VART3510 - AkE Internship Journal Week 2

Following on from last week, I'm continuing to develop my software and look into existing research on brainwave entrainment.

In preparation for a literature review I spent some time on the RMIT library search system for academic research papers. I had not used this system before, such a wealth of knowledge freely available! I am glad at least in point in my program I have found a need to investigate published journals.

I have never assembled a literature review before, I have made some key notes based on my findings.

• Brainwave entrainment uses rhythmic auditory and visual stimuli to alter brainwave frequency and have been investigated since the late 1800's [Huang et al. 2008]

• Most commonly used auditory stimulation in brainwave entrainment experiments use isochronic, monaural or binaural beats.

• Binaural and monaural beats use 2 tones with similar frequencies that trick the brain into perceiving the difference in frequency as a "beating" - monaural beats sum these two signals into one, where the binaural method uses two independent tones are fed to either ear and the 'beating' is creating psycho acoustically.

• Isochronic tones are evenly spaced tones between moments of silence to create "beating.

• Binaural beats are best perceived when the carrier and standard tone frequencies are at approximately 400hz with differences between the two frequencies being no more than 35hz. [Krishnan et al. 2004]

• The Frequency Follow Response has been observed using audio cues, the EEG response has been correlated to the binaural beat frequency [the difference between tones] [Marsh et al 1970]

• Control factors for brainwave entrainment experiments have incorporated periods of white noise and measuring a baseline EEG response. 

• Recent studies controlling for personality traits have failed to produce statistically significant results. [Goodin et al. 2012]

• Recent controlled studies have concluded that binaural beat theta brainwave entrainment methods are no more effective than Pink noise [Stevens et al. 2003]

• The evidence that brainwave entrainment can be used to affect vigilance, performance and mood is largely anecdotal [Lane et al. 1997]

As is to be expected, the further I dig into the established literature - the more confounding the results. What is promising is that research into this area remains current with studies still being conducted locally at institutions like Swinburne Uni.


Darrin and I have a meeting tomorrow with Dr. Eva Cheng from RMIT to discuss the research.