Thread: Published in Nature Neuroscience: 77% induction rate with electrodes on the scalp at 40 Hertz

Originally Posted by FryingMan

The time to get excited is if/when someone's *long-term* LD frequency jumps from say 20% to 80+%. First night results can be basically thrown away. With the devices so fragile to start with, it's entirely likely all results were pure placebo.

Well, I respectfully am not in agreement with most of this. YMMV, but I think even a jump from 20% to 40% would be pretty awesome. That's 5 LDs per month up to 10 LDs per month. I'll take that any day and be pretty stoked.

And yes, first night results are outliers, but when it's a *repeatable* "first night result", then it isn't exactly a first night result. If every time they get a new unit it works, then that seems to indicate that it isn't really a "first night" result. It's like if the batteries only lasted one night, and every night you replace them it works 80% of the time. Would you pass on purchasing the device because every night it's a "first night" result with the new batteries? Of course in this case what's going off isn't the batteries. It's something else. But whatever that something else is, it seems to be fixable much like dead batteries are fixable.

I think we're in agreement that more testing needs to be done, but if in fact every time a new unit arrives it works for almost everyone that night, then to my mind that's a repeatable effect, and that's all I care about. I wouldn't want to have to buy a new one every night, but the hope is that whatever is getting busted in the units so quickly can get fixed.

And as for placebo, you might be right. But again, who cares? If it produces a repeatable effect, then I don't really care if that effect what due to the reason the manufacturer says, or because somehow it is able to produce a reliable placebo effect -- it manages to make me believe I'll LD in such a way that I actually do, even though the device itself isn't doing anything other than triggering the placebo, or whatever. If it works, I'll take it.

I think we all agree more testing is needed. But if it is in fact, as the report suggests, a repeatable effect (every time they use a new device it works), then that's really encouraging news.

Originally Posted by regulator

And as for placebo, you might be right. But again, who cares? If it produces a repeatable effect, then I don't really care if that effect what due to the reason the manufacturer says, or because somehow it is able to produce a reliable placebo effect -- it manages to make me believe I'll LD in such a way that I actually do, even though the device itself isn't doing anything other than triggering the placebo, or whatever. If it works, I'll take it.

Hi regulator, I understand your point, but… The first customers had LDs very likely just because of the unusual feeling on their haed. They could not have regular sleep, had frequent awakenings, which is a typical WBTB technique. If the device would work continually, than they would notice the lessening of this effect. The final result would be zero LD. When they got the new devices, it was AGAIN an unusual feeling, plus the placebo, which caused the LDs again. Because of the technical difficulties the users could not test it att many nights, so this “getting used” effect could not be experienced. I am using LdreamM headset more than 3 months regularly, every night. On the beginning I had LDs, as well, as the first customers of Luciding. But then: nothing. A few days ago I have changed the stimuli electrodes, and they caused inconveniency, which resulted again an LD!
So, you can not count on this effect continually! This is an important point. Testing in many nights is a must for every LD induction devices.

@regulator: Fair enough re: "80+%." But I was being conservative with the "LUCID DREAMS EVERY NIGHT!" claim -- 80+% is still generous. Call it instead a "dramatic, sustained increase in LD frequency."

You should care about placebo, very much, as LdreamM points out. Results due to placebo vanish very quickly in time.

The results should also get you much more excited about your natural ability to LD: WBTB and intention/expectation are very, very powerful in producing LDs all on their own. That I think is the most important takeaway from this information. Not that we didn't know that already, but it's an excellent confirmation. Which should be taken into account when considering the Voss study as well.

Additionally, you should be very concerned with companies like Luciding, which claim 100% success right out of the gate without having produced a single unit and without doing any studies. They, and companies like them, potentially set back the entire industry by years, because they hype up the public and let them down. It gets to the point where legitimate producers (see Oneirics, for example) can't get funding because the fraudsters who came before turned off the investor/enthusiast community.

Hi everyone!
Just wanted to give an important update-warning here, for everyone trying DIY tACS stimulation (as myself) or buying commercial devices (e.g. Dream catcher or Focus):
The guy behind the LdreamM headband (Tibor, also posting here) did a lot of trials on himself and came to realize that prolonged use of tACS stimulation (the kind drVoss used in her study) might in fact be dangerous! What he noticed was that after trying different stimulation protocols for some nights, he ceased to have REM sleep altogether (just delta waves the whole night) and this lasted for a whole week afterwards! This might potentially be quite serious as REM sleep is valuable for proper health. Besides, he experienced nausea and heart pain for this whole period.
So, here is his warning and all the relevant info.
Read carefully and take into consideration if you decide to keep on experimenting on yourself!


P.s. Please do not remove the link as his web page does NOT have items for sale. He is not selling (and won't sale in the near future) any device due to the health risk he spotted. Thank you.

Yeah, I started exploring completely non-invasive methods after my attempts at trying to reproduce the findings, even shying away from vanilla electrodes for EEG. My uneducated guess is that the myelin sheaths can't regenerate.

Here are some more reviews from Motherboard - We Wore Electrodes to Bed to Induce Lucid Dreaming | Motherboard:

Unfortunately, my experience was not quite so thrilling. Though the lucid dream program on the foc.us delivers a relatively low electrical current of 1.5 milliamps, it was too high for me. The electrodes immediately started to sting my skin and I had to take them off after about three seconds. So, I enlisted my less-sensitive coworkers to test it out, but the results were just as disappointing.

Adrianne Jeffries, our managing editor, clawed the electrodes off in her sleep. No lucid dreams for her. Editor in chief Derek Mead said the device made him feel “really weird.”

