From Brainwaves to Wellbeing: The Potential Neurotherapy for Anxiety

Abstract

Anxiety is one of the most widespread mental health problems globally, often causing serious emotional distress and making it hard for people to function well in daily life. Although medications and therapies like CBT can be helpful, some people experience side effects, struggle to access treatment, or do not respond well. This leads to a need for other treatment options. Neurofeedback is a non-invasive method that helps people learn to control their brain activity by showing them their brainwaves in real-time feedback, potentially alleviating anxiety symptoms by promoting neural self-regulation and emotional resilience. This paper explores the use of neurofeedback as a personalised intervention for anxiety, emphasizing its theoretical basis, commonly used protocols, and the relevance of brainwave patterns such as alpha and high-beta frequencies in anxiety symptomatology. It highlights the limitations of standardised neurofeedback approaches and underscores the clinical advantages of tailoring protocols using quantitative EEG (qEEG) assessments. Through a review of global publication trends using the Scopus database (1974–2024), this study reveals a significant rise in research interest, largely dominated by Western countries, with a notable research gap in non-Western regions such as Southeast Asia. The paper also discusses the potential of culturally adaptable and individualised neurofeedback protocols to bridge this gap. The findings emphasise the need for more inclusive, accessible, and personalised applications of neurofeedback to improve anxiety treatment outcomes globally. Continued research and teamwork across different fields are important to create neurofeedback treatments that work well and fit different cultural contexts.