Applied psychophysiology and biofeedback of event-related potentials (brain waves): historical perspective, review,...

This paper reviews the efforts of workers in the 1960s-1980s to demonstrate voluntary control of exogenously evoked (event-related) potentials in visual, somatic sensory, and auditory systems in rats, cats, and humans. The first part of the paper reviews the conceptual foundation and development of the work--it actually arose from traditional sensory coding and neural correlates of behavior studies. The second part summarizes recent applications of the method in the area of pain control. In reviewing these matters, the major effort is directed at revealing how the ideas unfolded in very human, day-to-day, anecdotal terms. There is not much of an attempt to formally review the literature, which is cited for consultation elsewhere. In the same spirit, many possible future experiments are suggested by way of elucidating the key remaining questions in the area.