News: More People Are Microdosing for Mental... (The New York Times) - Behind the headlines
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More People Are Microdosing for Mental Health. But Does It Work?
Scientists are split over whether the benefits some microdosers experience are a placebo effect or something more.
Read more at The New York Times
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Research findings and data from the National Library of Medicine
PubMed articles
Psilocybin produces substantial and sustained decreases in depression and anxiety in patients with life-threatening cancer: A randomized double-blind trial
ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00465595.
Microdosing psychedelics: More questions than answers? An overview and suggestions for future research
It is concluded that while most anecdotal reports focus on the positive experiences with microdosing, future research should also focus on potential risks of (multiple) a …
Psilocybin occasioned mystical-type experiences: immediate and persisting dose-related effects
Under supportive conditions, 20 and 30 mg/70 kg psilocybin occasioned mystical-type experiences having persisting positive effects on attitudes, mood, and behavior. Impli …
Motives and Side-Effects of Microdosing With Psychedelics Among Users
In line with media reports and anecdotes, the majority of our respondents microdosed to enhance performance. Negative effects occurred mostly acutely after substance cons …
Trial of Psilocybin versus Escitalopram for Depression
On the basis of the change in depression scores on the QIDS-SR-16 at week 6, this trial did not show a significant difference in antidepressant effects between psilocybin …
Low Doses of LSD Acutely Increase BDNF Blood Plasma Levels in Healthy Volunteers
Despite preclinical evidence for psychedelic-induced neuroplasticity, confirmation in humans is grossly lacking. Given the increased interest in using low doses of psyche …
Psychedelic Microdosing: Prevalence and Subjective Effects
Anecdotal reports suggest that the administration of sub-hallucinogenic doses of psychedelic compounds on a chronic, intermittent schedule - a practice known as psychedel …
Mood and cognition after administration of low LSD doses in healthy volunteers: A placebo controlled dose-effect finding study
There is a popular interest in microdosing with psychedelics such as LSD. This practice of using one-tenth of a full psychedelic dose according to a specific dosing sched …
Exploring the effect of microdosing psychedelics on creativity in an open-label natural setting
While this study provides quantitative support for the cognitive-enhancing properties of microdosing psychedelics, future research has to confirm these preliminary findin …
Psilocybin microdosing does not affect emotion-related symptoms and processing: A preregistered field and lab-based study
Our confirmatory analyses revealed that psilocybin microdosing did not affect emotion processing or symptoms of anxiety and depression compared with placebo. Our explorat …
Self-blinding citizen science to explore psychedelic microdosing
Microdosing is the practice of regularly using low doses of psychedelic drugs. Anecdotal reports suggest that microdosing enhances well-being and cognition; however, such …
Repeated low doses of LSD in healthy adults: A placebo-controlled, dose-response study
The resurgence of interest in using psychedelic drugs, including lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), in psychiatry has drawn attention to the medically unsupervised practic …
Low doses of LSD reduce broadband oscillatory power and modulate event-related potentials in healthy adults
Low doses of LSD produced broadband cortical desynchronization over the DMN during resting state and reduced P300 and N170 amplitudes, patterns similar to those reported …
Preliminary Report on the Effects of a Low Dose of LSD on Resting-State Amygdala Functional Connectivity
These preliminary findings show that a very low dose of LSD, which produces negligible subjective changes, alters brain connectivity in limbic circuits. Additional studie …
Psychedelic effects of psilocybin correlate with serotonin 2A receptor occupancy and plasma psilocin levels
The main psychedelic component of magic mushrooms is psilocybin, which shows promise as a treatment for depression and other mental disorders. Psychedelic effects are bel …
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