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ISNR Research Foundation
Mission Statement
"We will accomplish the necessary research to demonstrate that neurofeedback is or is not efficacious in particular disorders. To that end, we will identify areas of current interest for neurofeedback research, identify researchers possessing both the interest and competence to conduct clinical trials of neurofeedback, solicit grant proposals from them and acquire funding for these major grants."
Founding Board |
Advisory Board |
Executive |
Current Activities
In the near future, studies in key areas, such as AD/HD, autism and brain injury will be focused upon. Once the studies are designed, grants will be written to solicit to private, individual and/or corporate foundations who are positioned to donate large sums of money. We are developing our By Laws, chartering the legal entity and we had our first Board meeting in San Antonio. If you or anyone you know is interested in participating in the work of the Foundation, we urge you to contact either Cynthia Kerson or John Nash.
This is a very exciting project for ISNR. We expect to be able to fund significant studies that will meet standards for clinical trials that are commonly accepted by the medical and neuroscience communities. Our efforts will help put neurotherapy into the mainstream.
Founding Board of Directors (2008-09 term)
President
David L. Trudeau, MD, is the editor emeritus of the Journal of Neurotherapy and has served as chair of the ISNR research committee since it's inception four years ago. He directed the Neurofeedback Lab in the Department of Psychiatry at Minneapolis Veterans Affairs Medical Center for ten years, prior to his retirement in 2000. He has served as Assistant Professor in the Department of Family Practice and Community Health in the Academic Health Center at the University of Minnesota and in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Kansas-Wichita. He currently holds the rank of Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Minnesota. He is a career addictionist and has been the recipient of grants from the Center for Addiction and Alternative Medicine Research under the Office of Alternative Medicine, NIH. He has been active in the teaching of medical students, psychiatry and family practice residents and addiction fellows in addiction medicine and brain wave biofeedback. He has authored forty-four scientific articles in the fields of neurofeedback, QEEG, and addiction medicine. He has co-chaired annual national scientific meetings of ISNR, and has served on the board of directors.
President-elect
M. Barry Sterman, Ph.D.
I. EDUCATION
B.A., Psychology, University of California at Los Angeles, 1958.
Ph.D., Psychology and Neuroscience, University of California at Los Angeles, 1963.
II. PRE- & POST-DOCTORAL AWARDS
Fellow, NIMH Mental Health Training Program, Brain Research Institute, UCLA,
1960-63.
National Science Foundation Sleep Research Exchange Program, UCLA/University of Tokyo, 1967-70.
III. ACADEMIC APPOINTMENTS
a. Research Psychologist, V.A. Medical Center, Sepulveda, Calif. 1963 - 1997.
b. Lecturer, Dept. of Psychology, Yale University, 1964.
c. Assist. Prof., Dept. of Anatomy, School of Med., UCLA, 1965-69.
d. Visiting Associate Prof., Inst. Brain Research, Univ. of Tokyo, 1967.
e. Assoc. Prof., Depts. of Anatomy and Psychiatry, UCLA School of Med., 1969-1975.
f. Attending Staff, Neonatal Service, County/USC Medical Center, 1973-83.
g. Professor, Depts. of Anatomy and Psychiatry, Step IV, UCLA School of Medicine, 1975 - 1998.
h. Professor Emeritus, Depts. of Neurobiology and Biobehavioral Psychiatry, UCLA School of Med., 1998-Present.
i. Faculty, Collaborative Centers for Integrative Medicine, UCLA, 2004-Present.
IV. Recent Publications
Sterman, M.B. Functional patterns and their physiological origins in the waking EEG: Implications for Event-related EEG responses. In: Event-Related Desynchronization. Handbook of Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology, Revised Series, Vol. 6. G. Pfurtscheller and F.H. Lopes da Silva, (Eds.), Elsevier Science B.V., Amsterdam, Chapter 3, 33-49, 1999.
Sterman, M.B. Basic concepts and clinical findings in the treatment of seizure disorders with EEG operant conditioning. Clinical Electroenceph.,2000, 31(1): 45-55.
Sterman, M.B. EEG markers for attention deficit disorder: pharmacological and neurofeedback applications. The Child Study Journal, 2000, 30(1), 1-23.
Sterman, M.B. and Kaiser, D.A., Comodulation: A new QEEG analysis metric for assessment of structural and functional disorders of the CNS. J. Neurotherapy, 2001, 4(3): 73-83.
Egner, T, Sterman, M.B. Neurofeedback treatment of epilepsy: From basic rationale to practical application. Expert Reviews in Neurotherapeutics, 2006, 6, 247-257.
