Magic mushrooms change personalities, study finds

[DwayneHoover]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/09/30/MN5U1LBBPC.DTL

Magic mushrooms change personalities, study finds

Oooo, maaaan....mouth watering!!!

New York --

Psilocybin, or "magic mushrooms," can make people more open in their feelings and aesthetic sensibilities, conferring on them a lasting personality change, according to a study by Johns Hopkins researchers.

People who had mystic experiences while taking the mushrooms were more likely to show increases in a personality trait dubbed "openness," which is related to creativity, artistic appreciation and curiosity, according to the study in the Journal of Psychopharmacology.

The change was still in place a year later, suggesting a long-term effect.

"The remarkable piece is that psilocybin can facilitate experiences that change how people perceive themselves and their environment," said Roland Griffiths, a study author and professor of psychiatry and behavioral science at Johns Hopkins University of Medicine in Baltimore. "That's unprecedented."

Magic mushrooms are hallucinogens native to tropical and subtropical regions of South America, Mexico and the United States. The fungi were favored by former Harvard psychologist Timothy Leary, who founded the Harvard Psilocybin Project, and explored by '60s writer and anthropologist Carlos Castaneda. The 51 participants, who had an average age of 46, completed two to five eight-hour drug sessions at least three weeks apart. In the test, 30 people had a mystical experience, as established by a set of psychological scales. On tests of major personality traits, their openness scores rose, suggesting a greater interest in imagination, aesthetics, feelings, ideas and values. The 22 patients who didn't have a mystical experience showed no change.

Psilocybin mushrooms are a schedule I substance in the United States, which means the government considers them to have a high potential for abuse and no legitimate medical purpose, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

This article appeared on page A - 9 of the San Francisco Chronicle

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/09/29/MN5U1LBBPC.DTL#ixzz1ZUis5gpZ

 

[DwayneHoover]

Of course according to some there is no such thing as a "mystical experience" (you see there's nothing more to the psychedelic mindstate than just being "really really stoned"). I guess the people who did not have the interesting personality enhancements just did not get zonked enough. Who would have thought that merely getting plastered could have such profound effects? I wonder why getting blotto on beer does not have these effects? Perhaps they just never bothered to check

 

[Lawrence Arms]

That's interesting. I've never had whatever probably defines a mystical experience on any psychedelics, so I can't say for me. But a few of my friends had quite a night one time while I had a bad trip, and in theafterglow of the morning, they all had decided to get their live s' back on track'. afyer it wore off, one of them kicked the other out of his house not letting him crash there even though it was around seven am. I think when it comes to psychedelics people tend to search for a little more than what is really offered from the drug. But, then again, maybe that's The point...

 

[Flickering]

Not news to me and I doubt it will come as a surprise to anyone who's had such an experience, but it's good to see science is starting to validate it.

 

[TheAppleCore]

Of course according to some there is no such thing as a "mystical experience" (you see there's nothing more to the psychedelic mindstate than just being "really really stoned"). I guess the people who did not have the interesting personality enhancements just did not get zonked enough. Who would have thought that merely getting plastered could have such profound effects? I wonder why getting blotto on beer does not have these effects? Perhaps they just never bothered to check

Hmm... I wonder who you could possibly be mocking?!

 

[Solipsis]

Of course according to some there is no such thing as a "mystical experience" (you see there's nothing more to the psychedelic mindstate than just being "really really stoned").

Thanks for the info, captain junk science.

Saying you have had a mystical experience does not necessarily imply that the truth is that there is a fundamentally mystical aspect to reality that has no explanation IF the right question is being asked and sufficient data is provided.

 

[huolesoh]

funny you should post this, i was just literally reading about Roland Griffiths after seeing him in the Shulgin "Dirty Pictures" and then i come on here and...

Roland has much better fashion and taste then your average old person (in the Shulgin doc)

but you could say it's a chicken and egg dilemma; which comes first, the open-minded person who then decides to trip, or the tripping that encourages a person to be more open-minded ??

 

[Solipsis]

I think bypassing a certain inhibition that prevents us from looking beyond our nose is a psychedelic mechanism that would be expected to lower latent inhibition. Open-mindedness is such a controversial term. Check up on low latent inhibition and tell me if you think psychedelics promote it or not.

To elaborate on my previous post: I think "experience" is the key word here. Never mind if mysticism is truly right or not (if you can even approach such a question), people do seem to have these experiences that have a mystical aspect. Do you really want to question that? Classic 'the map is not the territory' fallacy.

 

[atara]

The mystical is not how the world is, but that it is.

 

[TheAppleCore]

^ Hah... interesting... still trying to wrap my head around that one. :D

 

[jaurk]

"a·buse/əˈbyo͞oz/
Verb: Use (something) to bad effect or for a bad purpose; misuse.
Noun: The improper use of something. "

Their definition of "abuse" is way too opinionated imo.

