Oh, and then he sings a little song about it. And why not?? I mean, it’s, like, totally song-worthy.

I’ll be guest-posting on Axonify’s blog. Check out my first post.

The impetus for the Summit is the fact that the workforce in the Western world is aging rapidly, and we have a major demographic challenge on our hands to keep people healthy and productive into their senior years. Probably the most salient aspect of aging from a productivity perspective is cognitive functioning. We all decline cognitively as we age, and it starts happening in our early twenties, as this graphic taken from the work of Dr. Timothy Salthouse at the University of Virginia shows:

Effectiveness in the workplace moves in lockstep with cognitive ability, which means that enhancing employees’ cognitive functioning will help companies to keep them around and keep them effective longer, thereby softening the transition into the post-Baby Boomer era.

And how, you may ask, can you enhance employees’ cognitive functioning? Visit our booth at the Summit, or contact us, and we’ll talk about what neuroscience has to offer. You’ll be amazed!

It reminds me of a poem by Emily Dickinson:

Increasing Corporate Effectiveness through Cognitive Training

 By Philip E. Toman, Ph.D.

Owner, Choratech

Introduction

Behind all human success lies the functioning of the human brain. More than ever before, technological, economic and demographic realities are such that well-functioning brains are among corporations’ most valuable assets. At the same time, developments in neuroscience have made it possible to improve many aspects of brain functioning through non-invasive means, enhancing both productivity and personal wellness. Choratech brings scientifically validated tools for cognitive and self-regulatory enhancement to the corporate space, offering personally coached cognitive training programs that enhance workers’ effectiveness and efficiency, lengthening their productive careers and increasing their quality of life.

Problem Statement

In the contemporary economy, organizations’ most valuable asset is the collective brain capacity of their personnel. Information and knowledge are the major carriers of value in the current global economic and technological climate. Therefore, it is more important today than ever before that organizations have team members who are intelligent, attentive, imaginative, and good at managing stress.

 There are several factors that make brain function a particularly relevant concern for organizations in the early 21^st century. These factors include technological developments, changes in the workplace, and demographic trends.

 Factor 1: Technological developments

 In the last fifty years technology has allowed us to store and manipulate far more information, in far more ways, than ever before in history. The advent of computers and, more recently, the Internet and mobile devices has led to an explosion in the quantity and variety of information at our disposal. As is often the case with technological developments, the human impact of these advances has not simply been one of increasing convenience and decreasing the amount of work to be done. Instead, new technologies have created a world that is increasingly complex and that contains a dizzying amount of information which impinges on us from all sides, during nearly all of our waking hours.

The modern workplace is one where multiple communication technologies are simultaneously active, and the automation of simple tasks has required employees to function at a higher level, making more decisions and monitoring more streams of information concurrently. At the same time, the boundaries between private and work life have been blurred by digital media, with increased interpenetration between work and personal life.

 Consequently, “information overload” has become a prominent feature of the contemporary workplace. It has become increasingly critical for people to be able to sort, weigh, and prioritize among multiple pieces of information, to “multi-task” efficiently, to remember accurately, and to focus their attention on what is relevant while ignoring what is potentially distracting.

 The human brain was not designed to operate in this type of environment. The context in which our brains developed was slower and less complex, and allowed for focus on one thing at a time. The result has been that our brains are increasingly taxed by the demands of the environment, both at work and outside of work. This creates failures in cognitive performance, and sets the stage for stress-related problems.

 Factor 2: Specialization and expertise

 Much of today’s economic activity is linked closely to the productivity of people with specialized cognitive abilities and skills, people who were hired at a premium, essentially because of what they can do with their brains. This is especially the case in the high-tech and professional sectors, but also at the higher management strata and in specialized segments of other types of organizations.

 Choratech refers to those whose cognitive functioning is particularly mission-critical as cognitive thoroughbreds. Like the equine variety, cognitive thoroughbreds are expensive to secure and keep fed and watered, but they are richly rewarding (and a joy to behold!) when they are doing what they do best. Their contribution is often the difference that gives the edge to one company over another in a highly competitive climate – the spark of ingenuity, the burst of energy, or the flash of insight that allows for the job to be done that little bit better.

