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Journal of Adult Development pp509-jade-374328 June 20, 2002 11:45 Style file version May 31, 2002

Journal of Adult Development, Vol. 9, No. 3, July 2002 (

C 2002)

Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding

in Adults: A Brief Method Integrating Dennisons Brain
Gym Balance With Piagets Reflective Processes

Chester Wolfsont1

A single session intervention was given individually to 4 adults in order to assist them in achiev-
ing their personal goals by improving their behavioral skills for achieving the goals and their
conceptual understanding of how to attain these goals. The method was based on a brain-
ability analysis of understanding conservation on Jean Piagets conservation tasks combined
with Paul and Gail Dennisons Brain Gym balance procedure. My whole brain understand-
ing model (C. A. Wolfsont, 1999, 2000) and M. L. Commons et al.s Hierarchical Complexity
Scoring System manual were used to analyze the verbal protocols (M. L. Commons et al., 1992;
Commons, Danaher, & Meaney, 2000). Increases were found in the participants conceptual
understanding and in the complexity of their performance.

KEY WORDS: Brain Gym; reflective understanding; hierarchical complexity; conservation task; visual
imagery; figure-ground perception; cognizance; developmental stage; transition; behavioral intervention;
anxiety reduction.

INTRODUCTION simple physical exercises to enhance performance in

Behavioral interventions that model develop-
mental change processes and are analyzed with com-
parable measures of change, such as Commonss
Hierarchical Complexity Scoring System (HCSS),
may offer adults the opportunity to expand their ca-
pabilities while giving clinicians a clearer way to ex-
amine the process of change (Commons, 2002). My
deep understanding balance (DUB) intervention
and model of whole brain understanding (WBU)
provide a holistic-developmental framework for ef-
fecting and measuring changes in adults behavioral
skills and their conceptual understanding. This WBU
model coordinates two theoretical systems that are
linked to effective action.
The first system is the Dennisons Brain Gym
(Dennison & Dennison, 1989; Freeman, 1998). This
is a learning readiness system, which utilizes a set of
1 Towhom correspondence should be addressed at Cohoes City
School District, Cohoes, New York; e-mail: chetsgym@hotmail.
com.
all areas, including academic, creative, athletic, and in-
terpersonal areas. These exercises were adapted from
early developmental movements, physical move-
ments of the body that are necessary for normal
brain development. The exercises stimulate the ease
and balance of movement along the three dimen-
sions of the body. In a parallel fashion, increasing the
ease of movement in the body along these dimen-
sions (theoretically) stimulates the integration of neu-
ral connections among brain centers along the same
dimensions. The brain centers located at the oppo-
site sides of each dimension provide complementary
functions for task performance. When the opposing
sides of each dimension are integrated, a general per-
formance or ability is enhanced; these abilities are
communication for the leftright hemisphere di-
mension, organization for the topbottom dimen-
sion, and comprehension/attention for the front
back brain dimension. Sometimes, these dimensions
are not integrated for a given task because of stress
or other factors. At these times, the use of Brain
Gym exercises may increase peoples ease of physical

187 1068-0667/02/0700-0187/0
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188
movement and the flow of information among these
brain centers for a given task, thereby improving their
performance on the task.
Piagets developmental theory of conceptual un-
derstanding explains how people are able to succeed
on certain tasks without reflectively understanding
the how and why of their successes (Piaget, 1976,
1978). He asserted that this gap between success and
understanding occurs because the reflective under-
standing performance requires a higher stage of men-
tal operations than is required for the successful be-
havior on the task. Furthermore, this higher stage of
mental operations is required for people to be cog-
nizant of the set of organized actions that produces the
successful solution to the task. Here, I will explain how
my behavioral intervention, the deep understand-
ing balance (DUB) combines these two approaches
to behavioral action, that is, the Brain Gym system,
and Piagets theory of conceptual understanding. Af-
ter providing the background for both my concep-
tual model and intervention, I will focus on the stage
changes of adults verbal explanations that resulted
from my intervention, and the implications these find-
ings have for both my model of understanding and for
Piagetian theory.
Cognizance and Stage: The Bridge Between Action
and Reflective Explanation
The DUB is a single session intervention method
designed to assist people to act more effectively on
their goals and to explain their solutions for how to
succeed on these goals on a higher level of under-
standing. The method uses a combination of proce-
dures for attaining these two outcomes, and these pro-
cedures are organized within a Brain Gym method,
called a balance (Dennison & Dennison, 1984).
The balance is a general 5-step method, which as-
sists people to act effectively on their personal goals.
Based on my observations of adults doing these bal-
ances, I noticed that these individuals would act more
effectively at the end of the balance procedure, but
that they seemed unable to explain their new strate-
gies. I inferred that their new actions were done au-
tomatically but not consciously. For example, adults
would suddenly sit more comfortably, speak more flu-
ently, or write more concisely, but when asked how
they did it, they seemed baffled in trying to explain
their new accomplishments. I wanted to have indi-
viduals achieve this insightful understanding of how
I did it by creating a balance that would elicit this
Wolfsont
understanding quickly and for a wide variety of goals.
What the balance method lacked was a set of activ-
ities designed to help people gain this reflective un-
derstanding. In order to design these activities, I drew
upon Piagets studies on how children become con-
scious of their actions and how they conceptualize the
actions that solve their tasks (Piaget, 1976).
In his (1976) theory of understanding, Piaget
articulates the developmental process that links
acting successfully on a task with explaining ones
method accurately. Such a link is not automatic, as im-
plied by Piagets studies (Piaget, 1976, 1978); it seems
to require people to observe their goal-oriented
actions on a task and the effects of these actions, and
to reflect on these observations. Furthermore, the
task itself and the age of the child influence the link-
age between success and reflective understanding.
On a set of tasks for which the child gains success
precociously, he found an impressive developmental
lag between understanding actions on a practical
know how level and explaining those actions
accurately on a conceptual level. For example, most
children crawl in a contralateral fashion before they
turn 1 year old yet do not explain the 4-step sequence
of crawling movements until they are at least 9 years
old (Piaget, 1976). In Piagets study of walking on all
fours, he found that most 5- and 6-year-old children,
who first crawled correctly in a contralateral fashion,
then explained their movements incorrectly, as if
they followed an ipsilateral, N pattern (Piaget,
1976). Most children in his sample of 910 year olds
provided correct explanations of the contralateral or
X pattern. Piaget asserted the reason for this order
of explanations is that they become more complex
with development. Thus, the younger children failed
to report the order of the actions they enacted and
observed because this sequence of these actions was
more complex than the stage at which they were re-
flectively understanding these actions. Yet, he also
reported an informal study done by a colleague for
whom some highly educated adults erred by reporting
the incorrect N pattern, too. These adults, it would
seem, possessed the potential to explain their actions
accurately, but may have failed to use that potential.
One of the aims of the DUB is to help adults bridge
this gap between what they do and what they say they
do. Piaget (1976, 1978) argued that bridging this gap
requires both a higher level of complexity in thought
than is required for successful action and a greater
cognizance of actions and their effects.
