PLoS One
October 11, 2017
Raphael Vallat, Benoit Chatard, Mark Blagrove et al.
60 citations
Several studies have demonstrated that dream content is related to the waking life of the dreamer. However, the characteristics of the memory sources incorporated into dreams are still unclear. We designed a new protocol to investigate remote memories and memories of trivial experiences, both relatively unexplored in dream content until now. Upon awakening, for 7 days, participants identified...
PLoS One
September 5, 2017
Ausiàs Cebolla, Marcelo Demarzo, Patricia Silveira Martins et al.
186 citations
OBJECTIVES: Despite the long-term use and evidence-based efficacy of meditation and mindfulness-based interventions, there is still a lack of data about the possible unwanted effects (UEs) of these practices. The aim of this study was to evaluate the occurrence of UEs among meditation practitioners, considering moderating factors such as the type, frequency, and lifetime duration of the...
PLoS One
May 24, 2017
Jared R. Lindahl, Nathan E. Fisher, David J. Cooper et al.
468 citations
Buddhist-derived meditation practices are currently being employed as a popular form of health promotion. While meditation programs draw inspiration from Buddhist textual sources for the benefits of meditation, these sources also acknowledge a wide range of other effects beyond health-related outcomes. The Varieties of Contemplative Experience study investigates meditation-related experiences...
PLoS One
April 21, 2017
Emilia M. Lefevre, Gregory Medley, Timothy Reeks et al.
8 citations
Stress is known to modulate sensitisation to repeated psychostimulant exposure. However, there is no direct evidence linking glucocorticoids and sensitisation achieved by repeated administration of the NMDA receptor antagonist MK-801. We tested the hypothesis that co-administration of RU486, a glucocorticoid receptor (GR) antagonist, prior to repeated daily MK-801 injections would block the...
PLoS One
January 9, 2017
Pierre Bourdin, Itxaso Barberia, Ramon Oliva et al.
120 citations
Immersive virtual reality can be used to visually substitute a person's real body by a life-sized virtual body (VB) that is seen from first person perspective. Using real-time motion capture the VB can be programmed to move synchronously with the real body (visuomotor synchrony), and also virtual objects seen to strike the VB can be felt through corresponding vibrotactile stimulation on the...
PLoS One
2017
Claire Braboszcz, B Rael Cahn, Jonathan Levy et al.
Despite decades of research, effects of different types of meditation on electroencephalographic (EEG) activity are still being defined. We compared practitioners of three different meditation traditions (Vipassana, Himalayan Yoga and Isha Shoonya) with a control group during a meditative and instructed mind-wandering (IMW) block. All meditators showed higher parieto-occipital 60-110 Hz gamma...
PLoS One
August 25, 2016
Jonathan Smallwood, Theodoros Karapanagiotidis, Florence Ruby et al.
When not engaged in the moment, we often spontaneously represent people, places and events that are not present in the environment. Although this capacity has been linked to the default mode network (DMN), it remains unclear how interactions between the nodes of this network give rise to particular mental experiences during spontaneous thought. One hypothesis is that the core of the DMN...
PLoS One
June 17, 2016
Jason Wallach, Heather Kang, Tristan Colestock et al.
73 citations
1,2-Diarylethylamines including lanicemine, lefetamine, and remacemide have clinical relevance in a range of therapeutic areas including pain management, epilepsy, neurodegenerative disease and depression. More recently 1,2-diarylethylamines have been sold as 'legal highs' in a number of different forms including powders and tablets. These compounds are sold to circumvent governmental...
PLoS One
June 15, 2016
Andrea E. Steuer, Corina Schmidhauser, Eva H Tingelhoff et al.
18 citations
3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA; ecstasy) metabolism is known to be stereoselective, with preference for S-stereoisomers. Its major metabolic step involves CYP2D6-catalyzed demethylenation to 3,4-dihydroxymethamphetamine (DHMA), followed by methylation and conjugation. Alterations in CYP2D6 genotype and/or phenotype have been associated with higher toxicity. Therefore, the impact of...
PLoS One
June 15, 2016
Clara Strauss, Kate Cavanagh, Annie Oliver et al.
ObjectiveMindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) can reduce risk of depressive relapse for people with a history of recurrent depression who are currently well. However, the cognitive, affective and motivational features of depression and anxiety might render MBIs ineffective for people experiencing current symptoms. This paper presents a meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of...
PLoS One
June 14, 2016
Bryan L. Roth, Simon Gibbons, Warunya Arunotayanun et al.
153 citations
In this paper we determined the pharmacological profiles of novel ketamine and phencyclidine analogues currently used as 'designer drugs' and compared them to the parent substances via the resources of the National Institute of Mental Health Psychoactive Drug Screening Program. The ketamine analogues methoxetamine ((RS)-2-(ethylamino)-2-(3-methoxyphenyl)cyclohexanone) and 3-MeO-PCE...
PLoS One
June 14, 2016
João Martins, Miguel Castelo-Branco, Ana Batista et al.
10 citations
3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA; ecstasy) is known to produce euphoric states, but may also cause adverse consequences in humans, such as hyperthermia and neurocognitive deficits. Although MDMA consumption has been associated with visual problems, the effects of this recreational drug in retinal physiology have not been addressed hitherto. In this work, we evaluated the effect of a...
