While there are ways to train the brain to manage stress and other emotional responses, such techniques do not work for everyone and are not always highly accessible. Now, a new study reveals the development of a new tool that could bring self-regulation of brain activity to a much wider audience.

In the journal Biological Psychiatry, researchers from Tel-Aviv University in Israel report how a new imaging technique provides accurate feedback on electrical activity in the amygdala of the brain – the region that regulates emotional responses, such as fear and stress.

By using this tool, researchers found participants were better able to reduce amygdala activity, which enabled better control of emotional responses.

According to senior author Dr. Talma Hendler, of the Tel-Aviv Sourasky Medical Center, and colleagues, it is notoriously difficult to monitor activity in the amygdala; it is located deep within the brain’s medial temporal lobe, making it hard to reach.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is typically used to assess amygdala activity, but the team notes that this imaging technique is expensive and largely inaccessible, which restricts its use in clinical practice.

Now, Dr. Hendler and team describe how a low-cost imaging tool that uses electroencephalography (EEG) could offer a reliable, highly accessible way to monitor amygdala activity, enabling better self-regulation of such activity.

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