In order to study the process for becoming
cognizant of the effective actions on a task and
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Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding in Adults
conceptualizing them, I analyzed Piagets conserva-
tion of substance task and his explanation of the
phases of grasping conservation (Piaget, 1967). To
create activities for a Brain Gym balance that would
assist adults to utilize this understanding process, I an-
alyzed conservation in terms of left-brain, right-
brain, and integrated leftright-brain abilities. I am
treating the grasping of conservation as a general pro-
cess of constructing understanding. Conservations are
properties that remain the same despite disturbances
or transformations. Conservation may span from the
concrete stage to even a paradigmatic stage. For exam-
ple, higher laws of physics contain conservations, such
as the constants involved in inertia and the speed of
light. Thus, my method might deepen understanding
indefinitelythat is, raise stage indefinitely (limited
only by the persons physiology).
Whole Brain Understanding:
A Three-Dimensional, Dialectical Transition Model
I have conceived of understanding the conser-
vation concept as consisting of a dialectical process,
one that requires three coordinated performances.
I related these performances to brain hemispheric
abilities as suggested by various practitioners or re-
searchers (e.g., Davidson & Hugdahl, 1995; Dennison
& Dennison, 1989; Kosslyn, 1994), and organized
them as complementary abilities, consistent with the
Brain Gym system. These performances, their corre-
sponding brain-bases, and their major functions are
1. Constructing accurate visual images of ob-
served objects, their movements and transfor-
mations. Mostly the left hemisphere produces
this performance. This will be referred to as
a constructive imagery performance or pro-
cess. Its major function is to identify the ac-
tions, objects, and agents involved in solving
the task.
2. Directing visual focus between an object and
its backgrounds in order to perceive the same
object in different perceptual backgrounds.
Mostly the right hemisphere directs this per-
formance. This will be referred to as the
figure-ground performance or process. Its
major function is to locate the actions, objects,
and agents involved in solving the task.
3. Naming observed and imagined actions, their
agents, objects and contexts as they oc-
curred in #1 and #2. The coordination of the
left and right hemispheres orchestrates this
11:45 Style file version May 31, 2002
189
performance. This will be referred to as the
word-action performance. Its major func-
tion is to name these aspects of the task, es-
pecially the actions that solve the task.
For example, consider people who have the goal of
stretching out a ball of clay to determine if the amount
of its substance is conserved, that is, that it remains
the same. When intentionally lengthening a piece of
clay into a sausage, people use the constructive im-
agery performance to construct a sequence of im-
ages of the sausage increasing in length, akin to mak-
ing a mental movie of the event. They can also
imagine or anticipate both increases and decreases in
length by running the movie forward and backward.
Here, I assume that people need to imagine and
not merely observe changes in form in order to an-
ticipate reversible changes along each dimension. At
the same time, or in rapid alternation, people use the
figure-ground performance to shift or widen ones fo-
cus in order to notice that the breadth of the object
has decreased. Then people may use constructive im-
agery to imagine changes in breadth, followed by the
figure-ground performance to notice both changes to-
gether. Furthermore, in explaining why the amount
of substance is conserved, people name the actions
made on the object, and name the objects identifying
features and locations as it changed over time. Alto-
gether, these performances allow people to concep-
tualize conservation by visualizing reversible, com-
pensatory changes that occur simultaneously and by
verbally reporting on these visualizations.
In the WBU, I have broken down each of these
three performances into a dialectical process that
provides transition steps between one stage and the
next. Figure 1 depicts these performances as three
dialectical dimensions. The four transition steps are
described in Table I. This process is based on Piagets
Fig. 1. Dimensions of whole brain understanding.
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Table I. Dialectical Process for Constructing Reversibility
1. Differentiate to be aware of the differences between two
cognitions, such as discriminating figure from ground in
perception
2. Alternate to oscillate between two related cognitions, such
as alternating between ones perception and internal image
of an object
3. Coordinate to regulate two or more related cognitions at the
same time, such as perceiving figure and ground simultaneously,
within the same perceptual space
4. Generalize to transfer the coordinated awareness to
different objects, states, or contexts. Perceiving the same
object in different backgrounds generalizes the
simultaneous view of figure and ground
probability phases of grasping the conservation of
substance and on Werners ontogenetic principle (in
Baldwin, 1967, i.e., whenever development occurs it
proceeds from a state of relative globality and lack
of differentiation to a state of increasing differentia-
tion, articulation, and hierarchic integration; Piaget,
1967). These steps are similar to those formulated in
the Commons HCSS (Commons & Miller, 1998). I
train adults to enact these first two performances by
modeling eyehand tasks that demonstrate each tran-
sition step. Also, I direct verbal statements to adults
that abstractly describe some of these steps. These
statements are given in Table II. The word-action
performance is elicited by having adults alternate be-
tween saying what they do and both doing and ob-
serving these actions. Formulating a goal, acting upon
it, and explaining how to act on it effectively provide
some of the performances for coordinating words with
actions.
In the DUB, after adults are given brief training
in these general performances for understanding, they
are given a few additional preactivity tasks. These in-
clude a brief training in related performances, such
as in classifying and ordering objects, and in relating
parts to whole. The rationale for instructing partici-
pants to do these latter activities is to prepare them to
Table II. Verbal Statementsa for Eliciting Conservation Ability
This system
Perceives the difference between new and familiar information
Puts information into different contexts
Perceives the parts as connected to the whole
Perceives the whole as greater than the sum of the parts
Intuitively identifies familiar patterns
Knows the difference between appearance and reality
Classifies and gives examples
Puts information into orders or sequences
a Followingeach statement are directions for doing simple eye
hand tasks that model the ability implied.
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Wolfsont
conceptualize their goal actions more logically and
coherently. Also, these performances provide brief
practice on concrete stage tasks to help in the tran-
sition to formal stage tasks (Piaget, 1967).
Accessing Deep Understanding Performances
and Providing Levels of Support
In Brain Gym, there is an assumption that peo-
ple who are experiencing difficulty in attempting
to achieve a goal in a balance have physically
blocked some of their goal-related performance.
For instance, participants may tense their neck mus-
cles when listening, thereby inhibiting their perfor-
mance of reflexively turning their heads to listen fully.
Various Brain Gym procedures for noticing blocked
movements, and exercises for restoring movement are
used selectively to access peoples blocked abilities, in
order for these people to perform optimally on tasks
(Dennison & Dennison, 1989).
Also, each Brain Gym balance is designed to tar-
get a particular domain of goals, such as listening,
and to unblock key performances within that do-
main. In order to enhance the participants perfor-
mances on their goals, they do a small set of tasks
that would likely include component actions of goals
within that domain. Having the participants perform
this representative set of tasks briefly before and after
they do Brain Gym exercises may help the partic-
ipants to access goal-relevant performances. A par-
ticular menu of Brain Gym exercises is selected for
a certain balance, partly because these exercises are
ones that would likely assist the adults to unblock
performances on these tasks.
In designing the DUB, I used these design steps.
Eight Brain Gym exercises were chosen for this bal-
ance because they were found to assist adults in exe-
cuting the three general performances of the whole
brain understanding model. I found that these per-
formances overlap the more general ones of the three-
dimensional Brain Gym model (Wolfsont, 1999). In
the Brain Gym model, the ease of movement along
the bodys three physical dimensions facilitates gen-
eral performances for comprehending/attending, or-
ganizing, and communicating (Dennison & Dennison,
1984). Consequently, the chosen exercises might be
expected to facilitate a wide variety of behaviors
for implementing the goal as well as for doing the
eyehand tasks and verbal explanations for reflective
understanding.