 Cognitive thoroughbreds are a major investment, a precious and sought-after commodity—and they are worth investing in, if there is a way to hone their already keen abilities to an even higher level of acuity, while enhancing their well-being and their ability to make the most of their talents both on and off the job.

 Factor 3: Demographic trends

 Western economies and societies are undergoing major changes resulting from the aging of the “baby boomer” generation, combined with historic low birthrates. The first “baby boomers” (defined as those born between 1946 and 1964) are just this year arriving at the end of their working years, at least as defined by the traditional retirement age of 65. At the same time, corporations and governments face an unprecedented challenge in the form of low birthrates and a shrinking pool of workers to continue the economic legacy of the baby boomers and to provide the means by which to care for the needs of a massive cohort of aging citizens. Policymakers are in a panic as to how they will deal with the coming surge in retirements and, soon afterward, rapidly escalating costs of supporting and providing healthcare to huge numbers of elderly citizens, co-occurring with a shrinking tax base due to demographic decline.

 The corporate sector also faces a challenge in the form of the impending loss of a large group of its most experienced and knowledgeable workers, the pressure of having to provide post-retirement benefits to a large cohort, and an insufficient pool of young, well-educated workers. In the meantime, even for younger workers the cognitive demands of an increasingly information-dense environment—and having to accomplish more with fewer brains—will continue to grow. Given the small pool of qualified workers, it will be in employers’ interests to maximize the cognitive effectiveness of their workers regardless of their age. Notably, decline of core cognitive abilities has been shown to begin in the early 20s and to proceed in roughly linear fashion through the remainder of the lifespan, making cognitive enhancement a potentially valuable tool for the entire workforce, irrespective of age.

 These demographic factors converge to create an environment in which there will be significant pressure to lengthen the span of people’s productivity and independence, both from the people themselves, and from the need of employers (and governments) to delay and soften the economy’s transition into the post-baby-boom era. Enhancement of cognition through scientifically validated training holds out the promise of accomplishing this, in a way that is effective, affordable, and highly scalable.

Previous Options

The problems posed by the technological, social, and demographic factors listed above are striking businesses with new force and urgency, although it has always been acknowledged that people are limited by their cognitive ability, and that these limitations are felt most keenly in cognitively intensive settings, or where cognitive capacities have been diminished due to the effects of age, injury, illness, or stress.

 In a very real sense, if these limitations were not seen as problems previously, it was partly because it was not imagined that there could be any conceivable solutions to them. The idea of enhancing cognitive ability was simply not in anyone’s universe of possibilities, including those whose job it was to study cognition scientifically.

One perhaps unfortunate byproduct of the way psychological science developed in the last century has been a rather persistent pessimism about the possibility of changing basic cognitive abilities. The early history of psychology included a strong tradition of quantitative trait measurement (called psychometrics), which was a necessary and positive step in bringing behaviour within the purview of scientific study, but which had the unintended effect of subtly encouraging scientists to think of the traits they were measuring as fixed and immutable. Later on, with the rise of computing machines in the 1950s and onward, cognitive science began to use computers as the dominant metaphor for the functions of the brain, again with the unintended consequence that brain capacities were considered “hard-wired”, fixed and unchangeable.

 As a result of these intellectual trends, it was widely thought in scientific and professional circles that there was really nothing that could be done to improve cognitive ability directly. Where problems or limitations were present, the only solution would be to work around them through the use of compensatory strategies or technology. Certainly, it was widely thought that it was probably at least mildly beneficial to keep one’s mind active, perhaps by doing crossword puzzles, taking courses, and so on; but no one took seriously the idea that cognitive abilities could actually be increased through targeted effort.

