Biofeedback is a method of learning to control body processes that are not ordinarily thought of as being under voluntary control. People have learned to regulate their blood flow, blood pressure, body temperature, brain waves, heartbeat, and other internal body functions. Normally, the autonomic (self-regulating) part of the nervous system controls such processes automatically. People can also use biofeedback to relearn to use muscles no longer under their voluntary control because of an accident, stroke, or brain damage.
Oriental holy men had claimed for hundreds of years that they could consciously control their internal body functions. Western scientists traditionally scoffed at these claims. But by the late 1960’s, biofeedback experiments had demonstrated that such control was possible. Since then, biofeedback has become an important method of medical therapy. Biofeedback research has led to a better understanding of certain diseases and the learning process. In the United States, most major cities have biofeedback clinics.
How biofeedback works.
Biofeedback provides people with information on the functioning of the body processes they are learning to control. For example, people cannot normally detect a change in their blood pressure. Therefore, if they try to lower their blood pressure using only their conscious minds, they have no way of knowing whether they have succeeded. In learning to control this process through biofeedback, an individual is connected to a machine that measures the blood pressure on each heartbeat. If the pressure falls below a certain level, the machine sounds a tone. Subjects know they have succeeded when they hear the tone, and the knowledge of their success acts as a reward. This feedback of information makes biofeedback training unique. With repeated practice, people can learn to regulate their blood pressure.
Biofeedback in medicine and psychology.
Biofeedback is used to treat many illnesses. Heart patients can be trained to use biofeedback to control dangerously irregular heartbeats. Other patients use biofeedback to control high blood pressure, migraine and tension headaches, and muscle spasms. People also can learn to control stress by using biofeedback to regulate their own brain waves.
Physicians have long recognized that many body disorders are related to a person’s emotional health. Such psychosomatic conditions include high blood pressure and bronchial asthma. Biofeedback research has helped explain how the state of a person’s mind can influence the systems of the body.
Most psychologists once believed that the visceral (internal) organs could be taught new responses only through the simple kind of learning called classical conditioning. But biofeedback has shown that visceral responses can be taught by instrumental conditioning, a more advanced kind of learning. This development has stimulated further research into how human beings learn. For an explanation of classical and instrumental conditioning, see Learning.
See also Transcendental meditation.