The conservation or understanding tasks, as
previously described and stated in the DUB course
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Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding in Adults
manual (Wolfsont, 2000), are intended to provide
basic component tasks for the domain of reflective
understanding. In the DUB, people are prompted
to relate these understanding task performances to
their specific goals. Thus, the major purpose of the
balance is to help people to access their perfor-
mances or skills so that they are ready to solve the
task independently. The purpose is not to teach the
solutions to the personal goal tasks but to prompt
people to construct these solutions on their own. The
assumptions that people construct their own expla-
nations for their own solutions to their goals are im-
portant as criteria for judging adults explanations as
indicators of their understanding. If people have
been given these solutions and explanations, then they
may be parroting explanations without understanding
them and may have difficulty reproducing and apply-
ing these explanations independently.
The Commons (1994) levels of support model
reinforces this concern. Commons asserts that stim-
uli that act as cues or prompts in aiding performance
affect how easy the task is for the learner. With
each increase in the level of support, the task gets
easier, so that a lower order of complexity of per-
formance is required from the learner. For example,
when a learner demonstrates failure to function in-
dependently, the teacher might provide more support
by simplifying the task, such as by giving step-by-step
directions. This particular level of support would re-
duce the task demands on complexity by two stages,
according to the Commons model. Thus, using the
Commons levels of support model in this study
might help to estimate the task demands for com-
plexity that were made on the participants for giving
verbal explanations.
Measuring Complexity of Performance
With the Commons HCSS
In selecting a suitable measurement technique
for assessing stage in this study, several criteria
were considered. First, the measure needed to assess
changes in the stage of complexity of verbal expla-
nations given by participants. Ideally, these changes
would include changes in the steps of improvement
from one transition step to the next in each stage as
well as increases in general stages of complexity. These
stages and steps would need to be Piagetian types, in
order to be consistent with the design of the interven-
tion model. Second, the technique would need to have
a high interrater reliability, partly because of the small
sample of participants chosen for this study. Third, the
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191
measure needed to be sensitive to changes in perfor-
mance related to the brevity of the DUB intervention
and small sample size. Fourth, the measurement tech-
nique should be content-free in order to be applied
across a variety of skill domains. In this study, the par-
ticipants goals included ones in the content areas of
interpersonal skills, musical performance skills, and
personal organization skills.
The Commons hierarchical complexity scoring
scheme (HCSS; Commons et al., 2000) provides an
excellent scoring model for all of these criteria. It has
been used to analyze textual material into Piagetian
stages and transition steps of organized complex-
ity. The model of these transition steps is very sim-
ilar to the one used for intervention purposes in
this study. T. L. Dawson (personal communication,
May 1, 2000) has found the HCSS to have an inter-
rater reliability of 95%. As found in the Commons
manual (2000), this method has been applied to
scoring changes in complexity of verbal statements
made by counseling clients in a coping skills pro-
gram (M. Broderick), and statements that come from
a variety of skill domains. Some of these skill do-
mains include themes on Armons Good Life Inter-
view (Armon, 1984; Lam, 1999), explanations for ed-
ucational systems (Commons, Danaher, & Meaney,
2000), and responses to the life experience inter-
view (Danaher, 2000). In addition to these criteria,
the highest stage of complexity of a task that a per-
son solves is equivalent to the stage of complexity of
the persons performance. In this study, the equiva-
lence between task and performance makes it possi-
ble to compare the complexity of participants goals to
their verbal explanations for how to succeed on these
tasks. Also, the Commons model of stimulus control is
linked to the HCSS, making it possible to judge how
much a verbal intervention technique, such as task
instructions, may have lowered or raised the level of
complexity required for successful performance on a
certain task.
Exploring the Effects of the DUB Intervention:
Research Questions
In examining the process of change that occurs in
using the DUB intervention (DUB), a list of research
questions will be explored. These questions address
the efficacy of the intervention, some of its assump-
tions, and the implications it may have for my model of
whole brain understanding as well as for Piagetian
models of understanding. Patterns of responses from
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the protocols and simple, statistical analyses will be
used to address these questions.
1. Does the DUB assist adults to increase the hi-
erarchical complexity of their verbal explana-
tions for how to achieve their goals? At what
stages and steps does this change occur? How
does this change relate to the measured com-
plexity of their goals?
2. How might the stimulus support provided for
adults have affected the level of complexity
of performance required from these partici-
pants on the verbal explanation tasks? What
is the estimated level of complexity on which
the participants needed to perform indepen-
dently?
3. What general performance or skill for reflec-
tive understanding emerged between the pre-
activity and postactivity explanations? How
might this skill have been facilitated by lower
order complexity actions that were prompted,
trained and/or practiced during the interven-
tion? What other influences, if any, may have
facilitated this performance? How does this
performance relate to the whole brain under-
standing model and to the notion of conser-
vation as a process for understanding?
4. What implications might these results have
for the relationship between cognizance and
stage, for the whole brain understanding
model, and for the Commons model of stage
transition? What further research may be
helpful to explore these matters?
METHOD
Participants
A convenience sample of four adults was selected
for this study. These participants, one woman and
three men, ranged in age from 35 to 47 years. All par-
ticipants were college educated. This writer was one
of the four participants.
Procedure
Experimental Design
A single subject design was used with all four
participants. The author conducted the intervention
with all of the participants. Each subject was informed
of the purpose of the intervention. Next, they were
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Wolfsont
interviewed to obtain a rough draft of their per-
sonal goal. Then they were asked to describe the role-
play or exemplary action for the goal that would be
used later in the procedure. Whereas the interview
process was not recorded, the techniques used to pro-
vide the question for the goal, and the general for-
mats of goals and role-plays were written procedures.
The participant supplied the specific words and con-
tent for the goals, and chose the scene, materials, and
directed the characters for the role-plays. In this
study, I used the muscle checking technique that is of-
fered as an option in Brain Gym balances (Dennison
& Dennison, 1984). For this method, the facilitator
presses lightly on the subjects outstretched arm im-
mediately after the subject has performed an activ-
ity. A firm, resistant response from the subject in-
dicates that the subject is sure of this performance.
A yielding response to this light pressure indicates
that the subject is unsure, stressed, and requires more
learning. Also, subjects were asked to pay attention
to their reactions following many of the verbal state-
ments and physical activities used in the procedure.
The purpose of these methods is to provide feedback
to the participants so they may discriminate between
performances that are automatic and those that are
controlled, between what works and what doesnt in
the specific learning situations. Furthermore, subjects
were reminded frequently throughout the interven-
tion to be mindful of their goals.
After participants decided on a goal statement,
the facilitator used his DUB intervention, as summa-
rized in Table III. This procedure starts off with PACE
(Freeman, 1998), a brief set of physical activities to
help the client be ready to learn. From my observa-
tion, PACE assists a person to be in a state of relaxed
alertness, and sensitive to how easy or difficult it is
to respond to a verbal or physical activity. Then I di-
rected the participant to check the goal against four
general criteria (i.e., positive, active, clear, and ener-
getic). Once the participant responded that the goal
Table III. Deep Understanding Balance Procedure
1. PACE do the set of four Brain Gym activities that help one
get in a brain-body state of learning readiness
2. Goal set and check the appropriateness of the goal
3. Preactivity do the goal action, explain ones understanding
of how to act on the goal effectively, and respond to
conservation ability activities (See Table II)
4. Learning menu do the given set of eight Brain Gym
movements
5. Postactivity repeat the preactivities but do the last
activity first
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Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding in Adults
met these criteria, the participant did the goal action
or role-play. The participant selected this action with
minimal guidance from the facilitator. The participant
was asked to choose an example that was a familiar,
moderately challenging situation in which this person
experienced difficulty and was not successful in the
past. For example, a participant whose goal was to
build intimacy with another person chose to role-play
a situation in which the participant was attempting
to plan out an activity with another person, who was
played by the facilitator. The participant decided who
would play each role, and described the characteris-
tic behaviors of each of the actors for that scene. For
the nonsocial goals, the participants chose the activity,
such as the music to play on a piano. A brief descrip-
tion of the goal actions or role-plays for each case is
provided in the Appendix. Immediately following the
action or role-play, the participants explained in writ-
ing their understanding of how to act effectively on
their goals.
