What fMRI studies say about the nature of the psychedelic effect: a scoping review
Michal Beneš, Tomáš Páleníček, Jiřı́ Horáček
Frontiers in Neuroscience July 1, 2025 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2025.1606798 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Scoping review Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Psilocybin Serotonin |
| Keywords | Cognitive psychology Modality human–computer interaction Cognitive science |
| Citations | 4 |
| Key findings | fMRI studies of serotonergic psychedelics reveal de-differentiation with the default mode network at its core, complex changes to the thalamus, amygdala, and medial temporal lobe, and the importance of ego dissolution. |
Abstract
Research on psychedelic drugs, such as psilocybin, LSD or DMT, is a burgeoning field, with an increasing number of studies showing their promise in treatment of mental disorders as well as examining their mechanism of action. Determining their effect on the brain is crucial from clinical standpoint, but also offers highly promising avenues of advancement in basic neuroscience—functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is one of the most useful techniques to do so, with a number of newly published studies increasing every year. Here we present a scoping review of existing fMRI studies of serotonergic psychedelics to date, with a focus on finding unifying themes among them, in order to comprehensively grasp current directions within this field. We cluster the existing studies by fMRI modality and find several lines of developing concepts complementing the established models of psychedelic actions on the brain: namely, we describe a general picture of de-differentiation with the default mode network at its core captured by a diverse array of different techniques, complex changes to the thalamus, amygdala and medial temporal lobe structures, and the importance of the phenomenon of ego dissolution. Finally, contrasts to phenomenologically similar states and the successful process of anchoring fMRI findings to other markers are discussed.
Comparable studies
Other narrative reviews on serotonin, most cited first.
Citations in the library
Cited by 5
- Psilocybin shapes the slow, global propagation of brain activity over the cortical layout of 5HT2a receptors Communications Biology March 26, 2026
- Psilocybin alters visual contextual computations. Nature Communications November 21, 2025
- Psilocybin-induced changes in electroencephalography link acute and long-term effects Journal of Psychopharmacology September 4, 2026
- Study Protocol for "Exploring the safety and therapeutic potential of psilocybin in the treatment of anorexia nervosa in adolescents and young adults". PLoS One June 30, 2026
- A Comparative Neurophenomenology of the Psychedelic State and Autism: Predictive Processing as a Unifying Lens Psychoactives November 14, 2025
Cites 100
- Trial of Psilocybin versus Escitalopram for Depression New England Journal of Medicine April 14, 2021
- The entropic brain: a theory of conscious states informed by neuroimaging research with psychedelic drugs Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 2014
- Neural correlates of the psychedelic state as determined by fMRI studies with psilocybin Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences January 23, 2012
- REBUS and the Anarchic Brain: Toward a Unified Model of the Brain Action of Psychedelics Pharmacological Reviews June 20, 2019
- Neural correlates of the LSD experience revealed by multimodal neuroimaging. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences April 11, 2016
and 95 more in the library