 The closest things to what might be called “solutions” to the problem of cognitive limitation in the corporate sphere have reflected this general pessimism about the possibility of change. Corporate training programs have focused strictly on imparting content (e.g., skills training), and promoting the use of assistive tools and strategies (e.g., training in time management or in the use of productivity software), rather than aiming at the direct improvement of cognitive functioning per se.

Choratech Solution

Choratech represents the application of a new way of thinking about the possibility of change in human cognition.

 The conceptual and empirical basis of all of Choratech’s programs is the science of brain plasticity, or neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity refers to the brain’s ability to reorganize itself and change the way it deploys its resources in order to adapt to changes in its environment and the demands being placed on it.

 The principles governing the brain’s plasticity are better understood now than ever before. What is most noteworthy about the recent science in this area is the new appreciation that a significant degree of neuroplasticity is maintained throughout the lifespan, rather than being present only in the brains of still-developing children, as was previously assumed. In a real sense, brains never stop developing, because they are constantly modifying themselves to the changing demands that are being made of them.

This lifelong capacity for growth and change has made possible new interventions that can bring about significant changes in brain functioning simply by providing brains with the right sort of experiences and challenges at the right times. Scientific work in this area has demonstrated that lifelong brain plasticity can indeed be harnessed, with remarkably beneficial effects not only for cognition, but for emotional functioning, general health, and quality of life.

 Choratech’s mission is to select the most effective scientifically validated plasticity-based tools for the enhancement of brain function, and to deliver them in a way that is designed to meet the needs of corporate customers.

 Typically, cognitive training takes place by means of game-like computer software that is used for a period of 20 to 30 minutes, on a daily or near-daily basis, for a period of several weeks. The software is adaptive to the user’s performance, and is designed to stretch the selected brain system maximally by maintaining the difficulty level near the outer limit of his or her current capacity.[1] Over the course of training these limits move outward, resulting in better and better cognitive functioning that transfers to improved effectiveness in everyday life. These effects have been shown in scientific studies to remain undiminished across follow-up periods of over a year.

 Choratech is committed to establishing its work on a scientific foundation, which means that training technologies are selected only if they have been shown in published research to have real-life effects. It also means that Choratech collects research-quality data before and after training, and at follow-up intervals, for the purposes of establishing a scientific database whose results can be published in academic journals. These data include an automated, web-based battery of neuropsychological tests and a set of research-derived questionnaire measures of self-perceived cognitive and emotional functioning.

Effects

Cognitive training has numerous effects that are relevant to corporate effectiveness. These effects vary depending on the specific targeted function(s), but generally include the following:

 Effect 1: Improved concentration

 Users of cognitive training show increases in sustained attention and resistance to distraction. They are able to maintain their focus on the task at hand for longer periods of time, while more successfully suppressing or ignoring interference from distractions like ambient noise in the office, ringing telephones, alerts or alarms generated by their computer workstations, or their own non-task-related thoughts.

 Effect 2: Improved short-term memory

 Users show increased ability to maintain information in mind across task-relevant periods of time without forgetting. For example, when reading a lengthy written text or listening in a meeting they have clearer memory for what has been said previously. This allows them to make better sense of what they are reading or hearing currently, while decreasing the need to go back and re-read or clarify.

 Effect 3: Improved ability to manage complex information

 Cognitive training increases the user’s ability to hold in mind and consider multiple streams of information simultaneously. This allows for greater effectiveness on tasks that require information from multiple sources to be integrated, or those having multiple sequential steps whose inputs may themselves be products of previous steps. It also allows the individual to view the same problem from several different vantage points, and to consider various facets or aspects of a problem at the same time.

 Effect 4: Better self-regulation

 Cognitive training has documented effects in improving self-direction and self-control. Already mentioned is the improvement in users’ ability to control and direct their focus of attention. Importantly, though, cognitive training also increases the capacity for other types of self-control. For example, users have shown documented improvements in their ability to resist impulses. One study published in 2011 showed that heavy drinkers who completed a cognitive training program (identical to one of Choratech’s product offerings) responded less to habitual impulses to drink, leading to less alcohol consumption. Users often indicate that after cognitive training they are more patient and less prone to act on impulse. They are more able to stick with tasks that are difficult and unrewarding, and are better able to manage and organize their time without being excessively captured by their feelings or wishes of the moment. Their emotional responses also tend to be better regulated, which leads them to be more effective not only at getting things done, but also at getting along with others.

