Cognitive Therapy and Research
March 29, 2025
Federico Seragnoli, Fabienne Picard, Gabriel Thorens et al.
4 citations
Abstract Purpose Despite the presence of mystical-type experiences in psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT), an understanding of the cognitive processes involved is still lacking. Guided by theory and empirical research, we hypothesized a cognitive-grounded perspective based on current metacognition models to promote the understanding of the psychological processes involved in mystical-type...
Current Topics in Behavioral Neurosciences
2025
Nina M Sooter, Federico Seragnoli, Fabienne Picard
Ecstatic epilepsy is a rare form of focal epilepsy linked to the anterior insula in which patients experience a blissful state with a unique set of symptoms, including a feeling of physical well-being, mental clarity, a sense of oneness with the universe, and time dilation. In this chapter, we reflect on how these symptoms coincide with our current knowledge of the insula's functions and...
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience
2023
Fabienne Picard
11 citations
Abstract Ecstatic epilepsy is a rare form of focal epilepsy, so named because the seizures' first symptoms consist of an ecstatic/mystical experience, including feelings of increased self-awareness, mental clarity, and “unity with everything that exists,” accompanied by a sense of bliss and physical well-being. In this perspective article, we first describe the phenomenology of ecstatic...
Brain Sciences
October 22, 2021
Fabienne Picard, Peter Bossaerts, Fabrice Bartolomei
Ecstatic epilepsy is a rare form of focal epilepsy in which the aura (beginning of the seizures) consists of a blissful state of mental clarity/feeling of certainty. Such a state has also been described as a "religious" or mystical experience. While this form of epilepsy has long been recognized as a temporal lobe epilepsy, we have accumulated evidence converging toward the location of the...