Music to your brain

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The Listening Program may help people with dyslexia, learning disabilities, ADHD or disorders related to autism

Kellie Carling has been noticing little changes in her son.

"He never likes anyone hugging him or kissing him good night, but the other night he came over and just wanted to sit and snuggle on the couch. That was very odd for him, and I thought, 'Wow, this is nice,' " she said. "He just seems to laugh a lot more."

Those are little changes any mother can appreciate, but they're even more significant to Carling because her 8-year-old son, Jaron, was diagnosed with autism.

Carling, of Layton, credits The Listening Program, created by Advanced Brain Technologies of Ogden, for the change in Jaron's behavior.

Music for the mind

The Listening Program is a collection of recordings with music modified to exercise the auditory system, training it to process sound more effectively.

"We really believe in the power of music to help create change in the brain. Music is organized sound and can be used in a multitude of ways to enhance brain function," said Alex Doman, founder of Advanced Brain Technologies.

The program is intended to help everyone, from normally functioning adults to children with dyslexia, learning disabilities, ADHD or disorders related to autism.

Allison Tanner, 0a speech-language pathologist with Primary Children's Medical Center's outpatient rehabilitation, says she's used The Listening Program with several clients, including Jaron Carling. She's not surprised at the changes in Jaron's behavior.

"The CDs he's listened to so far focus on low frequencies," she said. "It's training the brain to attune to those sounds and focus on them, and in return, it's affecting areas of the body that react to those sounds."

Zoned listening

The Listening Program is built, in part, on the ideas of Dr. Alfred Tomatis, a French ear, nose and throat specialist who died in 2001.

"He kind of pinpointed some different zones within the body, and determined that certain bands of sound frequencies affected these different zones in the body," said Tanner. "Zone One, low fre-quency sounds, tend to be sensory integration areas."

That includes the sense of touch, which many autistic children, like Carling, have trouble processing.

Tanner says low frequencies also affect balance, coordination and rhythm.

Zone two, mid- and higher-frequency sounds, are believed to affect speech and language areas of the body, according to Tanner. Higher frequencies, in Zone Three, stimulate energy and creativity.

Modified recording

The music also focuses on four fundamental skills needed to process auditory information, Doman said. "You need the ability to process frequency or pitch. .<2009>.<2009>. You need to recognize volume, you need to be able to process time, and you need to be able to process space."

The same skills are needed in music and communication.

Doman says the music in The Listening Program is arranged and recorded in a way that emphasizes those elements of music, exercising the ears as well as the brain.

Classical music is used because it's been the focus of most scientific reseat's the most widely accepted genre in cultures around the world. People using The Listening Program listen to the specially modified music under the direction of a trained practitioner, using CDs or the iListen series for iPods. High quality players and earphones that pick up all of the frequencies are required.

Local listeners

Kellie Carling isn't the only one who believes The Listening Program works.

Jill Shaw of South Jordan says her 6-year-old son, Michael, who is also autistic, has been "cured" of some problems.

"When he started the program, he wouldn't go outside without his hands on his head, because he didn't want the wind to blow on him," she said. "That's gone."

The benefits can extend to adults. Patti Ehle of Ogden is cautiously optimistic. She volunteered to be a research subject to explore the effects of The Listening Program on a person who is blind.

"One-third of balance is sight, so somebody who is totally blind needs everything they can find to help them balance well," Ehle said.

Ehle says she could feel the music doing something to her brain.

"During certain CDs, it actually feels like someone's touching your head, sometimes on the left side of the brain, sometimes in back," she said.

According to Ehle, it improved her balance and coordination, but there were other changes as well.

"I think it helped me sleep better, and I know it made me feel much more confident," she said, adding that it also gave her a really strong urge to talk.

Ehle says the effects stayed with her for several months, then seemed to wear off. She plans to retest the program after a one-year period.

Sound science?

According to Doman, the principles applied in The Listening Program are firmly grounded in science. Doman, who did not complete a college degree, says he learned by working with his father, founder of the Ogden-based National Association for Child Development.

He directs the program, working with occupational therapists, speech and language pathologists, music engineers and others.

Researchers agree that sound can change the brain.

"The kind of sound we put into people's ears, into their brains, changes the wiring of the neural system, and changes it in very significant and fundamental ways," said Richard Ashley, an associate professor of music and cognitive science at Northwestern University in Illinois.

What experts don't know is whether the methods developed by Doman, or his predessesor Tomatis, work. Ashley hasn't heard of The Listening Program, and says the studies on the Tomtatis method have been mixed -- which is not unusual for most clinical practices.

Ashley, a bass player, says he believes in the "shake your booty effect," that low frequencies are related to the body and the urge to move. And he says the theory that listening to filtered music can teach the brain to ferret out meaningful patterns is entirely plausible.

"If I have to put my money on whether or not this stuff, the manipulation of sound, could have significant effect on people with various kinds of learning dysfunctions, the answer is yes," he said.

However, he would like to see more rigorous research to prove it.

Proving it

Tom Parks, executive director of the Brain Institute at the University of Utah, says studies in the field of auditory integration training, like The Listening Program, don't generally meet the highest standard.

"That doesn't mean it can't help patients, but some kind of prospective randomized blinded trial is the gold standard for a scientist to believe a treatment is effective," he said. "I'm not saying anything specific about these people -- I don't know enough about them. .<2009>.<2009>. But in any kind of disorder, people often get better spontaneously. You have to show the treatment works better than a sugar pill."

Most of the studies published on Advanced Brain Technology's Web site, www.advancedbrain.com, have been trial studies and individual case studies. "Gold standard" trials are currently under way, Doman said.

Dr. Alan Rosenblatt, a specialist in neurodevelopmental pediatrics based in Chicago, is an autism expanel for the American Pediatrics Association. He agrees there haven't been enough quality studies to show The Listening Program benefits children with autism.

"Other than the tremendous expense if a family wanted to buy the whole thing themselves, there's not too much harm in trying it, and I've had certain patients that have responded well to it with less auditory hypersensitivities," he said.

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