 Effect 5: Quality of life

 Although less tangible and less directly linked to the corporate bottom line, cognitive training research has resulted in documentation of numerous effects on quality of life, from increases in self-reported well-being to variables such as usage of medical services and involvement in motor vehicle accidents. Users feel smarter, sharper, and more vigorous, resulting in increases in confidence.

Implementation

Choratech’s cognitive training programs are set up to be run almost entirely remotely. We consult with executives or HR professionals on the particular needs of their businesses, resulting in a tailored solution that selects training programs and groups of potential users for maximal organizational benefit. Users are introduced to the science of neuroplasticity and the practical aspects of their cognitive training at a group training session. They then complete online assessments of self-reported cognitive and mental functioning, as well as neuropsychological tests of their performance. The cognitive training itself is done daily, usually for 20 to 30 minutes a day, for a period of several weeks. Each user’s performance is tracked by a Choratech coach and remote support is provided to ensure full follow-through with the training regimen. The assessment battery is repeated several weeks after the completion of training, and again after a follow-up interval of several months.

Summary

Organizational success is ever more dependent on the ability to capitalize on human resources, and the primary human resource of our own or any other time is the brain, with all its dazzling and mysterious capacities. In a real sense, the success of all earthly human endeavours stands or falls on the operations of human brains. Until recently, this truth was merely academic, given that there was no available way outside of the classical disciplines of education, training, and character development to influence the ability of brains to do the work that was demanded of them. However, recent developments in the science of neuroplasticity have made the direct enhancement of cognitive function a real possibility.

 Choratech’s purpose is to take research-validated applications of the science of neuroplasticity and make them available to corporate and organizational customers. One of the means of doing so is through cognitive training, which has been demonstrated to be effective in increasing people’s ability to sustain attention, resist distraction, manipulate complex information, and engage in the fundamentally human processes of self-direction and self-regulation.

 Choratech’s cognitive training programs are embedded in a consultative process that identifies corporate needs, matches users to cognitive training tools, coaches users through to the completion of time-limited training regimens, and measures outcomes empirically.

 For more information about corporate cognitive training, or to learn more about its scientific basis and range of applications, please contact Choratech.

[1] Other applications use the principles of biofeedback, training users to modify neural processes by showing them direct, moment-to-moment information about their ongoing neurophysiological state on a computer screen or handheld device, while another, called repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS), amplifies or suppresses electrical activity directly in carefully targeted neural sites through the application of pulsed magnetic fields, with scientifically documented effects on states such as depression, anxiety, migraine, and chronic pain. All of these applications, which can be arrayed along a continuum from completely non-invasive to minimally invasive, are part of Choratech’s product line.

Whitehouse notes that the patients that Alzheimer originally described were not old, but were cases of premature dementia occurring in the fifth or sixth decades of life, rather than the eighth or ninth. In addition, Whitehouse points out that the diagnosis of AD is really a residual one; i.e., if signs of dementia are not accounted for by the presence of some other disease, the diagnosis of “probable” AD is made. Finally, he writes that the brain pathology (plaques and neurofibrillary tangles) originally identified with the presence of AD doesn’t actually correlate that well with symptoms of dementia. Specifically, many people who showed no signs of dementia while alive are found to have the pathology in their brains after death, which calls into question the role of the pathology in producing the cognitive decline.

Whitehouse argues that it was in the interest of certain groups (he identifies the National Institute of Aging and, not surprisingly, the pharmaceutical industry) to turn age-related cognitive decline into a “disease” as a way of attracting funding to their cause.

