Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences
December 13, 2020
Flavie Waters, Joseph M Barnby, Jan Dirk Blom
26 citations
Hallucinations, mental imagery, and dreams share a common feature: they are perceptions that occur without matching external stimulation. Historically, medical and psychological sciences have studied these experiences separately, but this review examines their similarities and differences in phenomenology and brain function to unite them within a single framework. Using Edmund Parish's historical work alongside current cognitive, clinical, and computational research, the authors consider how different perspectives can be reconciled to generate new hypotheses for future investigation.
Frontiers in Psychiatry
July 3, 2018
Joseph M Barnby, Mitul A. Mehta
18 citations
The therapeutic potential of psilocybin, a psychedelic compound, is increasingly recognized in psychiatry, but its effects depend heavily on the context of use, known as 'set and setting.' This opinion article argues that the psychotherapeutic framework—including the relationship with therapists and the preparation and integration process—is as important as the drug itself for achieving positive outcomes. The authors suggest that neglecting the therapeutic context risks reducing psilocybin to a mere biological intervention, undermining its full potential for psychological healing and personal insight. The piece calls for careful integration of psychotherapeutic principles into psychedelic treatment models.
November 7, 2022
Joseph M Barnby, Sohee Park, Tatiana Baxter et al.
1 citation
preprint
The felt presence (FP) experience—the sense that someone else is nearby without sensory evidence—ranges from benevolent to distressing and can be personified or ambiguous. FP occurs in neuropsychological conditions, psychosis, paranoia, sleep paralysis, anxiety, endurance sports, and spiritualist communities. This review covers philosophical, phenomenological, clinical, and non-clinical aspects of FP, along with psychometric, cognitive, and neurophysiological measurement methods. It presents current mechanistic explanations, proposes a unifying cognitive framework, and identifies outstanding questions. FP provides a window into the cognitive neuroscience of own-body awareness and social agency detection, an intuitive but poorly understood experience in health and disorder.
The lancet. Psychiatry
May 1, 2023
Joseph M Barnby, Sohee Park, Tatiana Baxter et al.
Felt presence is the basic feeling that someone else is nearby without clear sensory evidence, ranging from benevolent to distressing and appearing in neurological conditions, psychosis, sleep paralysis, endurance sports, and spiritualist communities. This review summarizes philosophical, phenomenological, clinical, and non-clinical correlates, along with psychometric, cognitive, and neurophysiological approaches. It presents current mechanistic explanations, proposes a unifying cognitive framework, and identifies outstanding questions. Felt presence offers a way to understand the cognitive neuroscience of own-body awareness and social agency detection as an intuitive but poorly understood experience in both health and disorder.