“I've tried cranial stimulation devices before, so was more concerned about trying to fall asleep with wires everywhere—I'm a terrible sleeper, and a thrasher I've heard—than getting zapped, but it was a bit weirder than I anticipated,” Derek said. “The current made my cheap LED bed lamp have a shutter effect I didn't expect, and after the first 10 minute session I didn't notice anything so I turned it off, hoping I'd stimmed myself enough. No dreams that night either, but I have enough wild dreams on my own.”

Fellow staff writer Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai said he thought it worked for him, maybe, but it was difficult to tell for sure.

“I felt some sort of weird pain in my head,” Lorenzo said. “It was like someone was squishing my brain. When I fell asleep, I think I had a lucid dream, but I think my brain just wanted to believe I had a lucid dream. I don’t remember what it was about.”

So Motherboard didn't find much success on the electrically-stimulate lucid dreaming front.

Originally Posted by Voldmer

As mentioned I don't know the exact details of how electrical signals move across the brain, but if a nerve carries an electrical signal, then this signal has a frequency. If that frequency, in a nerve connected to hearing, actually differs from the frequency of the vibration, then this implies a transducing metod of greater complexity than needed (a loudspeaker is really very simple). Maybe the human body is actually like that (this would mean that we humans have actually beaten evolution at something ), but do we really know what the frequency-spectrum of the signals in the acoustic nerves are like?

However, if brainwave entrainment is a reality, then there must be some way to translate the acoustic signal to an electrical one. The Monroe Institute has been preaching for thirty years that this is indeed possible.

Anyone with an EEG-device should be able to test this easily. Put a 40Hz signal on the stereo, and measure then EEG at the same time. If the 40Hz signal shows up in the EEG, then it would be a strong indication that entrainment took place. Next, try with other frequencies.

This isn't exactly what you were asking for (it's about binaural beats specifically, and is rather limited in range-tested/scope), but it's similar: Do Binaural Beats Really Affect Brainwaves?*

EDIT: Oh wow. I read the first page, and thought that was the second most-recent post. My apologies for responding to a post 12 pages back. : P (though I'll leave it up since it's somewhat related anyway)

Originally Posted by IAmCoder

Yeah, I started exploring completely non-invasive methods after my attempts at trying to reproduce the findings, even shying away from vanilla electrodes for EEG. My uneducated guess is that the myelin sheaths can't regenerate.

Hi Michael,
so, you didn't manage to replicate Jeff's success with tACS - if I understood correctly. That's one more with zero results, correct?
I am not sure why you guess though, that the myelin sheath can't regenerate.
Can you expand a bit in that - what do you mean?

@Venryx: yea, the thread has gone a looooong way since then! Actually none of the original posters (including Voldmer) is active in the thread anymore. But yes, that was an interesting research. It confirmed for me my observation that binaural beats are ineffective. Thanks.
The problem is that tACS also appears to be ineffective - and perhaps dangerous - despite the initial hope to the contrary...

Correct. But I shouldn't have expected results in agreement with Tibor's insights.

I can't expand on the myelin sheath degradation... that is just what my brain felt like on the inside after zapping. And what I imagined would happen to electrical wiring after exposure to too much current.

^^ Thanks for the clarifications.
I think you described your feeling and guess quite well, it's a plausible theory
Let's see what we get with Mag-stim now...

Originally Posted by SearcherTMR

Ok, both factors were affected by the stimulation - but look more close as they say for magic tricks...
Insight and dissociation ratings were indeed increased by the stimulation - and 70% of the dreams were rated as "Lucid".
But was the increase enough to induce lucidity? Unfortunately no...
The LUCID scale was created by Voss herself and the ratings were 0-5 for each factor (strongly disagree to strongly agree) and for the single most significant factor for lucidity (insight that one is dreaming - that actually defines LDs) non lucids averaged 1 and lucids 3:
Attachment 8808
So, were ratings of 3 (or above) reached with 40hz stimulation for the factor "insight"?
Nope... it remained less than 1 (!!!)... that is : strongly disagree that I now that I am dreaming....
Attachment 8807
Statistically significant increase with the stimulation - yes, but clinically and practically totally insignificant... I am sorry but that's the truth about it.
So, why did Voss labeled these normal dreams as "Lucids" and claimed 70% lucidity when she achieved zero?..... I guess just to make it to headlines...
I did what I did because of Jeff's success - but when I learned that he used galantamin as well.... the 40hz tACS bubble was off for good...

So let me see what I think these charts mean. I think this part is amazing.

Completely ignoring the stimulation, only discussing the scale:

For people who had non-lucid dreams, they rated "insight" below 1 on a scale of 0 to 5.
For people who had lucid dreams, they rated "insight" 3 and above.

Now, for the study with tACS stimulation:

People who had placebo devices reported insight close to zero for their dreams.
People who had stimulation, the highest insight score, with the 40Hz stimulation, reported insight of about 0.6, or the insight of a non-lucid dream, according to Voss's own scale.

And she claims "70% lucid dream induction!?!?" I'm flabbergasted.

^^ Amazing indeed... also amazing to speculate how many people are fooled, how many people have start and will start making tACS devices (and related businesses) thinking its the holy grail of Lucid Dreaming...
So, how can she possibly claim 70% induction rate?
Well, she includes a (small lettering) paragraph at the end of the study, labeled: " Assumption of Lucidity" Where she defines Lucidity (in direct contradiction with her previous studies) as " elevated ratings (>mean + 2 s.e.) on either factor (insight or dissociation).
This practically means that if a subject reported slightly higher score than the mean score, the dream was labeled "Lucid" - even if the mean score was 0,3 and this dream had scored 0,6.... amazing, and really annoying to realize, isn't it....