Treasurer
Richard E. Davis, M.S. is a licensed counselor in private practice in the Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas metro area. He holds two Masters Degrees, a Masters in Labor and Industrial Relations and a Master's in Counseling and Human Development with a concentration in biofeedback from the University of North Texas. He is also certified in EEG Biofeedback by the Biofeedback Certification Institute of America and has been involved in Biofeedback/Neurofeedback for 17 years working almost exclusively with Neurofeedback and qEEG for the last 12 years. He is a former Treasurer and Board Member for the Biofeedback Society of Texas, and is presently completing a two year term as Treasurer for the International Society of Neurofeedback and Research. He is also a Board Member of the EEG Division of the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback. Richard also holds a Bachelor of Business Administration Degree in Production/Operations Management and has had many years of varied business experience to bring to the Treasurer's position.
Secretary
Jane Kingston was licensed in 1989 as a marriage and family therapist, and practice in Half Moon Bay, CA. She has been in private practice since 1993. Her training for neurofeedback was obtained in 1997 in San Francisco, and this modality accounts for about half her practice.
Her not-for-profit board experience includes various offices (including president) in the Santa Clara Valley Chapter of CA Marriage and Family Therapists, Secretary and Director of the Half Moon Bay Family Council, and Treasurer of the Northern California Psychologists for Social Responsibility. In a previous career, she gained extensive experience as a technical writer and editor, all within the scientific academic community, at MIT, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, EG&G, and the Department of Energy, and as education coordinator in the Computer Center at Stanford. She has written grants to raise funds from various foundations, and is familiar with the world of foundations and government funding agencies. (She is proud to say that she raised enough funds from a local foundation to cover 40 sessions of neurofeedback for one of my child clients.)
She is excited to serve on this board and to be collectively responsible for raising research funds, and designing and sponsoring research in our field. She has had to answer clients' questions by saying "there is not enough research" too many times. There is a lot to do.
Sergeant at Arms
Lynda Kirk is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Texas at Austin and is a Licensed Professional Counselor in the state of Texas. As a public health Peace Corps volunteer in West Africa, she became interested in mind-body phenomena, which led her to begin her study of biofeedback. Lynda is the founder and clinical director of the Austin Biofeedback and EEG Neurotherapy Center where she directs a staff of clinicians and sees clients for all applications of biofeedback and neurofeedback. Lynda is past-president and Foundation Board member of the Association of Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback (AAPB). She is past-president and Fellow of the International Society for Neurofeedback and Research (ISNR) and past-president of the Biofeedback Society of Texas. Lynda is a BCIA-Senior Fellow in biofeedback and a BCIA-Fellow in EEG neurofeedback. She is a Diplomate in Quantitative EEG (QEEG).
Member at Large (3)
John K. Nash, Ph.D., Licensed Psychologist in the State of Minnesota. He received his Bachelor of Science degree in biology/biochemistry from Princeton University in 1968. He received a Master's degree for work at the Institute for Neurological Science at the University of Pennsylvania.
His Psychology Ph.D. is from the University of California, Santa Barbara, where his dissertation involved human EEG research on attention and perception. He received National Institutes of Health-sponsored postdoctoral training in one of the first four Behavioral Medicine training programs in the U.S., at the New Jersey Medical School. He completed his postdoctoral internship at the Clinical Psychology Department, Iowa Methodist Medical Center in Des Moines. He has worked with psychological, emotional and physical problems for over 25 years, using cognitive behavior therapy and biofeedback.
Dr. Nash's professional activities have included working in a large multi-specialty medical practice in the Twin Cities, being Clinical Director of a Community Mental Health Center, evaluating human EEG and biofeedback research for NASA and operating his own private practice in the Twin Cities since 1987.
Dr. Nash helped found the Society for the Study of Neuronal Regulation (now our International Society for Neurofeedback and Research) and was its President in 2000. He participated in the early efforts in neurofeedback certification. He has published on neurotherapy and EEG in peer reviewed journals including Clinical Electrophysiology, Journal of Adult Development, Memory and Cognition and Psychophysiology. His is a Consulting Editor for the Journal of Neurotherapy. He also has extensive experience speaking and consulting with management and professional groups.
Charles (Dick) Stark, MD was educated at the University of Michigan Medical School and School of Public Health. He then spent 17 years doing epidemiological research at NIH (National Cancer Institute and National Institute of Child Health and Human Development) and the FDA (Bureau of Radiologic Health). His second career in clinical Family Medicine lasted to the present and merged with his current 3rd career in EEG and Peripheral/Autonomic Nervous System Biofeedback. His current 3rd career emphasizes hands-on clinical activities and clinical research.