After giving this explanation, I implemented a
set of preactivities, based on a brain-ability analysis
of Piagets conservation concept as described previ-
ously. These activities include verbal statements that
are presented as commands. The verbal statements
are listed in Table II. Following each of these state-
ments, the facilitator instructed the participant to do
a set of eyehand techniques that model perceptual
or imagery activities related to the statement. For ex-
ample, after the participant responded to the state-
ment, This system puts information into different
contexts, the facilitator modeled and verbally in-
structed the participants to put one of their hands
up near different backgrounds and see both at the
same time, so that the hand is perceived to be in the
background. The entire set of instructions for these
eyehand tasks is found in the DUB course manual
(Wolfsont, 2000).
Next, the facilitator led the participants through a
set of eight Brain Gym exercises along with comments
on how these movements help to restore abilities in
the balance, such as the abilities to perceive figure-
ground relationships. After the participants become
more relaxed, energized, and confident by doing these
exercises, participants are directed to do the same con-
servation ability activities as they did before.
The participants repeated their goal actions. Im-
mediately after this role-play, the participants again
wrote down their understanding of how to act on
the goal effectively. Afterwards, the participants were
asked to notice positive changes in both behaviors
and verbal explanations. In order to reinforce these
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193
positive changes independently, after the session was
over, the participants chose an appropriate phrase
from the explanation, one that represents the new
strategy. The participants also selected appropriate
Brain Gym activities, if needed, to use along with the
phrase. To reinforce the new behaviors, the facilitator
suggested that the participant could choose to say the
phrase and do the Brain Gym activities up to 6 weeks
following the session.
Including the interview procedures, this entire in-
tervention process varied in time from about 45 min
to 2 hr. Typically, it took about 75 min. The interval be-
tween the two verbal explanations was about 20 min.
Within a few weeks after the intervention, the par-
ticipant was contacted to obtain an informal report
on the progress made toward achieving the goal. A
description of each report appears in the Appendix.
Scoring
The preactivity and postactivity explanations
given by each participant were scored using the
(Commons & Richards, 2002) HCSS for both stage
and step of complexity. Each explanation was broken
down into sentences or phrases for detailed scoring
and then the entire explanation was scored for both
stage and transition step. Scores were then compared
within and across participants to detect changes in
complexity. The verbal goal was scored for stage of
complexity. The goals and verbal explanations scored
for both stage and step can be found in the Appendix.
The verbal explanation task was examined for
demands on the order of complexity required from
the participants. Stages of performance were inferred
from a combination of the hierarchical complexity of
the task and the level of stimulus support provided.
For the latter, the Commons levels of support table
(Commons & Miller, 1998) provided a guide for how
a support technique changes the measured order of
performance relative to unaided problem solving.
All of the participants protocols were ex-
plored for a common performance for reflective
understanding, one that showed a direct line of low to
high stage actions that were trained, prompted and/or
practiced in the session.
RESULTS
Measured Levels of Hierarchical Complexity
An increase in complexity of performance be-
tween the preactivity (PRE) and postactivity (POST)
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194
Table IV. Commons HCSS Stage, Step, Substep, and Difference
Scores for Preactivity (PRE) and Postactivity (POST) Explanations
Subject/goal PRE POST Difference
Friend/pastor 10-3-2 11-2 4+1
Build intimacy 10-3-2 11-2 4+1
Find disks 10-3-1 11-4 5+2
Play piano 10-3-2 11-3-2 5+0
Note. 10 = formal stage, 11 = systematic stage, step 2 = relativism,
step 3 = attempted synthesis, substep 1 = smash/hits and excess
false alarms and misses, substep 2 = hits and excess false alarms,
substep 3 = correct rejections and excess misses, step 4 = new tem-
porary equilibrium. Scores are quantified as stage-step + substep
(e.g., 10-3+2). The difference scores are based on steps 0, 1, 2, 3,
and 4; only step 3 has substeps (i.e., +1, +2, and +3). Thus, one
counts five steps to a stage.
explanations was found for each of the four partici-
pants. Applying the Commons HCSS (Commons &
Richards, 2002), each adults (PRE) was scored at a
transition step between the formal stage and system-
atic stages, and each (POST) was scored at a tran-
sition step between the systematic and metasystem-
atic stages. The PRE, POST, and difference scores for
each participant appear in Table IV. Two expert raters,
Dawson and Commons, confirmed the stage scores in
Table IV. In the Appendix, the participants verbal
explanations, complexity scores, and the analyses for
the scoring of each case are provided.
These explanations were scored for transition
steps, using the Commons HCSS (Commons &
Richards, 2002) manual. All of the PREs were scored
at formal, step 3. This is the attempted synthesis
step in the transition process between the formal and
systematic stages. At this step, one attempts to syn-
thesize two or more abstract variables but the syn-
thesis lacks full coordination and success. In its first
substep, called smash, the variables are added in a
conjunctive, chaotic fashion, without tying them to-
gether logically to form a system. For example, the
adult who set a goal to find a box of disks easily
and quickly explained that his searching strategy was
based on a series of criteria that would determine
the most likely to least likely places to look. Here,
the participant said, To look in probable and then
less probable places; feel, look, determine possible fit,
safety, appearance, logical relation to use, ownership,
etc. These criteria were listed in an arbitrary, unor-
ganized way, so that there was no systematic way to
proceed, no way to set priorities. Other participants
also listed their methods, which consisted of solutions
that failed to logically coordinate all of the goal vari-
ables or persons perspectives involved on a system-
atic stage.
Wolfsont
The participants verbal goals, listed below, were
analyzed to assess approximate stage of hierarchical
complexity.
1. To understand how to be an effective friend
and pastor to an individual;
2. To understand how to build intimacy with John
Doe;
3. To understand how to find disks (lost com-
puter disks) easily and quickly; and
4. To understand how to read the notes, feel
the keys and hear and express the music
simultaneously.
Because of brevity of the goals, they were scored with
a lower level of confidence. The goals were analyzed
in terms of their explicit versus implicit meanings. For
their explicit meanings, all of the goals were scored at
the formal stage. For instance, the goal, I understand
how to be an effective friend and pastor to an indi-
vidual, includes the abstractions of a friend and
pastor. These two roles are abstract because they
are defined relationally rather than in terms of a con-
crete reference to a person (T. L. Dawson, 2000, per-
sonal communication, May 1, 2000). Also, each role,
is conceived as a variable, in terms of its effectiveness.
Thus, explicitly, this goal would be at a formal stage
of complexity. These goals seem to be formulated on
the attempted synthesis transition step between the
formal and systematic stages because they imply a syn-
thesis between two or more variables or perspectives
but do not as yet formulate a system that integrates
these variables.
