The typical near-death experience (NDE) is generally understood as an altered state of consciousness in which the experient has the impression of existing as an extrapersonal self out of and/or away from their physical body during real or presumed life-threatening and/or near-death circumstances. This presumed extrapersonal self can sometimes have a perception of being located within the...
The peripersonal space, that is, the limited space surrounding the body, involves multisensory coding and representation of the self in space. Previous studies have shown that peripersonal space representation and the visual perspective on the environment can be dramatically altered when neurotypical individuals self-identify with a distant avatar (i.e., in virtual reality) or during clinical...
Psilocybin therapy is receiving attention as a mental health intervention with transdiagnostic potential. In line with psychotherapeutic research, qualitative research has highlighted the role of reductions in experiential avoidance (and increases in connectedness) within psilocybin therapy. However, no quantitative research has examined experiential avoidance as a mechanism underlying...
The sigma-1 receptor S1R is a chaperone that resides mainly at the mitochondrion-associated endoplasmic reticulum ER membrane MAM, it is considered a “pluripotent modulator” in living systems, plays a critical role in maintaining neuronal homeostasis and acts as a dynamic pluripotent modulator in living systems. Given its specific localization at the MAM, S1R plays a major role regulating...
In a landmark paper from 2019, Robin Carhart-Harris and Karl Friston lay out their theory for what happens to the human brain under the influence of psychedelics: their so-called REBUS (RElaxed Bra...
The capacity to reflect on oneself is of utmost importance to human personhood. To elaborate on the manifold forms of reflective self-consciousness, this article endorses a multidimensional conception of self, according to which self-reflection essentially involves an experiential dimension. While classical analyses of reflective self-consciousness have highlighted unique epistemic and...
Traditional psychedelics, such as LSD, psilocybin, or DMT, are psychoactive compounds that exert their effects mainly through agonism over serotonergic receptors. In appropriate doses and contexts, they produce profound changes in the subjective experience, configuring altered states of consciousness that, upon reaching a critical point, involve the appearance of phenomena of mystical,...
This paper presents a critical comparison between two phenomenological accounts of schizophrenic experience: on the one side, Blankenburg’s seminal work on the basal disturbance (Grundstörung) of schizophrenia as loss of natural self-evidence (Natürlichen Selbstverständlichkeit); on the other side, Tatossian’s insight, briefly elaborated in a lecture presented in Heidelberg in 1994 and largely...
June 30, 2023Matt P D Gwyther, Jane E. Aspell3 citations
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Flotation-Reduced Environmental Stimulation Therapy (REST) and mindfulness meditation (MM) are known to induce altered states of consciousness (ASC) and self-consciousness. In this study, we use a phenomenological and predictive processing (PP) framework to compare the interventions alongside the psychedelic experience. Ego-dissolution scores were greater than ego-inflation scores in both...
Dissociation is a "disruption of the usually integrated functions of consciousness, memory, identity or perception of the environment" according to DSM-5. It is commonly seen in psychiatric disorders including primary dissociative disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and panic disorder. Dissociative phenomena are also described in the context of substance intoxication, sleep...