Lonnie Nelson received his PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Arizona in 2004. He has been involved with iSNR since 2000, when he began working with B. Robert Crago, PhD, as a clinical practicum student. From his first exposure to NF, he has been a strong advocate of research endeavors in the field, and has focused his efforts in this domain toward the notion of Practice-based Research methodologies, largely based on the lack of enthusiasm from the National Institutes of Health for funding studies examining the efficacy of NF for any of the disorders which it is well suited. Dr. Nelson remains active in ISNR as a member of the Student Advocacy Committee, and Chair of the Committee for the Advancement of Research in NF. He is actively pursuing the empirical evaluation of many approaches used by NF practitioners in his work with the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center in sites both at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Richmond, VA, and the Ft. Carson Army base in Colorado Springs, CO. He will bring strong methodological and practical research knowledge, as well as a creative approach to the many tasks that will face the members of the ISNR Research Foundation.
International Member at Large
Dr. Efthymios Angelakis is director of the neuropsychological lab of the Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Athens Medical School, research associate of the Hellenic Neurosurgical Research Center, and he has a private practice for neuropsychological assessment and neurofeedback. He received his Ph.D. from the Department of Psychology at the University of Tennessee, and he did his postdoctoral research and training at the University of Pennsylvania and at Drexel University Psychology Departments in cognitive neuroscience. He specializes in clinical and experimental neuropsychology, quantitative EEG (qEEG) analysis, and neurofeedback, and his research interests include innovative applications of neurofeedback and transcranial Direct Current Stimulation, neuropsychology of epilepsy, dystonia, and brain injury, as well as in the study of cognitive processes in Persistent Vegetative State and Minimally Conscious State.
Advisory Board
Robert Thatcher, PhD received a bachelor's degree in chemistry from the University of Oregon and a Ph.D. degree in Psychology/Biopsychology from the University of Waterloo before completing postdoctoral fellowships in Neurobiology and Neurophysiology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and New York Medical College. In 1973 Dr. Thatcher was appointed as Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at New York Medical College and in 1977 as an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at New York University School of Medicine. In 1979 Dr. Thatcher was appointed as a professor of Psychiatry and Director of the QEEG service at Shock Trauma, University of Maryland before joining the National Institutes of Health in 1991 as the Program Manager for the integration of 128 channel EEG with MRI, PET and SPECT. Dr. Thatcher was the director of the NeuroImaging Laboratory at the Bay Pines VA Medical Center, Bay Pines, FL from 1993 to May 2006 and he is currently the director of Neuroimaging at the Applied Neuroscience Research Institute in Bay Pines, Florida. Dr. Thatcher is an adjunct professor of Neurology in the Department of Neurology at the University of South Florida. As the principal investigator for the Department of Defense Head Injury Program (DVHIP) Dr. Thatcher over saw the collection and analysis of quantitative EEG from over 1,500 head injured patients which also involved the integration of EEG with MRI. Dr. Thatcher currently serves on the National Institutes of Health Scientific Advisory Committee for the NIH Human Brain Map Project and he sits on the boards of the American Board of Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology and the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society. Dr. Thatcher is certified as an expert in both conventional electroencephalography and quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG). Dr. Thatcher is the author of six books and over 200 publications.
Joel Lubar, PhD received his B.S. and Ph.D. from the Division of the Biological Sciences and the Department of Biopsychology at the University of Chicago. Dr. Lubar has published more than 130 papers, wrote many book chapters, and eight books in the area of neuroscience and applied psychophysiology. He has been an Associate Editor for the Journal Physiology and Behavior, and an Associate Editor for Biofeedback and Self Regulation, Associate Editor for the Journal of Neurotherapy, and a member of the Editorial Board for the journal of Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback. He was an Assistant Professor at the University of Rochester, a Senior Faculty Science Fellow for the National Science Foundation at the UCLA School of Medicine, a visiting professor at the Institute of Physiology of the School of Medicine of the University of Bergen in Norway and is currently a Full Professor and now Professor Emeritus at the University of Tennessee. Dr. Lubar had been President of the Academy of Certified Neurotherapists which he incorporated into the Biofeedback Certification Institute of America EEG Specialty area (BCIA-EEG). He has been president of the EEG Division of the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback (AAPB) and was President of AAPB in 1996-1997. He was President of the International Society for Neuronal Regulation (ISNR). Dr. Lubar has been co-director of Southeastern Biofeedback Institute in Knoxville and Pompano Beach, Florida since 1979.
Dr. Lubar was responsible for developing the application of EEG biofeedback (neurofeedback) as a treatment modality for children, adolescents, and adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. This endeavor began with controlled double blind cross over studies in the mid 1970s.