In the context of a balance procedure, the ver-
bal goals carry both present and future meanings. Al-
though the goal is written in the present tense as if it
were achieved, the adult acknowledges that one has
not achieved the goal at this time. However, the future
meaning of the goal is that at the end of the balance,
the actions verbalized in the goal will be performed
more proficiently, globally, and in a more coordinated
fashion. Thus, the future meaning of the goal may be
on a systematic stage of complexity, where the general
actions are integrated into a process that is applied in
a larger context. Additionally, the anticipated task of
explaining ones understanding of how to implement
the goal may also imply that a systematic stage re-
sponse is needed. Here, the implicit demand is for
one to explain the underlying process that integrates
the variables; this is a systematic stage performance.
Consequently, I would speculate that the verbal goals
are written explicitly at a formal stage of performance
but implicitly at a systematic stage of performance.
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Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding in Adults
Levels of Stimulus Support Provided and Their
Effects on Task Complexity
The Commons levels of support table
(Commons & Miller, 2002) was used to judge the ef-
fects of the facilitators supports on the adults mea-
sured levels of performance of the PRE and POST.
For each adult, an informal analysis was made of the
level of stimulus support provided to assist the adults
in performing the PRE and POST tasks. This anal-
ysis was based on a combination of written instruc-
tions, general procedures used by Brain Gym instruc-
tors, and recollections of each case. There were no
verbatim records of the interventions. Consequently,
I will speculate on the minimum and maximum levels
of supports that were provided to adults on this task.
For the PRE and POST tasks, the adults were
asked to explain their understanding of how to act
on their goals effectively. They were given gen-
eral training on the issues and concepts involved
in understanding. Although this general training
was not specific to any personal goal, it may have
prompted components of systematic stage explana-
tions. According to Commons (Commons, personal
communication), prompting components at the sys-
tematic stage would lower the task demands to the
formal stage. What is difficult to determine, however,
is how specific the prompting needs to be in order
to lower the task demands. This analysis begins by
identifying defining features of the systematic stage
explanations that were found in the protocols.
In this study, the adults systematic stage explana-
tions coordinated multiple perspectives or variables
or both to account for a general process that solved
their tasks, and they placed these perspectives or vari-
ables or both into one or more large contexts. These
features were absent from the formal stage explana-
tions, and they may have been cued by verbal state-
ments given to the participants. For example, one
adult gave a systematic stage explanation, in which he
coordinated the perspectives of the friend and pastor
roles by placing each into a different temporal con-
text. He noted that it may not be possible to be both
at the same time but that acting on these roles at
different times could be done. Some of the verbal
statements I made to this adult may have cued him
to organize his reasoning in this fashion. For exam-
ple, one statement was This system puts information
into different contexts. Also, the verbal directions
given to him for shifting perceptions between his hand
and its background includes phrases that asked him
to see these two things at the same time and to
11:45 Style file version May 31, 2002
195
alternate between looking at his hand and the back-
ground. These statements may have prompted specific
transition steps, such as the relativism step that this
adult formulated by putting the roles of friend and
pastor into different contexts. Consequently, I would
speculate that the support I gave to the adults either
did not affect the task demands or it lowered them
by one stage at most, so the task demanded a formal
stage of performance.
The General Performance for
Reflective Understanding
There were three interrelated, general perfor-
mances that seemed to emerge in the postactivity
explanations. One method of analyzing this change
was to compare the PRE and POST for statements
that had similar content but different problem-solving
strategies, strategies that were related to the under-
standing activities practiced during the DUB. Af-
ter stating each general performance, I will clarify the
terms of the performance, provide an example of it,
and speculate on the lower order components of these
performances that were practiced or prompted during
the DUB.
1. The adults envision one of more large contexts
in which they place themselves and the task in
order to solve it.
Envision means that the participants imagine
events as possible or future occurrences. An example
of this, which appears below, begins with the words I
visualize the pages ahead. The large contexts are
places or times that are conducive to solving the task.
These may be metaphorical or mental ones, such as
a calm place.
PRE: I play slowly enough to anticipate each upcom-
ing section of the music, looking ahead while keeping
aware of what my hands are feeling and where they
are.
POST: I visualize the pages ahead and the intent of
playing and the feeling for the music to be expressed,
all from a calm place.
The components of this performance might in-
clude ones from the figure-ground and constructive
imagery activities that were modeled and practiced
as during the DUB. Also, the abstract verbal state-
ments referring to contexts and images may have
prompted these performances. Together, these may
have stimulated the participants to look at broader
perceptual contexts and construct visual images of the
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196
actions and objects in their solutions to tasks. Also,
many of the Brain Gym exercises used in this balance
have the effects of broadening ones perceptual field
and increasing visual imagery, as reported by clinical
observation. Effects of the Brain Gym exercises are
noted in Dennison and Dennison (1989).
2. In the described process of solving the task,
the participants conceptualize peoples exter-
nal behaviors, including their expressions or
observations, as coordinated with those per-
sons internal states, selected roles (states of
being), or mental processes. The new solution
to the task seems to be based on these coordi-
nated events.
Peoples external behaviors may refer to their
expressions of internal events or states, such as the
example of John expressing love in few words because
he doesnt know what love is. This participant implies
that she is a woman of many words when it comes to
love, so that a solution to building intimacy with John
is for her to use fewer words, to replace the words with
actions.
PRE: He sees intimacy in a different way than me.
Status quo is OK for him. Change appears threat-
ening.
POST: I need to understand that John is a man of few
words when it comes to love. Hes not even sure what
love is. Working together to growmaybe not words
but action.
Prompting adults to know the difference be-
tween appearance and reality may have lead them
to look for external behaviors that were controlled by
internal events, such as a man of few words is con-
trolled by being not even sure what love is. The con-
structive imagery exercises may have provided prac-
tice and prompting for this performance as well. In
this training, the adults coordinated observing their
hands and imaging their hands in different views and
shapes. Other activities directed adults to see famil-
iar patterns in their hands. These activities may have
stimulated the adults to rapidly image their previous
observations of events and may have primed them to
do so during their second role-plays. Consequently,
they may have become more cognizant of familiar pat-
terns or images related to their goals, such as John is
a man of few words when it comes to love.
3. The effective goal actions for achieving all
the key properties named in the goal are ex-
pressed in a direct, active fashion, so that the
agent is controlling the actions, which in turn
Style file version May 31, 2002
Wolfsont
are attaining the goal. The actions are not em-
bedded in nouns nor are cause and effect con-
founded in vague verbs.
To clarify, actions that are embedded in nouns
might be called nominalizations. Examples of these
are recognition and affirmation; these terms em-
bed the verbs to recognize and to affirm into
nouns so that it is not clear who is doing the action and
how it is being done. Vague verbs that may confound
cause and effect include encourage and welcome.
These verbs imply both cause and effect. For ex-
ample, welcoming people implies that these people
feel welcomed. The clearest example of this change
in expressing actions comes from the pastor/friend
protocol:
PRE: The parishioner is looking for recognition and
affirmation from someone who represents the gate-
way to an organization I desire to join. The pastor
wants to welcome and encourage but not offer a
blank check to this unknown albeit eager prospec-
tive prospect.
POST: What I am looking for from an individual at
each particular time will be different as I am friend
and pastor.
This change in performance may be linked to
practice on the component actions of the word
action tasks in the DUB. These tasks included the
combination of the role-play followed by reviewing
the goal and then writing the reflective explanation.
