Cognitive Restructuring though Technology to Reduce Stress

http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/18/health/train-brain-stress-enayati/index.html?hpt=he_c1


The article starts with a pointed finger exposing the absurdity in which the general public holds on the topic of mental self-development.  Like Hadrian, she retreats behind her barrier of an obligatory presentation of pop culture and an attempt to bring the hard science of the Matrix down to the reader's level. However, she can be forgiven due to the weight of the information later presented. In her article she presents the landscape of the battle and it's combatants; our mental health is being besieged daily by the mundane stressors. Without recuperation, the taut neural fibers are being torn asunder by the internal and external stressors of our lives.  Meanwhile the general population is slowly poisoned by this perpetual state of fight or flight, our greatest minds are conducting stress research on athletes and soldiers. The research occurring in USC's Institute of Creative Technologies is conducting two major projects; STRIVE and Virtual Iraq. STRIVE is a project based on the resilience model and consists of preemptive measures for soldiers to have better coping skills for dealing with the trauma they will experience. The former project and Virtual Iraq are based off behavioral therapy and specifically exposure where they recreate such traumatic events for habituation in the client. In all therapy there must be a key element for the process to be effective. This element is sometimes referred to in the business as a therapist. Due to the decreasing number of clinicians, the technology has been evolving in the form of SimCoach. This is effectively an artificial intelligence designed for clinical interactions without any diagnostic skills. Essentially, it's an imaginary friend in a physical form for an adult without the result of going to Bedlam. This simulation will allow you to "vent", receive stress relieving techniques, and seek private mental help without the social repercussions. The second more pressing issue in the article is the immense stress exerted on professional athletes. The sheer pressure exerted by their bank account upon their fragile egos is enough to shatter most men's schemas. In all seriousness, professional athletes live with a tremendous amount of stress that they manage in various ways. In addition to the copious amounts of drugs and fornication that athletes use on a daily basis, researchers are now integrating metacognitive techniques. These range from the elder mindfulness and meditation to a newer integration with technology. A combination of qEEG and visual stimulation to have the athlete cognitively recognize his or her own brain waves is an impressive combination of clinical techniques. In being exposed to these stimulation of different types of brain wave patterns, they focused on the athlete recognizing and in the future controlling the brain waves emitted.

 The thought of  having the ability to not only recognize different forms of mental sensation, but actively direct them is a immense contribution to the clinical field. In theory, if this research could extend to different forms of mental patterns, it may be theoretically possible for an individual to be consciously aware of not only the encroachment of depressive or manic symptoms, but also the  forerunners to the symptoms.
From experience and observations there are many stress relieving techniques employed by professions and by the general public. What are your techniques fro relieving stress, and what are your thoughts on the metacognitive techniques being employed by the athletes? Do you think that such an non-quanitative methodology should be embraced for it's achievements or be written off as pseudoscience with its lack of data?
-M.A.C.