Who seeks ayahuasca and why? Participant profiles and engagement patterns in a community-based practice (2014-2026)

Background: Community-based ayahuasca use has spread across Europe, often accompanied by public concern about intensive or escalating involvement. Yet who takes part, what brings them, and how long they stay are poorly documented. Describing these patterns is a prerequisite for proportionate harm reduction, benefit enhancement, and policy.

Aims: To describe the demographics, motivations, and mental and physical health of participants in a long-running community practice; to describe engagement over time using attendance behaviour rather than self-report; and to test whether participants form distinct subgroups.

Methods: Retrospective analysis of three administrative datasets from La Maloka, a non-religious community ayahuasca practice near Barcelona operating since 2014: registration records (N=1,134; 2014-2025), health intake forms (N=359; 2025), and ceremony attendance logs (N=309; 2023-2026). We used descriptive statistics, survival analysis of how long participants kept attending, and cluster analysis to identify participant subgroups.

Results: Participants were mostly middle-aged adults (mean 46.7 years) reporting high life satisfaction (mean 7.4/10) and low current psychological disorder (10.3%), yet most (63.8%) had previously been in psychological therapy, a profile combining prior engagement with psychotherapy and present stability. Personal growth, not symptom relief, was the dominant motivation (72.5%), and prior psychedelic experience was common (80.5%). Participation was typically occasional: just over half (54%) attended a single ceremony, the median time participants kept attending was 0.7 years, and there was no sign of escalating participation. Only about 9% of participants showed a profile of higher clinical need, and no difference in engagement duration across health-based subgroups was detected.

Conclusions: In this setting, ayahuasca drew stable adults pursuing personal development rather than clinical treatment, and participation was typically occasional rather than intensifying. A small minority presenting clinical complexity may warrant closer attention, supporting differentiated rather than uniform community protocols. Routinely kept records can describe who participates and track engagement over time, offering a practical monitoring approach for other community groups.