This combination is done twice in the DUB. Thus, the
participant may have benefited from practice in coor-
dinating words with actions. Furthermore, repeating
these activities might provide the effect of producing
an output in the PRE that is used as input for the
POST. This would help the adult to generalize from
the PRE, such as to state simply what I am looking for
from an individual without having to name specifics.
Various Brain Gym exercises may have assisted this
adult to listen, observe, and reflect more attentively
during the second role-play and verbal explanation
tasks, thus facilitating this performance.
The Confluence of Cognizance and Stage
in the Process of Conservation
In constructing new solutions for their personal
goals, the participants seemed to formulate conser-
vations of key properties their goals. The four adults
learned that certain dimensions related to their goals
could vary yet the essential properties of the goals
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Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding in Adults
would be conserved. The pastor could conserve the
pastor and friend roles by enacting them at dif-
ferent times with an individual so these roles wouldnt
conflict. Building intimacy could be conserved even
though the amount of talk about love would be re-
duced. In the context of being together, action
or doing things together might replace talking about
love and result in building intimacy. The piano player
learned that he could conserve his attention to the mu-
sic by not attending to his worry and by visualizing
various aspects of the task including a feeling for the
music to be expressed from a calm place. He could
reduce his immediate visual attention to his hands and
the pages of music, and still accomplish all the features
of his goal. The finder of the lost disks learned that he
could find a lost object easily and quickly by scan-
ning and zeroing in on it. He would become aware
of its location and identity gradually and simultane-
ously without having to look deliberately in specific
locations for it. Pursuing the thought of the lost ob-
ject during the search for it would conserve both ef-
fort and time. I suggest that the participants increased
their cognizance of the tasks larger contexts, and in
each case, this allowed them to identify and effect ac-
tions that would conserve the essential properties of
the goal.
Factors That Increased Stage of Performance
Did practice and/or prompting of component ac-
tions of the adults verbal explanation performances
account for the increase in stage of performance? I
suggest that these ways of improving performance
were necessary but not sufficient for the change to
occur. The first necessity was a change in the direct
actions on the goal, which took place in the role-play.
These new actions seemed to have provided fresh data
for the participants to increase the stage of their verbal
explanations. However, changes in direct actions on a
goal would not necessarily produce an increase in the
stage of complexity of the verbal explanations. From
my experience in using Brain Gym balances that do
not include the DUB techniques for visualization and
verbal explanation, adults experience improvements
in behavior but usually offer simpler, less insightful
explanations for these improvements than they did in
this study. The second necessity was the prompting
and practicing of systematic stage and lower orders of
component actions for the verbal explanations. Again,
I suggest that this was a necessary factor but not a
sufficient one. The prompting was not specific to the
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197
participants goals and the practice was very brief. In
contrast to this brief practice, these adults had labored
for several weeks to months, trying to make substan-
tial progress on these goals. What then, was the suffi-
cient means that created a rapid increase in reflective
understanding?
I speculate that the DUB assists adults to visual-
ize observed actions rapidly and in multiple contexts
in the pursuit of their goals, and that this performance
is a key generator for conceptualizing actions on a
systematic stage. I suggest that it was the combination
of the conservation exercises and the Brain Gym ex-
ercises that increased this visualization performance
rapidly. From my observations, doing the combination
of the Brain Gym exercises and the conservation ac-
tivities increases the visualization of oneself as mov-
ing in space much more so than doing either inter-
vention alone. A direct relationship between the use
of Brain Gym exercises and the measured complexity
of adult performance has not been tested. However,
in a controlled experiment, Irving (1996) found that
doing just the PACE exercises daily over a 3-week
period resulted in about a 70% drop in self-reported
anxiety and a 19% improvement in skill-performance
tests for three groups of nursing students. In another
controlled experiment, university students response
times on a four-choice visual light display improved
significantly following Brain Gym activities (Sifft &
Khalsa, 1991). It is plausible that doing these exer-
cises reduces anxious feelings and defensive reactions,
thereby freeing up more attention, movement, and
energy to pursue a solution to the task. In a similar
vein, Pascual-Leone (1998) asserts that task perfor-
mance improves by inhibiting irrelevant schemes and
activating relevant ones, which produces a coactivated
set of relevant schemes. The irrelevant schemes could
include the worry in doing the task. Also, medita-
tion practices have been linked to reductions in stress
indicators, to increases in attention, and better per-
formance in abstract reflection (in Alexander et al.,
1990).
CONCLUSIONS
The major purpose of this study was to exam-
ine how the DUB intervention influenced adults to
raise their level of understanding for achieving their
goals. A second objective was to relate the findings
from this study to the writers model of whole brain
understanding and to neo-Piagetian models that ad-
dress the notion of understanding. The conclusions
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198
drawn here are based on an informal, pilot study
rather than a controlled experiment, yet they are con-
sistent with this writers extensive experience in using
these intervention techniques with adults.
It is proposed that the single session DUB inter-
vention resulted in an increase in the stage of adults
verbal explanations for how to solve their personal
goals, as measured by the Commons HCSS manual.
The adults PREs were in the transition between the
formal and systematic stages and their POSTs were
in the transition between the systematic and meta-
systematic stages. All participants got stuck at the
transition step 3 in the PRE, a step at which people
tend to experience a sense of chaos in trying to co-
ordinate multiple actions at the same time. This was
the same level of complexity at which the adults per-
sonal goals were written in explicit terms. Although
their goals may have implied that a systematic stage
explanation was needed, the adults failed to attain this
stage at the PRE. When they wrote their POST, about
20 min later, this stage had shifted and they produced
new solutions to their tasks in the process.
All of the participants attained this increase in
stage without receiving direct instruction on how to
solve their specific tasks. They generated the solu-
tions to their goals. However, the adults did receive a
general, nonspecific training in understanding that
may or may not have reduced the demands on the
complexity of performance for their tasks. Some of
the components of a systematic stage performance
seemed to have been prompted in a general fashion,
which was not specific to the content of the adults
goals. If it did reduce the demands on performance,
it is estimated that it may have reduced them by
one stage at most. Consequently, questions about the
generalization of the adults understanding go unan-
swered. Did the adults write down systematic stage
explanations that they really understood on this level
or were they merely parroting systematic stage no-
tions that were prompted during the intervention?
Would they apply this level of complexity in the future
to this task and to a variety of tasks related to their
goal? If so, how much practice would be needed? Ad-
ditional studies would need to address these and other
questions regarding the generalization of the perfor-
mance that results from the DUB.
A three-part general performance that emerged
between the PRE and POST was linked to this
writers three-dimensional model of whole brain
understanding. These newfound performances in-
cluded envisioning large contexts in which the task
could be solved, conceptualizing peoples external
Style file version May 31, 2002
Wolfsont
behaviors as coordinated with their internal states or
mental processes, and using verb forms that clarify
the agents and objects of the actions. The conclusions
regarding this writers model are suggestive but pro-
vide direction for future research in using the DUB.
Objective scoring measures of its three performances
would be needed along with controlled studies to test
the model in a rigorous fashion. Also, the effects of the
DUB on the complexity of performance could be
tested in a more controlled fashion by using it to sup-
port adults performance on standardized postformal
measures of complexity.