I agree that it’s easy to take the limitations, weaknesses, and ultimately the brevity of human life and sell the idea that they are illnesses or diseases, that need to be treated by experts — who, by the way, need lots of money to fund their research and pay for their time. This isn’t just the case in the area of cognitive decline and aging, it’s also a perennial pull in the world of psychiatry, with its ever-expanding list of diagnoses and ever-increasing claims of jurisdiction over what we used to consider the ordinary storms and strains of life. There is a great deal we can do to keep ourselves vital and sharp — that’s really what Choratech is all about — but we must never succumb to the dangerous illusion that we can use technology to bring an end to all human weaknesses, limitation, and pain.

Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback: Training for Stress Resiliency and Improved Performance

Philip E. Toman, Ph.D.

Choratech

This document summarizes the scientific rationale and the clinical research supporting heart rate variability biofeedback (HRVB) as a means of enhancing the nervous system’s ability to respond effectively to stress, mitigating the negative impacts of stress on the body and the mind, and increasing performance in high-stress contexts.

Stress and the Nervous System

Stress is a situation of challenge and novelty that pushes the organism out of its equilibrium. Our brains and bodies were designed to handle this sort of challenge by mobilizing themselves for action. This is why stress brings about emotional and physiological changes that are activating in nature: under stress, our attention is directed and narrowed toward the source of danger or concern, we feel a sense of discomfort and urgency, we have difficulty with slower and more deliberative kinds of thinking, and our bodies are prepared for action through changes such as increased heart rate and blood pressure, shallower breathing, and the release of stress hormones.

All of these responses are accomplished through a system of close, two-way communication between the brain and the rest of the body, called the autonomic nervous system (ANS). The ANS has two branches, the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system mobilizes the stress response, while the parasympathetic nervous system acts as a “brake” on this response and works to return the organism to a resting state. These two branches are constantly active, dynamically opposing one another. They are also constantly modifying, and being modified by, the activity of the brain.

Our bodies’ response to stress, mediated by arousal of the sympathetic nervous system, was designed to be an effective way of dealing with short-term dangers or problems, such as getting our ancestors away from predators. In situations of immediate physical danger, the system works very well: the sympathetic nervous system helps get us out of trouble, and then the parasympathetic nervous system returns our bodies and brains back to their normal state soon afterward. But life in modern society is not the same as the life lived by our ancestors. It has few physical dangers, but many other stressors that are chronic and long-term in nature. Our worlds are fast-paced and complex, and contain many constant pressures such as workplace challenges, financial concerns, and the need to manage complicated networks of relationships with many different people.

Because the ANS was not designed to handle chronic stress, this kind of stress has negative impacts on the body, the brain, and the mind. Chronic stress increases our risk for chronic physical diseases such as immune system disorders, endocrine disorders, high blood pressure, and heart disease. It also affects the long-term functioning of our brains, reducing our ability to concentrate, interfering with our ability to sleep, and putting us at increased risk for conditions such as anxiety and depression.

The Heart-Brain Connection

Alongside the brain, one of the major centres of the autonomic nervous system is the heart. The heart is much more than a simple blood pump: it has its own “mini-brain” consisting of tens of thousands of neurons, it releases its own hormones, and it is extensively interconnected with the brain and the rest of the body.  Not only does the brain’s activity influence the heart, the heart’s activity also influences the brain.

In addition to being a major determinant of activity in the ANS, the heart is also a useful window into the state of the ANS. Recall that sympathetic arousal increases heart rate, while parasympathetic arousal decreases it. This means that changes in heart rate can be interpreted as representing changes in the state of the balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic branches of the ANS.

The purpose of the ANS is to allow the individual to adapt flexibly to changing environmental conditions. It makes sense, then, that one of the best indices of the capacity of the ANS to modulate its activity is heart rate variability, or HRV. Rather than simply measuring how fast or slow the heart is beating, HRV measures how much the heart rate changes from one beat to the next. Higher variability (larger accelerations and decelerations in the heart rate) indicates a flexible, responsive ANS. In contrast, low HRV (the heart beating in a rigid, metronome-like pattern) is a sign of poor autonomic functioning.  Low HRV has been associated with many physical and emotional problems, including coronary artery disease, high blood pressure, depression, panic disorder, and posttraumatic stress disorder. High HRV is associated with good physical health, and it has also been found among individuals who have a generally positive outlook and the ability to manage and cope with emotional stresses effectively.

