechanisms. Two proposed neural mechanisms for priming include gating and homeostatic plasticity.
Gating occurs by disinhibition of intracortical inhibitory circuits as a result of increase in calcium in the targeted cortical neurons. Gating occurs instantaneously and is achieved concurrently with motor training. Homeostatic plasticity is the ability of neurons to increase excitability after a period of low synaptic activity (and conversely, to decrease excitability after a period of high synaptic activity) and is related to changes in postsynaptic glutamate receptors. The time scale of homeostatic meta-plasticity, in comparison to gating, is protracted, and hence the resting state of neurons is modulated prior to training in order to induce synaptic plasticity.
The priming paradigms that are supported by the greatest amount of evidence are:
- Energetic Stimulation – based; (such as transcranial magnetic stimulation)
- Motor Imagery - based; (mental movement rehearsal)
- Sensory – based; (NB. VIZR™ style “priming” is Sensory-based.)
- Movement – based; (actual low power movement rehearsal)
- Pharmacological – based. (Ziemann and Siebner)
Upon consideration, it becomes evident that Sensory-based Brain Priming and Sensory Enrichment and Neuroplastic Engagement are all overlapping methods that enable similar or possibly even the same core neurological methods of adaptation and self-regulation. Any apparent distinction may simply be an artefact of the various disciplines studying the phenomena and not any real difference in the mechanisms and outcomes.
EMDR & VIZR™:
Summary: The EMDR psychological process is enhanced by the application of alternating bilateral photic stimulation also found throughout the VIZR™ light/sound sessions.
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing) is a psychotherapy treatment that was originally designed to alleviate the distress associated with traumatic memories. Shapiro’s (2001) Adaptive Information Processing model posits that EMDR therapy facilitates the accessing and processing of traumatic memories and other adverse life experience to bring these to an adaptive resolution.
Memory consolidation during sleep contextualizes memories into the broader narrative of the individual's lifeline and is essential to meaning and self-identity. Trauma memories and associated fantasies (e.g. “what if” fantasies, fantasies of revenge against the perpetrator,
etc.) fail to be integrated, either because of their high emotional charge, or because of their taboo and unacceptable nature. Desensitization of affective charge and acceptance of taboo emotional processing during EMDR restores normal memory contextualization and integration at night.
The idea presented here is that the indirect therapeutic effect of EMDR on sleep is made considerably stronger by augmenting EMDR with alternating bilateral photic stimulation (ABPS). The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex remains activated during the flicker-induced “waking dream” and its functions of reflective thought and insight are preserved. It is hypothesized that flicker-induced hypnagogic imagery reinforces the EMDR mechanism of action, namely facilitation of memory integration during sleep, by creating greater linkage between EMDR therapy and dreaming. With ABPS-induced visioning EMDR progresses seamlessly from initial targeting of trauma and adversity to desensitization of emotionally-charged brain-disturbing material related to identity, selfhood, and embodiment. Desensitization of the affect allows the self-regulatory dynamics of sleep-dreaming to restore embodied selfhood by an integrative process of resynchronization. (Peter Carr, 2020)
One of the principal theories as to EMDR's mechanisms of action is sleep-dependent memory processing. It is proposed that the alternating bilateral stimulation (ABS) of the EMDR procedure especially when reinforced by alternating bilateral photic stimulation (ABPS) induces a brain/mind state similar to that of REM sleep and facilitates the memory processing during sleep that is necessary for the resolution of trauma.
The VIZR™ light/sound compositions employ alternating bilateral photic stimulation within the templated constructs of sessions. Hence, the VIZR™ may be used as a novel form of Brain Priming for EMDR applications or as a general process to help access deeper levels of retained experiences.
Entropic Brain/Psychedelic Information Theory:
Summary: Advanced brain research utilizing psychedelic compounds creates a roadmap for VIZR™ light/sound signaling designs that have integrated periods of de-stabilization and re-stabilization for optimum information processing.
The recent reintroduction of the scientific study of psychedelic compounds has had a powerful effect upon brain neurological research. The theoretical insights of Kent (Psychedelic Information Theory) and technical research of Carhart-Harris (Entropic Brain Model) are just two examples of high impact perspectives directly influencing the light/sound compositional constructs used in the VIZR™ experience.
At the heart of both Kent’s and Carhart-Harris’ understandings are the complementary factors of Order and Disorder (sometimes considered as Syntropy/Entropy or Certainty/Uncertainty or Stable/Unstable). Our brain constantly attempts to make predictions and seek out patterns. These neurological activities are considered “top-down” processes and are critical in maintaining high levels of Ordered responses in the wake of flooding sensory stimulation. Using Bayesian statistical terminology, our brain attempts to “reduce prediction errors” as our brain consistently “jumps to conclusions”. Basic biological survival depends largely on correct predictions.
Perhaps surprisingly, our Order-loving brain, like all natural complex adaptive systems also regularly dances up to the edge of Chaos and back (consider Chaos = Entropy = Disorder = Uncertainty). Apparently, when old Order is insufficient to match various adaptive challenges, the brain will temporarily abandon Order and venture into the Uncertain realms of Entropic Disorder. This Uncertain realm is obviously hard to predict and identify patterns – however it is also exceedingly “rich” (the Carhart-Harris term) in a wide range of potential possibilities.
The VIZR™ light/sound compositions are constructed upon templates that purposefully engage in degrees of “tempered instability” that act to disengage the brain from older Ordered neurological patterns in an effort to stimulate exposure to new informational experiences. Once “destabilized”, an “appetite” for Order is increased making it more effective in integrating experiences back into the more common Order states of consciousness.
REBUS & ANARCHIC BRAIN:
Summary: The combination of Certainty and Uncertainty of signaling in the VIZR™ light/sound experience promotes a softening or relaxing of rigid neurological patterns which enhance the acquisition of new adaptive behaviors.
The brilliant Karl Friston has developed profound models related brain behavior including the Free-Energy Principle, brain SURPRISE functions and his deep system of Active Inference. Friston partnered up with Robin Carhart-Harris (see above) to form a concept called REBUS (a clumsy acronym - it stands for Relaxed Beliefs Under Psychedelics (RElaxed Beliefs Under pSychedelics). They also propose the Anarchic Brain Model.
“Anarchic” is the adjective of “anarchy”. “Anarchy” literally means “without a leader”. So, what is the meaning of “Anarchic Brain”?
In this model, the “leader” is the common Ordered Waking State which is active throughout much of our daily periods of task fulfillment. It is the “leader” in mundane activities and acts to decipher the flood of ongoing stimulation both from the external environment and our internal awareness.
An Altered State of Consciousness will break away from this leadership leaving Ordered Consciousness to expand and explore the Disordered and Uncertain realms of possibility. Our brain commits anarchy in the Altered State of Consciousness. The critical point here is this anarchic state is NOT foreign to the brain. It is an intrinsic and innate capacity within the brain to “let loose” of “high-level priors/belief patterns” and explore new adaptive possibilities that may then be retrieved and successfully integrated into newly reconfigured Ordered Consciousness. It is a dynamic form of learning that is necessary when old non-functional molds need by broken.
Here it is proposed that the VIZR™ light/sound compositional constructs create a short but reliable Altered State of Consciousness (ASC) which permits a “relaxing of beliefs/patterns” and a “bottom-up” neurological entry into increased ranges of adaptive problem-solving information.