The implications of this study for neo-Piagetian
models of understanding focus on two issues. The first
is the relationship between cognizance and stage of
complexity. In this study, it was suggested that the
participants increase in cognizance of the larger con-
text of their tasks was a key factor in their systematic
stage performance. Although Piaget (1976) suggested
that an increase in the cognizance of actions and their
effects is dependent on an increase in stage of the per-
formance, the converse might be valid, too. However,
no independent measure of cognizance was used in
this study to confirm these results and to test out dif-
ferent causal relationships between cognizance and
stage. Controlled studies in this area with the DUB
could be helpful in researching this relationship, and
might also inform models that relate consciousness to
stage (e.g., Cook-Greuter, 1999; Kegan, 1994).
This study addresses the questions of how par-
ticipants get stuck in and how they move rapidly
through the transition process from one stage to the
next. Recently, Commons and Miller (2002) provided
a theory on what causes and what may block the tran-
sition process. They state that the rapid alternation
between actions causes transition and that certain
emotional states that occur at each transition step may
inhibit progress to the next steps. My model is consis-
tent with these points. However, it suggests that com-
plementary, organized performances for identifying,
locating, and naming actions may facilitate this tran-
sition, at least the transition from the formal to the
systematic stage. Also, I suggest that a rapid transi-
tion to a higher stage of complexity is more likely to
occur when people are in an ideal learning state
for performing their tasks. Using Brain Gym exer-
cises, which seem to restore fluid, balanced move-
ments and reduced anxiety reactions may be one of
many ways to elicit this ideal state. Conceptualiz-
ing ideal state within a developmental stage model
may be a next step in understanding the transition
process.
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Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding in Adults
APPENDIX
Protocol #1: Friend/Pastor
Subject: Male, age 41
Goal: To understand how to be an effective friend
and pastor to an individual.
Analysis: Transition between formal and systematic.
Stage 10, step 3 (attempted synthesis). Explicitly, this
goal is at a formal stage because it indicates that two
relational roles are to be combined, that of a friend
and a pastor. This anticipated synthesis of the two
roles suggests the transitional step of smash. The
goal may imply that the two roles are to be fully
coordinated, without compromising the effectiveness
of either role. In this case, the goal may be at least at
the systematic stage.
Role-play: The participant directed me to play the
pastor and he played the parishioner for this role-play.
Preactivity explanation: Now I sense how different
pastor and friend are. The parishioner is looking
for recognition and affirmation from someone who
represents the gateway to an organization I desire
to join. The pastor wants to welcome and encourage
but not offer a blank check to this unknown albeit
eager prospective asset.
Analysis: Transition between formal and systematic
stages. It is transition step 3 (attempted synthesis),
substep 2 (hits and excess false alarms). The client
has differentiated the two viewpoints but has not
clearly stated the roles of pastor and friend as
belonging to the pastor character. In the last sentence,
he seems to be combining aspects of authority and
friendship at the same time by indicating that one
can act friendly but still exert the authority of a
pastor by not offering a blank check to a parishioner.
This would seem to be an overgeneralization; it is
not clear when and where this strategy would work.
Thus, the performance fits an attempted synthesis,
which is step 3. At step 3, it fits substep 2, which is
the overgeneralization phase of integrating the roles.
The performance is not yet at the systematic stage
because there is not a process that coordinates the
roles to make them both effective.
Postactivity explanation: I understand that it may not
be possible to be both at the same time, and that
what I am looking for from an individual at each
particular time will be different as I am friend and
pastor.
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199
Analysis: Transition between systematic and metasys-
tematic stages. Stage 11, transition step 2 (relativism).
The client succeeds in bringing together the two roles
of friend and pastor within the same individual. He
alternates them in a systematic fashion so they do
not conflict with one another. His impression in the
preactivity phase was that the two people conflicted
because of incompatible perspectives or desires. In
the postactivity phase, this premise seemed to evolve
into the notion that the two roles are ultimately
incompatible if enacted simultaneously yet could be
alternated systematically. This use of an alternating
scheme to coordinate the two roles seems to fit the
dialectical step of relativism in the HCSS. This
explanation is in transition to the metasystematic
stage, where the roles would be defined as belonging
to systems of social relationships that are interrelated.
For example, the client might have viewed the roles
of pastor and friend as potentially more compatible in
an organization where power is distributed uniformly
so that everyone has (nearly) equal power. Here, he
might have asserted that the more authoritarian the
pastor role is in an organization, the more incompat-
ible it is with the friendship role, because the latter
relationship is based on equal power.
Note: This client was surprised by what he had
written the second time; he found it to be clear and
forceful.
Follow-up: The client noted that at social functions, he
was experiencing a greater awareness of how others
communicate with him differently as they address his
different social roles.
Protocol #2: Build Intimacy
Subject: Female, age 41
Goal: To experience a deeper understanding of
building intimacy with [John Doe].
Analysis: Transition from formal to systematic. Stage
10, step 3 (attempted synthesis). Building intimacy
with another person indicates the two people are
intimates who are involved in a process that may
increase the closeness of their social relationship. This
implies the coordination of two abstract variables,
which would be at least a formal stage task. To experi-
ence a deeper understanding of this process suggests
that the participant wants to grasp the underlying pro-
cess of this task, which implies that it is a systematic
stage task.
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Role-play: The participant guided me to play John
Doe in a scene where she played herself, attempting
to discuss matters of intimacy and to make plans.
Preactivity explanation: He sees intimacy in a differ-
ent way than me. Status quo is OK for him. Change
appears threatening. He doesnt see a problem.
Need to slow down, decrease distractions in the
environment and our lives. Need to explore and
respect each others wants and desires and function
as a team. Need to have a plan and not wing it all
the time.
Analysis: Transition from formal to systematic stage.
Stage 10, transition step 3 (attempted synthesis),
substep 2 (hits and excessive false alarms; overgener-
alization). The client has a needs to do list of the
abstract conditions required for building intimacy,
such as not being overwhelmed, exploring each
others wants and desires, and having a plan. This is
multiple causation rather than a systematic level of
understanding. The variables in the list are presented
as grand generalizations, needing to do all of these
actions without discriminating where or when, or up
to what point. The social relationship, as a system
that builds intimacy, is not explained as a coordinated
system of viewpoints that balances individual with
common needs or desires. Explore and respect
each others wants and desires indicates a notion of
maintaining independence and function as a team
implies interdependence but the participant doesnt
account for how to coordinate them. She only posits
a simple plan.
Postactivity explanation: I need to understand that
John is a man of few words when it comes to love. Hes
not even sure what love is. Intimacy is a place where
we can be together, yet unique beings, developing
our strength, shouldering burdens when each other
may be weak. Working together to growmaybe not
words but action.
Analysis: Transition from systematic to metasys-
tematic. Stage 11, step 2 (relativism). The adult
explains how two independent people work together
by compensating for one anothers weaknesses.
There is a clear statement of mutual independence
(unique beings) but weaker ones of dependence
(shouldering burdens when each other may be
weak) and of interdependence (working together
to grow). The actions of each person alternate but
do not yet coordinate to build intimacy. The text does
not support a metasystematic level of complexity.
Both people are not yet described clearly as separate
Style file version May 31, 2002
Wolfsont
systems or personalities, each having ones own
values, ways of expressing intimacy, and so forth that
interact with one another, that sometimes conflict
and find common ground.
Follow-up: Two weeks later, the client reported that
John Doe told her that he just had the best weekend
that hes had with her in a long time. She gave him
space to be himself.
Protocol #3: Find Disks
Subject: Male, age 47
Goal: To understand how to find disks [lost computer
diskettes] easily and quickly.
Analysis: Transition from formal to systematic stage.
