Mind-manifesting? Examining naturalistic reports from psychedelics, cannabis, meditation, and dreams from the ALTERD mobile application
Conor H. Murray, Michael Angyus, Sam Suchin, Max Suchin, Martin M. Monti
bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) August 4, 2026 preprint DOI: 10.64898/2026.07.28.741354 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Observational study |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 2,242 |
| Population | Reports from the ALTERD mobile application |
| Topics | Cannabis Meditation |
| Key findings | Psychedelics were most semantically similar to dreams but uniquely coupled with meditation on ASC themes including personal growth, supporting the psychedelic hypothesis. Cannabis was semantically similar to meditation but not aligned on themes such as personal growth, suggesting it lacks a transformative therapeutic character. |
Abstract
Abstract Altered states of consciousness (ASC) refer to states that differ markedly from normal waking consciousness. ASC may occur spontaneously, such as in dreaming, or through consciousness modifying techniques, from meditation, to cannabis and psychedelics. The etymology behind the term psychedelic, meaning mind-manifesting, is based on the hypothesis that certain substances, including serotonergic hallucinogens, do not merely distort perception, but also afford genuine observation and insight into the nature of mind, a claim that remains empirically contested today. Here, we address this psychedelic hypothesis using 2,242 reports from the Psychedelics, Cannabis, Meditation, and Dreams categories from the ALTERD mobile application. Across categories, we examined semantic similarity, topic structure, visual phenomenology, and alignment with a priori ASC themes. The Psychedelics category was most semantically similar to Dreams, consistent with a hallucinogenic character, yet it also uniquely coupled with Meditation across ASC themes, including Personal Growth, lending support for the psychedelic hypothesis. Cannabis showed the opposite pattern: similar to Meditation semantically, but not aligned on ASC themes such as Personal Growth. Together, these findings indicate that psychedelics induce a dream-like state, yet support a meditation-like trajectory toward personal growth, whereas cannabis may share phenomenological features with meditation, but lacking a transformative therapeutic character.
Comparable studies
Other observational and cohort studies on cannabis, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| High-potency cannabis and the risk of psychosis People with first episode of psychosis and healthy controls from the local population | 2009 | Case-control study | n = 454 |
| Ayahuasca-Assisted Therapy for Addiction: Results from a Preliminary Observational Study in Canada Rural aboriginal population | 2013 | Observational study | |
| Impaired cognitive performance in drug free users of recreational ecstasy (MDMA) Otherwise healthy young people | 2000 | Observational | |
| Continued cannabis use and risk of incidence and persistence of psychotic symptoms: 10 year follow-up cohort study Individuals from the general population in Germany aged 14-24 at baseline | 2011 | Observational cohort | n = 1,923 |
| Cannabis-induced psychosis and subsequent schizophrenia-spectrum disorders: follow-up study of 535 incident cases Patients treated for cannabis-induced psychotic symptoms in Denmark between 1994 and... | 2005 | Observational cohort | n = 535 |