Biofeedback Volume 39: Issue 2

The cover of this special issue shows a Buddhist monk in Taiwan, reflecting the theme of this special issue: Yoga, Meditation, and Applied Psychophysiology. I wish to thank Erik Peper, PhD, and I-Mei Lin, PhD, who recorded this photo June 5, 2007 during a research study investigating the physiological correlates of meditation and chanting, with a highly experienced Buddhist monk. The photo was recorded at the Longshan Temple in Huwei Town, Yunlin County, Taiwan.

Yoga emerged within the history of Hinduism in India and evolved as it spread across Asia and later into North America and Europe. Originally a comprehensive

The Biofeedback Certification International Alliance offers a Certification by Prior Experience (CPE) alternative to Board Certification in Biofeedback, Neurofeedback, and Pelvic Muscle Dysfunction Biofeedback. There are also academic and technician certification tracks for Biofeedback and Neurofeedback. The CPE program invites applications from professionals who can demonstrate extensive education and experience, and who have made significant contributions to the field. The CPE process preserves the high standards required by the traditional BCIA program, while offering a more expeditious path to certification. This article details the process and requirements for CPE, and discusses the value of BCIA Board Certification.

Meditation is a self-regulatory, mind-body process used to help engage attention and awareness, and to produce a state of inner quiescence. It has been used as a self-transformative practice for millennia, most notably in the Far East. Interest in meditation was evident in the United States in the late 19^th century, and began to flourish during the early 1960s as Transcendental Meditation, Zen, and other traditions grew significantly in popularity. Over the ensuing decades a large body of scientific literature has also emerged. One factor contributing to this growth in publications is an increasingly sophisticated ability to measure brain activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and advance EEG and MEG technologies. National surveys, including the National Health Interview Survey's (NHIS), also show clear evidence of growing consumer interest in meditation. The NHIS shows use of meditation to be in the top ten most commonly used complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) therapies. The most recent 2007 NHIS compared findings of meditation use with reported use in the 2002 survey. A statistically significant increase in mediation practice among adults in the previous 12 months was noted, up from 7.6% in 2002 to 9.4% in 2007.

Meditation procedures can have different types of effects and operate by very different mechanisms. Effects of Mindfulness and Vipassana procedures are often closely akin to what the meditators do in meditation and are understood as emerging via practice-makes-perfect mechanisms. Effects of major procedures from Zen and Transcendental Meditation (TM), by contrast, are often very different from what the meditators do in meditation and are traditionally understood as arising from states enlivened by the meditation techniques, rather than practice-makes-perfect mechanisms. Intensely concentrative γ-electroencephalogram (EEG)–related Zen koan work and effortless ά-related use of mantras in TM are reported to produce the same basic state of pure consciousness/emptiness and types of out-of-meditation effects. These include enhancement of activities incompatible with, rather than expressions of, the activities of the procedures said to produce them. Numerous studies of the TM technique support these observations. They show, for example, enhancement of highly focused, concentrative activities (academic performance, reaction-time, etc.) that are so different from the effortless, explicitly focus-eschewing, ά-associated activity of TM that they are regularly referred to as “ά-blocking.” Such effects do not appear to be explainable as practice-makes-perfect effects. Psychological, gross-physiological, and EEG-related mechanisms have been proposed to explain how state-enlivening procedures might produce their effects.

Special Issue: Yoga, Meditation, and Applied Psychophysiology

BCIA Certification by Prior Experience Provides an Alternative Path for Qualified Biofeedback and Neurofeedback Professionals

Growing Interest in Meditation in the United States

State-Enlivening and Practice-Makes-Perfect Approaches to Meditation

Neurophysiological Changes in Meditation Correlated with Descriptions from the Ancient Texts

Yoga as Therapy in Psychiatric Disorders: Past, Present, and Future

Meditation in Higher Education: The Question of Change, a Current Problem, and Evidence Toward a Solution

Biofeedback, Meditation, and Mindfulness

The Gifts of Illness: A Buddhist Perspective

QEEG Accepted in Death Penalty Trial in Florida v. Nelson

Clinical Use of a One Hertz Bin Electroencephalography Assessment to Distinguish Elite from Less Elite and Typical from Atypical Athlete Profiles

REPORT: Report from FABBS Meeting

PRACTICE MANAGEMENT: Establishing a University-Based Biofeedback Clinic for Practice, Education, and Research

SPECIAL ISSUE: The Impact of a Romantic Partner on Patient Experience of Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback

SPECIAL ISSUE: Pain—There Is Hope

ABSTRACTS: Abstracts of Papers Presented at the 54th Annual Scientific Meeting of the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback