Comment Re:won't treat REAL ADHD (Score 1) 124
That's not true, and I can tell you this from first hand experience using neurofeedback. I have ADD (clinically diagnosed) and have been taking treatment with first Straterra and then Adderall for some time now, and I was actually a part of some of the earlier testing of this exact system (the SMART system). When I was using it, it was somewhat buggy - the helmet with the sensors had some conductivity issues, and the hardware was incredibly annoying - but I still definitely reaped benefits from it. The brain is a marvelous thing, and claiming that anything about it can only be changed through one type of intervention (chemical) is pretty naïve.
I personally found that the Need for Speed series worked well with the SMART system, as did other racing games, because the system was able to modify the responsiveness of the accelerator in relation to my level of concentration. Honestly I didn't even like doing it that much because I get bored with racing games - I'm much more of a First Person Shooter or strategy game type of guy, but those don't work with the SMART system very well. I've learned now how to force my brain into that state, and now I only take my Adderall at certain times, like finals week. I stopped using the system when I left for college four years ago because, frankly, I didn't want to be "that kid" who sits in his dorm with a contraption attached to his head as an experimental treatment, but now that I'm about to graduate and get my own place I might look into what advances they've made in the technology and pick it back up again. Maybe eventually game developers will include support for systems like this in their games, so that more genres will work with it - rather than just turning the level of input from the X button up and down, the system could directly modify the rate of unit production in a strategy game or the speed at which your character heals in an FPS.