PLoS One
June 14, 2016
Todd Zorick, Mark A Mandelkern
Recently, many lines of investigation in neuroscience and statistical physics have converged to raise the hypothesis that the underlying pattern of neuronal activation which results in electroencephalography (EEG) signals is nonlinear, with self-affine dynamics, while scalp-recorded EEG signals themselves are nonstationary. Therefore, traditional methods of EEG analysis may miss many properties...
PLoS One
June 14, 2016
Olga Prilipko, Nelly Huynh, Sophie Schwartz et al.
INTRODUCTION: Functional magnetic resonance imaging studies enable the investigation of neural correlates underlying behavioral performance. We investigate the effect of active and sham Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) treatment on working memory function of patients with Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome (OSAS) considering Task Positive and Default Mode networks (TPN and DMN)....
PLoS One
June 14, 2016
Chen Song, Haishan Yao
BACKGROUND:Visual perception is usually stable and accurate. However, when the two eyes are simultaneously presented with conflicting stimuli, perception falls into a sequence of spontaneous alternations, switching between one stimulus and the other every few seconds. Known as binocular rivalry, this visual illusion decouples subjective experience from physical stimulation and provides a unique...
PLoS One
June 11, 2016
Sébastien Ballesta, Gilles Reymond, Matthieu Pozzobon et al.
7 citations
3,4-methylenedioxy-N-methyl amphetamine (MDMA) is one of the few known molecules to increase human and rodent prosocial behaviors. However, this effect has never been assessed on the social behavior of non-human primates. In our study, we subcutaneously injected three different doses of MDMA (1.0, 1.5 or 2.0mg/kg) to a group of three, socially housed, young male long-tailed macaques. More than...
PLoS One
June 10, 2016
Katharine N Thakkar, Heathman S Nichols, Lindsey G Mcintosh et al.
273 citations
A weakened sense of self may contribute to psychotic experiences. Body ownership, one component of self-awareness, can be studied with the rubber hand illusion (RHI). Watching a rubber hand being stroked while one's unseen hand is stroked synchronously can lead to a sense of ownership over the rubber hand, a shift in perceived position of the real hand, and a limb-specific drop in stimulated...
PLoS One
June 10, 2016
Chuang-Hsin Chiu, Tiing-Yee Siow, Shao-Ju Weng et al.
9 citations
3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), also known as "Ecstasy", is a common recreational drug of abuse. Several previous studies have attributed the central serotonergic neurotoxicity of MDMA to distal axotomy, since only fine serotonergic axons ascending from the raphe nucleus are lost without apparent damage to their cell bodies. However, this axotomy has never been visualized directly in...
PLoS One
June 10, 2016
Dina Collip, Nicole Geschwind, Frenk Peeters et al.
ContextParanoia embodies altered representation of the social environment, fuelling altered feelings of social acceptance leading to further mistrust. Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) may relieve paranoia and reduce its impact on social acceptance.ObjectiveTo determine whether MBCT alters momentary feeling of paranoia and social acceptance in daily life.DesignRandomized controlled...
PLoS One
May 13, 2016
Ellen M. Lee, Kathryn R. Klement, James K. Ambler et al.
42 citations
Extreme rituals (body-piercing, fire-walking, etc.) are anecdotally associated with altered states of consciousness-subjective alterations of ordinary mental functioning (Ward, 1984)-but empirical evidence of altered states using both direct and indirect measures during extreme rituals in naturalistic settings is limited. Participants in the "Dance of Souls", a 3.5-hour event during which...
PLoS One
April 26, 2016
Kirk Warren Brown, Robert J. Goodman, Richard M. Ryan et al.
105 citations
Training in mindfulness, classically described as a receptive attentiveness to present events and experiences, has been shown to improve attention and working memory. Both are key to long-term memory formation, and the present three-study series used multiple methods to examine whether mindfulness would enhance episodic memory, a key form of long-term memory. In Study 1 (N = 143), a...
PLoS One
April 13, 2016
Technological Analysis of the World's Earliest Shamanic Costume: A Multi-Scalar, Experimental Study of a Red Deer Headdress from the Early Holocene Site of Star Carr, North Yorkshire, UK.
PLoS One
March 3, 2016
Increased Grey Matter Associated with Long-Term Sahaja Yoga Meditation: A Voxel-Based Morphometry Study.
PLoS One
February 23, 2016
Kim P. C. Kuypers, Eef L. Theunissen, Janelle H. P. van Wel et al.
23 citations
BACKGROUND: Ecstasy use has been associated with short-term and long-term memory deficits on a standard Word Learning Task (WLT). The clinical relevance of this has been debated and is currently unknown. The present study aimed at evaluating the clinical relevance of verbal memory impairment in Ecstasy users. To that end, clinical memory impairment was defined as decrement in memory performance...
PLoS One
February 22, 2016
Daniela Dentico, Fabio Ferrarelli, Brady A. Riedner et al.
43 citations
STUDY OBJECTIVES: We have recently shown higher parietal-occipital EEG gamma activity during sleep in long-term meditators compared to meditation-naive individuals. This gamma increase was specific for NREM sleep, was present throughout the entire night and correlated with meditation expertise, thus suggesting underlying long-lasting neuroplastic changes induced through prolonged training. The...