 

[QuasiModo]

It excites me that this kind of knowledge is being shared openly. Of course it wouldn't constitute news to most of us here I don't doubt at least a few will have their view on psychedelics changed and maybe even be prompted to seek such an experience. Good news.

 

[Solipsis]

"a·buse/əˈbyo͞oz/
Verb: Use (something) to bad effect or for a bad purpose; misuse.
Noun: The improper use of something. "

Their definition of "abuse" is way too opinionated imo.

Never mind that, substance scheduling is a freaking joke in the US - very opportunistic,
shortsighted and I believe usually amended by people who don't know what the hell they're
talking about and/or have an agenda. There is money and power involved - also consider
pharmaceutical industry - and sheer disregard for many other values.

Anyway it would be a long topic of discussion anyway because you'd have to go on defining "proper" or "improper"
looking at your disctionary definition of abuse and words like that are as arbitrary as they come.

It's interesting how there is discussion about a number of details in there or a post by DH but not about the actual
content or topic of the study. Perhaps because there isn't anything revolutionary in there, maybe just that some
things that may or may not be somewhat obvious to mushroom users are now validated by some study. Whoop ti doo.

 

[Dondante]

The mystical is not how the world is, but that it is.

Great quote.

The word "mystical" (or words like "spiritual" or "sacred" for that matter) seems to trigger a knee-jerk reaction from the atheist crowd, and skepticism from much of the scientific community, but unnecessarily I think. These words can be heavily laden with religious connotations, but they do not necessarily refer to anything supernatural, and can be operationalized and validated just like any other rating scales that measure qualities of subjective experience. The authors of this study broadly define mystical experience as "feelings of unity and interconnectedness with all people and things, a sense of sacredness, feelings of peace and joy, a sense of transcending normal time and space, ineffability, and an intuitive belief that the experience is a source of objective truth about the nature of reality."

but you could say it's a chicken and egg dilemma; which comes first, the open-minded person who then decides to trip, or the tripping that encourages a person to be more open-minded ??

The study actually answers this question. Mystical experience did not correlate significantly with levels of openness at initial screening. I think this is particularly interesting, and maybe not what I would have predicted. The primary result, that there was a significant correlation between mystical experience and increased openness at the end of the study, including at 1 year follow-up is what many of us would expect, but it's exciting to see it supported by a rigorous scientific study. Regarding your point about openness of volunteers, I'd agree that overall, participants probably had above average levels of openness to begin with seeing as they chose to participate in a study involving the administration of a psychedelic drug.

I thought it was interesting to read what the study was actually measuring when it refers to openness. Openness is 1 of 5 core dimensions of personality measured by the NEO Personality Inventory. To quote the paper, "Openness includes a relatively broad range of intercorrelated traits covering aesthetic appreciation and sensitivity, fantasy and imagination, awareness of feelings in self and others, and intellectual engagement. People with high levels of Openness are ‘permeable to new ideas and experiences’ and ‘motivated to enlarge their experience into novel territory’ (DeYoung et al., 2005)." Also, here's an interesting bit from the conclusion: "During normal aging, Openness typically decreases linearly at a rate of approximately 1 T-score point per decade. In comparison, participants in the present study who had a complete mystical experience during their psilocybin session increased more than 4 T-score points from screening to follow-up."

On a related note, it seems that there are some personality characteristics that may be associated with more positive psychedelic experiences, though the following doesn't necessarily apply to mystical experiences. From an old post by psood0nym:

"Certain personality types tend to get more out of psychedelics than others. In their 1972 study (described on pgs 125-126 in "Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered"), Barr and Langs administered 100 micrograms of LSD to 30 male participants who were given personality tests beforehand and questionnaires before, during, and after the LSD sessions. The questionnaires and personality tests revealed significant correlations between certain symptom clusters and 6 different personality types. In summation, men who tended towards being emotionally open, narcissistic, intellectual, introspective, colorful in their use of words, and willing to accept their impulses were most likely to strongly experience what sound to me to be the best symptom clusters (such as elation and perceptions of new meanings), and demonstrated the most control over the trip. Obsessional, emotionally defensive, verbally aggressive men who tended to anticipate exploitation and externalize blame felt the worst symptom clusters most strongly (negative physical symptoms and anxiety). Practical men who tested low in sensuality and fantasy experienced a low degree of symptoms from all clusters."

