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18 papers
This paper reviews the recent comeback of psychedelic research and points out that much of that work borrows from indigenous healing traditions. The authors say Indigenous people, ethnic and racial minorities, women, and other marginalized groups are often left out of research and the mainstream story about psychedelic medicine. The…
This 2020 systematic review looked at human and animal studies on physical exercise and brain plasticity. The authors screened 20,782 records and included 21 original studies. They reported that exercise was linked to higher levels of several neurotrophic factors and receptors, more cell growth and proliferation, and better measures of…
Researchers studied 85 married couples (170 people) to see if worries about close relationships (attachment anxiety) link to stress hormones and immune cells. People with higher attachment anxiety had higher saliva cortisol across three days and lower counts of several T-cell types in blood. The study is observational, mostly white…
This paper reviews how people talk about and practice “psychedelic integration.” The authors say the term has many different definitions and many kinds of practices, which has created confusion. They present the first wide-ranging review and a new, synthesized definition and model of integration, plus a long list of integration…
Researchers compared an MBTI-style test and a Big Five test in studies of U.S. adults and found the Big Five predicted 37 measured life outcomes about twice as well as the MBTI-style test. The MBTI-style test did better than astrology but worse than the Big Five. The MBTI-style test often…
This systematic review of research up to 2024 found that meditation and mindfulness are linked to measurable brain changes and to better emotional regulation, cognition, and stress resilience. Many studies report thicker cortex in certain areas, lower amygdala reactivity, changes in brain connectivity and neurotransmitters, and improvements in anxiety, depression,…
This study followed people from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Youth 1979 to see how self-esteem in young adulthood links to depression later on. The authors found that, for men, alcohol and drug use in young adulthood partly explained how low self-esteem led to more depression. They also found that…
The authors built the Altered States Database (ASDB), a public collection of questionnaire answers about people’s experiences in altered states of consciousness. They pulled data from scientific articles, checked them using a standard review method, and put the raw questionnaire results online so anyone can view and compare them. The…
This review explains that classical serotonergic psychedelics — drugs like psilocybin, DMT (in ayahuasca), LSD, and ibogaine — can change brain cells and connections in lab and animal studies. These drugs have been shown to help neurons grow new branches and form more synapses, which are the contact points where…
Researchers looked back at recordings and interviews from 26 people who got ketamine infusions for treatment-resistant depression. They found that things people were exposed to in the days before treatment — especially digital media like videos — sometimes showed up inside their ketamine experiences and changed how emotional or “mystical”…
This study used data from 24,250 U.S. users of the WHOOP wearable (74.5% male, mean age 37.6 years) collected from May 1, 2020 to May 1, 2021. Compared to typical days, most U.S. public holidays, holiday eves, and Daylight Saving Time transitions showed clear changes: people tended to sleep longer,…
This review and meta-analysis looked at studies up to 2024 on body-positive social media content. It reviewed 56 studies (19 were left out of the meta-analysis for bad or missing data). Overall, short-term exposure to body-positive posts was linked to better body satisfaction and improved mood, especially when posts showed…
