Currently we find few studies that evaluate changes in psychological variables after a first use of psychedelics This is due, among other things, to the fact that it is extremely difficult to find people who are going to start using drugs.
Generally, the samples used already have a lot of experience or, if not, they are carefully selected, ensuring the total and absolute absence of any psychopathological trait, thus reducing the external validity of the results. That is, the possibility of extrapolating the findings to the entire population.
With the aim of obtaining information about these first consumptions, the psychologist Genís Oña, researcher at the Medical Anthropology Research Center of the Rovira i Virgili University and the recently deceased psychologist Juan Spuch, began a research project in mid-2014. The preliminary results of This project was presented at the international Breaking Convention conference, which was held at the University of Greenwich, in London.
In context: the therapeutic potential of psychedelics
Recently, psychedelic drugs such as LSD or psilocybin are starring in many journalistic or popular articles, in which possible therapeutic applications are discussed.
And, after several decades of prohibition in which any attempt at scientific research was canceled ipso facto, laboratories, hospitals and universities around the world are carrying out new studies on these substances. with the aim of developing new pharmacological therapies
Despite this prolonged “scientific vacuum,” many users turned, and continue to turn, to these substances for medical reasons. Many consumers noticed beneficial effects, often unexpected, about your anxiety, your mood or illnesses such as cluster headaches after taking psychedelic drugs. Due to the needs of these patients and many others likely to achieve some improvement in their situation, institutions as important as Scientific American or the British Journal of Psychiatry have launched express requests in recent years to reactivate this “psychedelic research.”
Until now, some were already known therapeutic potentialities of some of these substances However, new studies have appeared that have raised new questions. One of them is, for example, what happens when someone who has never taken this type of drug takes it for the first time? We could easily encounter this situation in the future if these treatments were approved, since many potential patients would never have tried these drugs, and we need to know exactly what the effects of this first contact are.
How research on the effects of LSD was conducted
In their study, Genís Oña and Juan Spuch managed to gather 9 young university students who met the desired profile: they had no previous experience in the consumption of psychedelic drugs and in the near future they planned to consume LSD.
“The objective was to respect the natural course of the situation at all times,” explains Genís. “We did not want to change the consumption context thinking about administering the substance in a hospital, as in the rest of the clinical trials. We wanted to see what really happens, in real situations. Something that is halfway between pragmatic essays or ethnographic methodology.”
The variables included in the study were levels of anxiety, depression, a measure of general psychopathology, a personality profile and the level of satisfaction with life. These were analyzed with standardized tests.
These dimensions were evaluated approximately one week before consumption took place and 30 days after said consumption. A follow-up was also carried out after three months to check the stability over time of the possible changes produced. Additionally, a control group that did not consume LSD was used in which the same tests were administered.
The effects of this drug in the first consumption
The first results indicated clear differences in the basal levels of some variables between the two groups. Apparently, the group that planned to consume LSD was more depressed, with more presence of psychopathological traits such as obsessions compulsions or psychoticism, and with lower satisfaction with life compared to the control group.
This changed after consumption. The data obtained in the retest showed a significant decrease, not only in these variables in which they differed with respect to the control group, but also in others, such as the level of anxiety, neuroticism, hostility or somatizations In this way, no significant differences could be found between the two groups in any variable and in the experimental group a general significant improvement was observed after the experience.
The information obtained from the three-month follow-up suggests a certain stability in these changes, since these could still be seen significantly with respect to baseline levels. Likewise, no significant differences were found between the two groups.
The beneficial potential of LSD
Does this mean that a first use of LSD can be beneficial? It is probable. However, we have to keep in mind the limitations of the study and be cautious in interpreting its results.
First, the sample was relatively small and, furthermore, there was poor control of extraneous variables that cannot be controlled outside of a clinical trial. Secondly, the effect of the psychedelic experience can be interpreted by considering it as a deeply positive experience, since for all the subjects who consumed LSD it represented a unique and unrepeatable experience. In fact, More than half of them rated it as one of the best experiences of their lives “Perhaps this effect,” explains Genís Oña, “is comparable to other deeply positive experiences that we experience only very occasionally, such as traveling to a distant country or spending a day at an amusement park.”
However, these results seem legitimize scientific research into the therapeutic potential of these substances because if we can observe these beneficial effects without having any psychotherapeutic context, the potential of these substances using an appropriate context seems very promising.
Many details of the study have had to be omitted due to its complexity, but the full article published in the Journal of Transpersonal Research.
