Depersonalization is a disruption in self-awareness marked by a sense of detachment from one's own thoughts, body, sensory experiences, actions, and emotions. While psychological distress and temporal disturbances are known correlates, the mechanisms through which these factors contribute to symptom severity remain poorly understood. The present study proposed and tested the Time...
UPDATED 2026-06-09 Corrected dataset attribution from Timmermann et al. (2019) to Pallavicini et al. (2021) UPDATED 2026-01-21 Background: Psychedelic substances produce profound alterations in conscious experience, yet the neural mechanisms underlying phenomenal richness remain poorly understood. Static measures of neural integration and complexity have shown limited success in predicting...
Background: Burnout syndrome has become endemic to healthcare professions and is characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and a diminished sense of accomplishment. The COVID-19 pandemic introduced additional burdens to pre-existing stressors and has left the global healthcare workforce, including those in India, with an ongoing psychological crisis. Objective: The aim of this...
Introduction Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is a well-known intervention for treatment resistant mood disorders but not indicated for dissociative disorders. To date, only few case reports have described incidental improvements in dissociative symptomatology following ECT administered for comorbid depression. Emerging neuroimaging evidence suggests that ECT modulates large-scale brain networks...
Psychedelic drugs are emerging as potentially efficacious tools for treating psychiatric conditions and probing the neural basis of consciousness. Although drug administration context is widely believed to shape psychedelic effects, it remains unclear whether it can independently generate placebo and nocebo effects resembling psychedelic experiences and side effects. In a pre-registered...
This chapter is an excerpt from a larger book project on the phenomenon traditionally described as the “Dark Night of the Soul” in the writings of John of the Cross. It combines historical, phenomenological, psychological, and contemplative perspectives in order to reinterpret this classical mystical concept for a contemporary audience. While remaining grounded in the Catholic and monastic...
Depersonalization is usually reported as a manifestation in other psychiatric disorders such as psychosis, anxiety, or depression; in physical trauma; or in drug addiction. But it has been very little reported in clinical descriptions relating to bodily injuries such as diabetic foot. This article focuses on the case of four Cameroonian adults with diabetic foot and presenting clinical...
Eastern contemplative psychology proposes that clinging to a fixed self-concept generates psychological suffering, while Western psychology’s self-discrepancy theory describes how gaps between actual and ideal/ought self-representations produce distress. Despite their theoretical complementarity, no empirical research to date has examined this intersection. The present study investigated...
Altered states of consciousness, including hallucinations, psychedelic experiences, and ego dissolution, differ qualitatively, yet no unified computational framework describes what varies and along which dimensions. Computational phenomenology (CP) has emerged as a promising bridge between first-person experience and computational models, yet current formalisations rely predominantly on the...
In this chapter, I will dive into the preparatory phase, a vital component of psychedelic-assisted therapy, emphasizing its role in creating the optimal conditions for a meaningful therapeutic outcome. I will talk about how the therapist, acting as a guide, adopts a directive yet empowering role to facilitate client readiness through the use of specific practices and an intentional preparation...