A new group of psychological interventions for hearing voices, called relational therapies, focuses on changing how a person relates to their voices. These therapies include Relating Therapy, Talking with Voices, and AVATAR Therapy. They use experiential dialogue with voices, such as role-play, direct conversation, or computer avatars, to improve the hearer-voice relationship. AVATAR Therapy has shown effectiveness in multiple randomized trials, Relating Therapy in two trials, and a trial for Talking with Voices is ongoing. Key mechanisms involve changing how the hearer relates to the voice, reducing threat, and integrating the voice experience into the person's life story. Future research should explore which therapy works for whom and how these therapies affect voice hearing itself.
Heavy cannabis users show weaker alpha brain oscillations during the encoding phase of a working memory task, particularly in superior parietal and occipital regions, compared to nonusers. During memory maintenance, a group-by-condition interaction emerged: cannabis users exhibited weaker alpha and beta oscillations during maintain trials but stronger oscillations in the same regions during manipulate trials, alongside prolonged reaction times. Nonusers showed no such differences. Neurobehavioral relationships in prefrontal cortices appeared only in nonusers. Chronic cannabis use may impair initial memory encoding but prompt compensatory neural activity during more demanding memory manipulation.
A novel 10-item tool, the Voice Characterisation Checklist (VoCC), reliably assesses how much people personify the voices they hear. Among 170 participants who heard distressing voices, 94% reported some degree of voice personification. Most described voices as distinct auditory experiences with basic attributes like gender and age, and many attributed intentions and personalities to them. However, fewer than half attributed mental states to the voice or identified a known historical relationship. The VoCC showed acceptable internal consistency and good inter-rater reliability, making it useful for testing whether voice characterisation influences treatment outcomes in therapies like AVATAR therapy.