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Doing research paper - need good books on psychedelic effects

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ParanoiaComes

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I am writing a research paper for psychology on the effects of psychedelic drugs on the human psyche and was hoping to get some suggestions on good (credible) literature.

I have my own experiences but I can't cite myself in a research paper obviously. :)
 
Pihkal and Tihkal by Alexander and Anne Shulgin, LSD psychotherapy by Stanislav Grof, Doors of Perception by Huxley
 
ParanoiaComes said:
I am writing a research paper for psychology on the effects of psychedelic drugs on the human psyche and was hoping to get some suggestions on good (credible) literature.

I have my own experiences but I can't cite myself in a research paper obviously. :)
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Just a couple of articles that turned up on a search and looked interesting to me: http://jop.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/22/6/621 (a study of the effects of psilocybin on psychedelic-naive participants) and
http://cogprints.org/4034/1/Psychedelic_Neurochemistry2.htm (a review of psychedelic effects on time perception, with some citations to other relevant papers)

Good luck with this.

ETA: Oh, and there's Robin Carhart-Harris (of Bristol University, when last I checked), who's been doing psychedelic neuroscience stuff. A review paper by him is here: http://karnacbooks.metapress.com/content/n5225u3264047605/ I'm not sure whether he's actually published anything from his psychedelic neuroscience research yet; but - if not - you could always ask him if he has any in preparation or in press papers you could look at.
 
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Ah, and there's Shanon's work on time perception under Ayahuasca: http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/imp/jcs/2001/00000008/00000001/1073
I haven't read the paper itself, but have read a discussion of it in Marieke Rohde's PhD thesis (see http://mariekerohde.com/contents/phd.pdf and search within it for Shanon).

ETA: And, if you count cannabis as a psychedelic... there's this paper on cannabis effects on time perception: https://jyx.jyu.fi/dspace/bitstream/handle/123456789/20862/urn_nbn_fi_jyu-2009411245.pdf?sequence=1

This looks quite interesting too: http://www.mentalhealthconsulting.ca/assets/Case Study of LSD-Eclipse.pdf (A case study of space-time distortion during a total lunar eclipse following street use of LSD). Please forgive the bias towards time-perception literature! :)
 
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Karl Jansen's "Ketamine: dreams and realities
Rick Strassman's "DMT the Spirit Molecule"
 
I'd second the Shulgin's, and also that you'd want to avoid the "way out there" overly biased types for a research paper, i.e. McKenna & Leary. However, Ram Dass, one of Leary's cohorts, has some good stuff regarding psychedelics & religious experiences, and the biopic on him, Fierce Grace, is a pretty good movie as well. Also, search the erowid library
 
yeah i'd second the notion of avoiding the "out there" stuff at least for a research paper for school. you should definitely try to stick with the more easily proven studies that deal with the actual physical/biological effects and whatnot
 
"The Varieties of Psychedelic Experience" by Masters and Houston is a pretty exhaustive. Also, "The Doors Of Perception" by Aldous Huxley is a beautifully written, succinct, and influential description of the experience.
 
But do and try and bring something, no matter how small, of the "out there stuff" into your work. It's a slow exercise in education. There's a lot of defensiveness, but gently desensitising a curious audience is a good way to go, and it sounds like you've got a good opportunity to contribute =D=D=D

E
 
I have to agree with those who suggest sticking with the non-out-there stuff. To clarify - by non-out-there stuff, I mean stuff that is backed up with evidence and reason. Speculative stuff is fascinating and lovely, and can be the basis for generating hypotheses for new research perhaps; but for a scientific essay you should be focused on making balanced, evidence-based arguments, not playing around with wacky fictions (like McKenna's delightful but basically unfounded ideas).
 
Yerg said:
"The Varieties of Psychedelic Experience" by Masters and Houston is a pretty exhaustive. Also, "The Doors Of Perception" by Aldous Huxley is a beautifully written, succinct, and influential description of the experience.
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I'll second the Masters and Houston. I'm only about half way through it at the moment, but its so far very informative and mostly unbiased. Excellent work from the golden era of psychedelic research.
 
if you are looking for "scientific" and academic research, shanon cannot be surpassed. The Antipodes of the mind is the most complete text on the psychology of psychedelic experiences out there, in my opinion.
 
Depends on how in depth you want to get. There are a lot of great references already mentioned here, but some are not practical as references for a college level paper.

For a concise overview, including descriptions of the more profound cognitive phenomena that are characteristic of the psychedelic experience, I recommend this reference:

Psychedelic Information Theory

The chapters under "Neurologic Deconstruction of Psychedelic Phenomena" are quite interesting, and short enough to keep one's attention. I'd actually recommend them to anyone...the diverse array of phenomena are surprisingly in accord with my own experiences.
 
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