 

[kingme]

On a related note, it seems that there are some personality characteristics that may be associated with more positive psychedelic experiences, though the following doesn't necessarily apply to mystical experiences. From an old post by psood0nym:

"Certain personality types tend to get more out of psychedelics than others. In their 1972 study (described on pgs 125-126 in "Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered"), Barr and Langs administered 100 micrograms of LSD to 30 male participants who were given personality tests beforehand and questionnaires before, during, and after the LSD sessions. The questionnaires and personality tests revealed significant correlations between certain symptom clusters and 6 different personality types. In summation, men who tended towards being emotionally open, narcissistic, intellectual, introspective, colorful in their use of words, and willing to accept their impulses were most likely to strongly experience what sound to me to be the best symptom clusters (such as elation and perceptions of new meanings), and demonstrated the most control over the trip. Obsessional, emotionally defensive, verbally aggressive men who tended to anticipate exploitation and externalize blame felt the worst symptom clusters most strongly (negative physical symptoms and anxiety). Practical men who tested low in sensuality and fantasy experienced a low degree of symptoms from all clusters."

thats actually very very interesting. got to get my hands on those pages, because ive always seen some differences in the way people experience drugs, but this actually classifies people... hmm i wonder if one were able to move from one cluster to another, or be moved as the case may be. im fortunate enough to seemengly belong to the first group mentioned in the quote, but id certainly love to help my friends join me there ...

and solipsis, its true people dont really discuss the subject of the op here, maybe because the group here (the forum people) already have their minds set to believing in the conclusions of the study so really, they have nothing to discuss, but maybe think that perhaps there is light in the future and people might look again at the possible benefits of such experiences... im sure if this were a different forum, say a social site or whatever, people would be throwing around a lot mroe jokes and misconceptions and what not...

 

[Ismene]

The word "mystical" (or words like "spiritual" or "sacred" for that matter) seems to trigger a knee-jerk reaction from the atheist crowd, and skepticism from much of the scientific community, but unnecessarily I think.

I think theres good reason to be skeptical tho. A lot of psychedelic users seem to blindly accept that the psychedelic experience is exactly the same as some primitive religious fanatic 2000 years ago believing in "God". I don't think they're similar at all. The psychedelic experience doesn't demand "followers" or "Gods". There's just yourself and the drug. It's a far purer and truer experience.

I've no doubt the 9/11 hijackers had plenty of mystical experiences - that's probably why they decided to do it. But lets not confuse the "mystical" experiences of religous fruitcakes with using a psychedelic. They're two entirely different things.

 

[lulzkiller]

Ismene: imagine a psychedelic drug which has all the positive sides that you associate with psychedelics except that it wouldn't have a propensity to make (some of) their users barf up half-baked Learyesque ideas. Best drug ever?

On topic: In general I am extremely happy about the Griffiths et al 2006 and 2011 studies. It is great to have a person in as prestigious a position as Griffiths do some real research on the subject. I wish he would have skipped the whole "mystical" term and gone for "the core of altruism", which IIRC are the words he uses in the short interview with him in Dirty Pictures. I don't really think the term "mystical" demystifies it very much to the general public.

 

[DwayneHoover]

If you replace "mystical" with "not understandable with normal sequential logical reasoning" it might be easier to parse. Psychedelics could lead to non-verbal mindstates not subject to description by words and rational concepts, but that are "purely experiential" sequences of multifaceted simultaneous emotions and multiple memories from the past, recent present, and projected future, all intermingled in non-linear ways, that are nonetheless EXPERIENCED by the "inner observer" as a coherent whole that ends on a feeling of having witnessed an entire tapestry of the contents of one's mind in one fell swoop, leading to feelings of deepened understanding of self and the world on an intuitional level, but that are still not relate-able in normal language, as having consisted of entirely novel sets of inner states for which there ARE NO WORDS. This is the sort of thing that people will typically describe as "mystical." That does not make them fake or non-existent. The people who had them had them, even if they cannot be boiled down to a linear sequences of logical words. By definition they are experiences BEYOND the normal bounds of experiences that are usually had. Why should there be proper words for them?

Instead of "mystical experience" substitute "indescribable subjective experiences deemed later to have great value to the subject."

 

[Ismene]

Ismene: imagine a psychedelic drug which has all the positive sides that you associate with psychedelics except that it wouldn't have a propensity to make (some of) their users barf up half-baked Learyesque ideas. Best drug ever?

I'd advertise it

I think it's a shame that psychedelics got caught up in that eastern religion phase back in the 60's. It seems to be pretty much the only interpretation available now.

Some primitive religious indian says "I see God when I take the mushrooms" and we all go "Wow dude".

I think we need to get as far away from that kind of thinking as possible and try and understand the psychedelic experience for what it is rather than being contaminated by bullshit religious ideas.

This is the sort of thing that people will typically describe as "mystical."

I think most people see mystical as having something to do with God or religion. That's why there' so much writing about psychedelics as being like the "Tibetan book of the dead" or like various religions. And the old chestnut that "Psychedelics are only temporary but studying Buddhism/hinduism/meditation is permanent". Obviously they're two entirely different things coming from entirely different mindsets and places.

 

[SpecialK_]

I wouldn't go as far to say it changes personality. But changing the way a person perceives things to a certain degree is definitely an effect of taking mushrooms. It tends to make people think about situations a lot more, for example narrow minded people are more likely to begin approaching different situations from alternative angles in their head or are more opinion to others opinions even if they believe it is wrong. I think it also makes people appreciate nature a lot more, scenery and the world around them. Even take an interest in something they never had before such as the brains response to psilocybin.

I don't know, changing personality just sounds a little negative to me...