Single-item measures are increasingly used to capture constructs that are impractical to assess with multi-item scales, yet their reliability is difficult to estimate and validity evidence is rarely combined across sources. Meditation-related states, which are embodied and often hard to verbalize, illustrate this challenge. The aim of this study is to present a multi-source framework and apply...
The aim of this article is to analyze the notion of movement in the conceptualizations of some altered states of consciousness, such as: sleeping (sonno), dreaming (sogno), meditation (meditazione) and hypnosis (ipnosi) in the Italian language. The research presented is based on the following theories: thematic proto-roles by D. Dowty (1991) and Kinesthetic Image Schemas by G. L akoff (1987),...
This paper proposes a theoretical framework for interpreting immersive neurogastronomic experiences as a form of ambient cognitive modulation. The framework originates in the direct, informal observation of approximately 6,000 guests conducted by the first author over more than six years of operation at Sensorium — an eleven-seat neurogastronomic restaurant with a controlled multisensory...
Immersive virtual environments are increasingly investigated as tools capable of modulating conscious experience, yet the specific contribution of graded immersion to altered states of consciousness (ASC), time perception, and cognition remains unclear. The present study examined how different levels of immersion during videogame play influence subjective experience and post-experience...
Sleep-related out-of-body experiences (OBEs) occupy an ambiguous position between sleep paralysis and lucid dreaming. OBEs are often considered part of the vestibular-motor component of sleep paralysis, but they also share features with lucid dreaming, including vivid internally generated experience, heightened awareness, and perceived agency. Here, we examined whether the emotional composition...
This chapter proposes that self-transcendent experiences can be usefully understood through the distinction between the reflective and experiential self, originally articulated by William James and developed in contemporary philosophy and neuroscience. The reflective self involves conscious, narrative self-referential processing, while the experiential self refers to affective processing and...
Background. Near-death experience (NDE) is an altered state of consciousness experienced at the moment of near death, which has a specific structure (which includes such elements as an out-of-body experience, a feeling of movement in a dark tunnel, a review of life, visions of bright light, other realities and meetings with the dead, and many others). The similarity of reports on the NDE of...
Research efforts spanning more than seven decades have used functional neuroimaging to investigate whether putative extra‑sensory perception (ESP/receptive psi) has identifiable neural correlates. However, the field lacks a coherent and critical synthesis of its methodological approaches and reported effects. We conducted a systematic review consolidating 143 reports and qualitatively evaluated...
Recent clinical trials have suggested the safety and efficacy of psychedelic therapy for treatment-resistant depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, addiction, and end-of-life distress. While neurobiological mechanisms such as 5-HT2A receptor activation, increased neural entropy, and default mode network modulation have been well-characterized, significantly less attention has been given to...
Converging operations allow one to home in on a construct, be this an altered state of consciousness (ASC), or trait and/or state impulsivity. Unfortunately (or, perhaps fortunately), measures that should provide converging operations for such a construct sometimes present with diverging results. Three cases are considered here: trait impulsivity, which should be positively correlated with...