HRV Biofeedback

One of the fruits of our increased understanding of the relationship between the heart and the brain has been the development of HRV biofeedback (HRVB) as an intervention to increase the flexibility of the ANS, and thus to increase the resilience of the body and mind to stress. HRVB works by making patterns in the heart rate visible to the individual, allowing him or her to practise producing larger and larger changes in his or her heart rate. This is primarily accomplished through changing breathing patterns. When we breathe at a certain rate (about six breaths a minute), there is a physiological reflex mechanism in the ANS that results in a strong synchronization of our heart rate with our breathing: as we inhale, the heart accelerates, and as we exhale, it decelerates, producing a smooth, wave-like pattern of heart rate changes. In HRVB, the individual spends time every day practising making this wave pattern progressively larger and smoother.

The results of HRVB in published, scientific literature have been impressive. In numerous, independent studies it has had effects on both physical and psychological variables associated with stress and ANS functioning. HRVB has been shown to be effective in reducing the symptoms of several stress-related physical and psychological disorders, including hypertension (high blood pressure), asthma, fibromyalgia, depression, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and Panic Disorder. In all these studies, participants have reported decreased self-perceived stress, increased ability to cope, reduced anxiety, and more positive mood.

Anecdotally, HRVB has also been noted to be a general performance enhancer. Because stress has a generally disruptive impact on brain performance, it stands to reason that enhancing the brain’s ability to manage stress will also increase its ability to do other things more effectively.

Choratech’s remotely coached HRV Biofeedback with the BioSign Qiu

Choratech has partnered with a world leader in HRVB technology, the German company BioSign GmbH.  BioSign has developed a number of tools for measuring HRV and doing HRV biofeedback. One of these is an elegant handheld device called the Qiu that makes HRVB possible anytime, anywhere. The user holds the Qiu in his or her hand, and blood volume sensors in the device pick up the heart rhythm. The Qiu device collects detailed, research-quality, heartbeat-by-heartbeat information from each practice session. When users synchronize their devices with software on their computers, they can email the data from their sessions to Choratech for analysis, allowing for personalized, remote coaching by Choratech staff. This helps to ensure that the practice is done on schedule, and that users benefit fully from use of the device.

Using the Qiu, Choratech is able to deliver an effective stress-resiliency intervention through remote means, with personalized coaching.

I’ve been doing HRV biofeedback for quite some time now myself, to get used to the technology. I can attest that it makes it much easier during my day to put on the parasympathetic “brake”, with effects that I can feel instantly both physically and emotionally. An additional benefit for me is that it has made me much more aware of how I am reacting to things physically, which in turn gives me cues as to what my emotions are telling me in the moment.

Coming soon:

• a bunch of stuff on emotion and stress regulation,
• a new and interesting study that showed increases in intelligence among preschoolers who underwent a computerized training program,
• more on rTMS, and
• the imminent addition of some exciting new technologies to Choratech’s toolkit.

Aw, I can’t resist. Here’s a sneak peek at the new stuff:

In a couple of months we’ll be able to deliver scientifically validated protocols that increase executive functioning and social skill in those with autism spectrum disorders, increase attentional focus and decrease hyperactivity in children or adults with ADHD, and even increase creativity in artists, musicians, and heck, whoever else wants to be more imaginative.

Maybe even more exciting: for people who are about to embark on psychopharmacological treatment (that’s a big word that means treatment with antidepressant, stimulant, and/or mood stabilizer medication), we’ll be able to generate a prediction in about half an hour about which medication or class of medications is most likely to be effective for a given individual, on the basis of his or her own brain physiology!

Man, I love my job.