Using Biofeedback & Neurofeedback to Support Meditation & Mindfulness Practice

Biofeedback and neurofeedback train the core skills that form the foundation of meditation, and thus help you build a more effective and more gratifying practice.

What Is Meditation?

Meditation is a systematic process of training the mind, in particular attention and self-awareness but also imagination and executive control. Meditation classes are increasingly available and popular. Scientific evidence for the benefits of meditation is well established - these include:

• Emotional well-being and emotional resilience
• Improved concentration and focus
• Better sleep and other health-related benefits.

Why Is Meditation Hard?

Even so, many people don't persist with an on-going regular meditation practice. Why is that?

Speaking from personal experience, I would say it's because meditation is hard - it's difficult to keep the mind still and focused, and when I spend most of a meditation in distraction and day-dreaming, it's not really gratifying, not enjoyable. It feels like a chore, or even a waste of time.

I know the practice is to notice distractions and simply return to the focus - but I can easily spend 10 minutes or more without noticing.

How Can Biofeedback Support Meditation?

One simple answer is that biofeedback can help you notice distractions - that's because (to some extent at least) distractions manifest as changes in body and brain physiology, which can be detected.

The mind-body principle is the idea that how you think, feel and pay attention is reflected in physiology, and vice versa. Applying this to meditation means that the calm, clear, lucid, focused, and emotionally vibrant states you achieve in peak meditations are reflected in body and brain functioning. Conversely, distracted, agitated, restless states are reflected in different physiology, and likewise for dull and sleepy states.

Biofeedback & Neurofeedback Parameters

1. EMG for Muscle Tension

Almost all meditation teachers recommend meditating with a relaxed, loose body.

Muscle tension biofeedback is conceptually very simple, but it's surprising how useful it can be in meditation. That's because agitating or emotionally arousing distractions that come into mind, manifest as muscle activity, typically in the face or the muscles associated with breathing.

Chest breathing is a stress-related pattern that is easily detectable using EMG biofeedback. Facial tension, also easily detectable, relates to emotions and inner self-talk.

2. HRV & Heart Coherence

Heart coherence is a pattern of variation in heart rate, where the heart speeds up and then slows down, in sync with the breath. It only really shows up when the breath is slow, calm and steady.

Coherence can be measured an seen as a prominent peak in a chart called a spectral display. This peak is often referred to as the meditator's peak. It was first noted in the context of meditation in a Russian cosmonaut who happened to be a regular meditator. TO_DO link to Gevirtz video

Personally I use heart coherence as my go-to biofeedback support in my meditation, and have done for many years - I still find the feedback to be helpful and pertinent.

3. Capnometry for Breathing Biofeedback

Another breath-related parameter is capnometry. A capnometer measures carbon dioxide in exhaled air which correlates (inversely) with oxygen delivery to brain cells. Optimal breathing (for optimal delivery of oxygen to brain cells) is actually gentle breathing, in the sense of being opposite to over-breathing. This allows brain arteries to dilate, and facilitates oxygen delivery.

Learning optimal breathing skills well can help to develop a clear, lucid awareness in meditation practice.

4. Hemoencephalography or HEG Neurofeedback

Hemoencephalography is based on a measure of changes in the brain's metabolic activation. The scientific name for the method is functional near-infrared spectroscopy or fNIRS. (Actually a second form of HEG is based not on fNIRS but simply on changes in infra-red heat radiation from the head.)

The HEG sensor is placed at the forehead (since it can't read through hair) where it measures activation in the Prefrontal Cortex (PFC). The PFC plays an important role in attention, and thus in meditation practice. It quiets other parts of the brain and hence inhibits distracting influences.

HEG training emphasises intense, even effortful focus. Of course not all meditation calls for this kind of application, so it isn't the ideal parameter for meditation. Though effort does play a part in meditation, you'd expect it to drop away as mental stillness and focus become more established. Nonetheless HEG neurofeedback can be useful, perhaps in the early stages of meditation or as a preliminary practice.

fNIRS & Breathing

In my personal research I noticed that a parameter derived from the fNIRS sensor, but not the standard HEG parameter, shows a rhythm that often syncs up with the breathing, rather like heart coherence. It seems to represent a rhythm in brain perfusion. I've found this to be a useful feedback parameter in meditation, and have release an app based on it, as part of the MBTT suite, which is not available elsewhere.

EEG & Meditation

Over decades now, research studies have looked for neural correlates of meditative concentration in the EEG. It's fair to say no simple, coherent account has emerged for what happens in the brain during meditation. In part this is due to the wide range of meditation practices there are, and another factor has no doubt been a lack of expertise in the meditating subjects.

Some consumer EEG neurofeedback devices claim to support meditation, but it's not clear exactly what EEG parameters they are using for feedback.

One relatively consistent finding has been that alpha rhythm is often very strong in meditation (i.e. high amplitude). This alpha tends to be slow (lower frequency) or becomes slower as meditative states deepen, also spreading towards the front of the brain (alpha is usually found in the back) and becoming more synchronous, meaning the rhythm is in sync or in phase in different parts of the head.

Alpha amplitude neurofeedback and alpha synchrony neurofeedback has been used for meditation support.