Spatio-temporal Pattern of EEG in Young Brain Respiration-training Children

American Journal of Chinese Medicine, Wntr, 2001 by Hyung Rae Kim, Soo Yong Kim, Dai Jin Kim, Young Youn Kim, Sang Kyu Park, Jeong Ho Chae, Kwang Soo Kim, Kun Ho Lee, Seung Heun Lee

(Accepted for publication June 23, 2000)

Abstract: We have evaluated the effect of `Brain Respiration' training on brain activity using Karhunen-Loeve (KL) decomposition as a method for spatio-temporal analysis of the electroencephalogram (EEG). BR training is a form of breath-work to optimize the function of the brain by concentrating Qi energy in the brain. Recently, BR-training has been reported to improve emotional maturity (i.e., EQ), short-term memory and intuition (Yoo et al., 1998). EEG data were taken during BR-training from 12 young BR-trainees (average age: 9.4 years) who had trained for 4 to 14 months, and during relaxation from age matched non-trained children. Spatio-temporal analysis showed a significant difference of EEG dynamics in right prefrontal, right inferior frontal, posterior temporal, parietal and occipital areas between BR-trainees and the control group. Amplitude of eigenvector components of BR-trainees in the areas of frontal, temporal and occipital cortex was larger than that of non-trained children (values were smaller in parietal cortex), with remarkably high amplitude alpha coherence all over the scalp. These results suggest that BR-training possibly activates brain function through changes in the activity of the frontal association area where higher mental integration and creative activities are mediated.

Brain Respiration (BR)-training is a brain development method using Qi energy developed by the Korea Research Institute for New Human Science (Lee, 1998 A). It has been widely practiced as breath-work to facilitate brain function and to relieve mental stress in Korea. The meaning of respiration in BR is quite different from breathing. Breathing stands for the process of inhaling oxygen and exhaling carbon dioxide, whereas respiration in BR refers to a kind of exercise attempting to interchange energy with the external world using meditation. Through BR-training, brain function is activated to enhance the development of one's potential ability (Lee, 1998 B). In a recent report, BR-training gave an improvement in the score of emotional maturity (i.e., EQ), short-term memory and intuition (Yoo et al., 1998). Furthermore, it is also effective in awakening human potential ability, especially for children. Actually, many children were awakened to their abilities such as speed-reading through the BR-training program (Lee, 1998 A). Unfortunately, the basic mechanism which underlies the effects of BR-training on brain activity has not been revealed.

There are many restrictions to a functional study of the active human brain. Electroencephalogram (EEG) analysis is a useful method to analyze brain activity in real time. Conventional EEG analysis shows that there are distinctive characteristics of the mental state produced by meditation which are different from commonly encountered states of consciousness, such as wakefulness, sleep, and dreaming, and from altered states of consciousness, such as hypnosis and autosuggestion. A number of EEG changes have been observed during meditation, including a predominance of alpha activity (Wallace, 1970; Wallace et al., 1971; Banquet et al., 1973), an increase in amplitude and slowing in frequency of alpha activity (Banquet, 1973), the occurrence of alpha activity in the frontal region (Brown et al., 1971; Wallace et al., 1971; Banquet 1973), and the occurrence of theta activity (Wallace et al., 1971; Banquet 1973). However, frequency analysis has not been found to be clearly superior to visual analysis in defining the meditation state or other practice-dependent mental states although modern quantitative techniques have improved the sensitivity of the EEG. There is thus still a need for new techniques of EEG analysis that can, either alone or in combination with frequency analysis, improve the value of the EEG in characterizing the mental states induced by specific practices such as meditation and BR-training.

During the last decades, definite progress has been made in modeling the dynamics of near instability, pattern formation and stability, and in the quantitative experimental analysis of patterns. The universal behavior of complex systems close to instability has been determined, leading to the wide interdisciplinary field that is now referred to as nonlinear science, in which the initial concept of synergetics was oriented.

The purpose of this paper is to use the basic ideas developed from synergetics to analyze the brain waves of BR trainees. It is well known from the close examination of synergetic systems that spatial patterns may govern the dynamical behavior of a complex system like the brain. It is useful to apply this concept to investigate brain functioning through a spatio-temporal analysis of EEG signals. In this respect, a novel global analysis of EEG signals has been undertaken. Using the Karhunen-Loeve (KL) decomposition method, we can extract qualitative information about the state of the brain during BR-training. This method's well-defined mathematical application to time-varying patterns has been established (Newman, 1995; Haken, 1996), and recently, it was applied to spatio-temporal dynamics and low-dimensional chaos (Broomhead et al., 1986; Sirovich, 1989; Caponeri et al., 1992). Under certain circumstances, the EEG pattern appears to be spatially well ordered (Lehmann, 1971). EEG pattern analysis using KL decomposition (Friedrich et al., 1991), phase transitions (Jirsa et al., 1994), and the synergetic approach (Jirsa et al., 1995; Haken, 1996) has recently been applied to clinical neurophysiology including epilepsy (Kim et al., 1999).