Stage 10, step 3 (attempted synthesis). This goal
involves coordinating two abstract variables, ease
and quickness, in the process of finding a lost
object. To understand the finding method as a gen-
eral, underlying process may raise the requirement
to a systematic stage task.
Role-play: The participant did this goal in his own
house. For the goal action, he walked about the house,
searching for a small box of computer diskettes that
he had failed to find for several months.
Preactivity explanation: To look in probable and then
less probable places; feel, look, determine possible fit,
safety, appearance, logical relation to use, ownership,
and so forth.
Analysis: Transition from formal to systematic.
Stage 10, step 3 (attempted synthesis), substep 1
(smash). This statement indicates multiple cau-
sation; a list of unorganized criteria is given for
finding the object. It is still formal because it does not
explain logical relationships among input variables;
for instance, the variables are not sorted out nor
ordered into a hierarchy. The method is chaotic at
this point so that it fits into the smash substep. The
client is using a spot-checking strategy for finding
things, employing an unorganized set of criteria to
anticipate the probable location of the item and its
identifying characteristics. The general actions of
locating and identifying are not adequately de-
fined nor interrelated in a system. Also, the adult does
not indicate how this method works easily and quickly.
Postactivity explanation: To find things easily is to
pursue a thought until it intersects perceptions or
images of the misplaced item, to sense its presence
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Increasing Behavioral Skills and Level of Understanding in Adults
without clearly identifying it, and then it appears as
if to fulfill some sense of it being there already.
Analysis: Transition from systematic to metasystem-
atic. Stage 11, step 4 (new temporary equilibrium).
The adult integrates locating and identifying
into a subjective, intuitive system of thinking about
an object. It seems that the actions of locating and
identifying are alternated rapidly. This is a strategy
of scanning and zeroing in on the misplaced item.
The scanning is done by first using the ground to
sense an object intuitively, and then by disembedding
the object more fully so it becomes the figure. At
this point, the appearance of the object is gradually
matched against the images of the thought about the
object until the client becomes fully conscious of the
objects presence. This strategy represents a new the-
sis for finding lost objects. Pursuing the thought of
the object is the new action that coordinates locating
and identifying the object. The explanation has not
yet transitioned to the metasystematic stage, where
the adult might explain how this intuitive system for
finding lost objects compares to an objective system,
where the latter is based on an organized knowledge
of the object and its possible locations.
Follow-up: The client discovered that his strategy
for finding things had shifted radically from spot-
checking to scanning and zeroing in on lost items. In
about 5 min (prior to giving his postintervention ex-
planation) he found the box of disks that had been
lost for several months.
Protocol #4: Play Piano
Subject: Male, age 47
Goal: To read the notes, feel the keys, and hear and
express the music simultaneously.
Analysis: Transition from formal to systematic.
Stage 10, step 3 (attempted synthesis). This goal says
explicitly that several actions are to be done simul-
taneously. This treats all of the actions as abstract
ones, because they become time-related variables
that need to be coordinated. Thus, the task is at
least a formal stage. Also, since the explanation task
required the participant to explain his understanding
of this method, it may have implied that a systematic
stage performance was required.
Role-play: The participant played a few musical pieces
on the piano, ones that he had been practicing at home
with mixed results.
11:45 Style file version May 31, 2002
201
Preactivity explanation: I play slowly enough to
anticipate each upcoming section of the music,
looking ahead while keeping aware of what my hands
are feeling and where they are. I know where to
look at any time when I switch from watching my
hands at the keyboard to the page and back again to
keep playing at a steady pace, accurately, and with
full expression. I keep the horses of my speed,
the music, and my hands harnessed in cooperative
synchrony with each other.
Analysis: Transition between formal and systematic.
Stage 10, step 3 (attempted synthesis), substep 2
(hits and excess false alarms). The client uses several
formal statements but he never links them into a
complete system. His strategy here is to slow down
his playing enough to be able to keep aware, switch
his attention, and anticipate sections of music. These
variables, although they seem to cohere into a system,
are never related clearly to the expression of the mu-
sic, a key output variable. He seems to overgeneralize
this method, stating that he knows where to look
at any time and plays with full expression. This
overgeneralization fits into substep 2. The response is
nearly at substage 3, because he is indicating where
and when the actions should occur. In this formal
stage response, which is one of linear logic, he is
not coordinating the two processes of monitoring
his actions that create the sounds and monitoring
the output or music into an overall system for
expressing the music.
Additional Brain Gym methods: For this case only,
additional muscle checking and brief questions were
used. These methods were taken from an advanced
type of Brain Gym manual. They were used to
address the clients stress over focusing and to explore
personal resources he might use to achieve the goal.
These methods may have elicited his references to
doing Brain Gym and chi activities at home. It is
noteworthy that this client had done two complete,
advanced types of balances on similar goals prior to
doing the DUB for this session.
Postactivity explanation: I relax. I breathe. I visual-
ize the pages ahead and the intent of playing and the
feeling for the music to be expressed, all from a calm
place. I keep practicing all the little snags to smooth
out. I get plenty of rest, do Brain Gym and chi activ-
ities. I visualize success and calmness. I pay attention
to the music and not the worry. I breathe some more,
and repeat. I remember this and create it from out of
my larger goals and purposes.
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202
Analysis: Transition from systematic to metasystem-
atic. Stage 11, step 3 (attempted synthesis), substep 2
(hits and excess false alarms). The client explains that
he uses visualization (or relaxation) systematically
to both elicit and integrate calmness, attention,
playing, a feeling for the music, and success in order
to achieve his goals. Thus, he is coordinating several
abstract variables. For instance, he pays attention to
the music and not the worry, and he visualizes both
calmness and success. There is a negation between
attention to the music and the worry, and there is
reciprocity between calmness and visualization. The
client seems to overgeneralize his solution, in that he
does not specify where and when to apply the method
to be effective. Thus, his responses fit into substep 2.
In comparing the preactivity to the postactivity
explanation, there is a shift from an awareness of the
step-by-step method to an awareness of interrelated
mental processes, such as calmness and visualization,
that are necessary for optimal performance. The
explanation has not reached a metasystematic stage.
For instance, he does not explain how calmness and
success represent two systems that are interdepen-
dent. So far, he has indicated how success depends
on calmness but not how success might cause
calmness.
Note: At the end of the session, the client noted he
played the last two pieces better than he had done
during the preactivity. He reported that a major
change was that he was much more relaxed. (His
posture appeared to be much more relaxed and his
speech more evenly paced.)
Follow-up: This adult noted that he had difficulty the
first day he played at an event which occurred several
days after this intervention. He had gotten little sleep
the night before his first performance. The second day
he performed, he was relaxed in playing at the con-
cert. He said that he made some adjustments in his
selection of pieces to play; he selected one he was
ready to play more easily and found that his audience
didnt realize this and was pleased.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I thank Michael L. Commons for his suggestions
and editorial assistance. Also, I would like to note
that Brain Gym is a registered trademark of the Ed-
ucational Kinesiology Foundation, Ventura Harbor
Village, 1691 Spinnaker Drive, Suite 105B, Ventura,
CA 93001. The deep understanding intervention
and model of whole brain understanding are this
Wolfsont
authors inventions although parts of these are drawn
from Brain Gym. Many of the similarities and dif-
ferences with the Brain Gym procedures and models
are noted in an earlier article (Wolfsont, 1999) and
in the deep understanding balance course manual
(Wolfsont, 2000).
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