This application of neurofeedback is one of the largest and used in clinics and schools throughout the United States, Canada, parts of South America, Europe, Israel, and China. Dr. Lubar has presented his research in many workshops in Europe, Japan, Australia, Israel, South America, Canada and to many state and national meetings of biofeedback organizations. He was the first president of the Biofeedback Society of Tennessee. Dr. Lubar was an invited keynote speaker at the Third International Conference in Biobehavioral Self Regulation and Health held in Tokyo, Japan in October 1993. In 1997, Dr. Lubar was invited to present lectures and workshops at the Medical University of New South Wales in Canberra, Australia. Dr. Lubar has been involved in the development of databases for the assessment of individuals with ADD/HD and has been a scientific advisor for a number of organizations that are involved in developing research to validate this application of neurofeedback. In 1992 he and his colleagues published a paper in Pediatric Neurology that showed for the first time that children with the inattentive form of ADD without hyperactivity differed significantly in terms of quantitative EEG parameters from matched non-clinical controls. Dr. Lubar is currently involved in research using an inverse solution technique known as Low Resolution Electromagnetic Tomography (LORETA) which allows one to locate current source generators inside the cortex that are responsible for the surface distribution of EEG. He and his colleagues at the University of Tennessee have trained individuals using LORETA neurofeedback to change activity inside the brain. This has never been done before and has been the first attempt to use the inverse solution for this application.
Andy Merdek is vice president of legal affairs, general counsel and corporate secretary for Cox Enterprises, Inc., one of the nation's leading media companies and providers of automotive services. He is responsible for all legal matters, regulatory compliance, litigation management and corporate governance of its roughly 600 subsidiaries and also supervises the CEI Legal Department as well as the work of more than 100 outside law firms. Merdek is a former partner in the law firm of Dow, Lohnes & Albertson of Washington, D.C. and Atlanta, where his counseling and litigation practice included media law, antitrust, mergers and acquisitions. He joined Cox Enterprises in 1987 as vice president and general manager of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and began his newspaper career on the editorial side as a reporter and editor for the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram. Merdek currently serves as chairman of the Newspaper Association of America's Legal Affairs Committee. A Phi Beta Kappa, Magna Cum Laude graduate of Middlebury College, Merdek is also an Order of the Coif graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law.
Mario Beauregard, PhD is currently associate researcher at University of Montreal (Departments of Psychology and Radiology, Neuroscience Research Center). He is the author of more than 100 publications in neuroscience, psychology and psychiatry. Dr. Beauregard is the co-author and editor of Consciousness, Emotional Self-Regulation and the Brain. Because of his research into the neuroscience of consciousness, he was selected by the World Media Net to be among the "One Hundred Pioneers of the 21st Century." His groundbreaking work on the neurobiology of emotion and mystical experience at the University of Montreal has received international media coverage. In 2006, he received the Joel F. Lubar award for his contribution to the field of neurotherapy. The National Film Board of Canada has produced a documentary film about his work titled The Mystical Brain (2007). Recently, Dr. Beauregard has published a new book titled The Spiritual Brain.
Estate (Tato) Sokhadze, PhD received Ph.D. in Human Physiology in 1988 (Novosibirsk, Russia). He completed post-doctoral fellowship in Psychopharmacology at Wake Forest University in 2001-2003, and post-doctoral training in Cognitive Neuroscience at Rice University in 2004. Currently Dr. Sokhadze is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at University of Louisville and a Director of Evoked Potential Lab at Cognitive Neuroscience Labs. His research interests include application of dense-array EEG/ERP brain mapping, neurofeedback, TMS, and other applied psychophysiological techniques in psychiatric research. Specific psychopathology areas of interest are substance abuse, PTSD, autism, conversion disorder, bipolar disorder, and comorbid mental conditions.
Marvin Berman, PhD is a licensed psychologist in Pennsylvania and President of the Quietmind Foundation and Quietmind Associates a comprehensive Neuropsychology and psychotherapy practice located in Plymouth Meeting, PA. Quietmind Foundation has been involved in neurofeedback research for since the early 1990s with a focus on dementia research and ADHD and conduct disordered children in the public mental health system. Currently he is directing a study on the efficacy of neurofeedback on executive functioning in early stage dementia. Dr. Berman is a member of the Quietmind Foundation's Institutional Review Board (IRB) that offers monitoring and approval of safety and ethical treatment of subjects as well as consultation on the conducting of clinical research for clinicians seeking to get involved in research. Dr. Berman and his group offer training and professional development programs for psychiatry residents and clinical psychology graduate students through internships and practicums.
Executive Director
Cynthia Kerson, PhD has been the Executive Director for ISNR since 2006. She brings with her a knowledge of the Society and of the field of neurotherapy. She recieved her PhD through the University of Natural Medicine in Clinical Psychophysiology. She is also in private practice in San Rafael, California.