Despite growing interest in psychedelics, there is a lack of routine population-based surveillance of psychedelic microdosing (taking "subperceptual" doses of psychedelics, approximately one-twentieth to one-fifth of a full dose, over prolonged periods). Analyzing Google search queries can provide insights into public interest and help address this gap. To analyze trends in public interest in...
This chapter employs the case of Akihiro, a transgendered boy who was initiated as a shaman as a 14-year-old, to expose a number of culturally specific factors that relate to shamanism, religion, mental health, and gender in Okinawa, Japan’s southernmost prefecture. I am particularly interested in how gender informs people’s choices about how to deal with their psychological or spiritual...