Embedding existential psychology within psychedelic science: reduced death anxiety as a mediator of the therapeutic effects of psychedelics

Self-reported negative outcomes of psilocybin users: A quantitative textual analysis

“…Psilocybin (4-phosphoryloxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine), the active ingredient in "magic mushrooms", has been investigated in relation to its medicinal properties, in particular for conditions such as treatment-resistant depression (TRD) [5], with suggestions that psychedelic research may lead to a paradigm shift in psychiatry [6,7]. Psilocybin has also shown potential clinical benefits for depression and anxiety in end-stage cancer [8], possibly with reductions in death anxiety underpinning its therapeutic effects [9]. Although psilocybin is considered a toxicologically safe substance [10][11][12], there is no scientific consensus on the risks that the use of psilocybin may bring [13].…”

Entity encounters and the therapeutic effect of the psychedelic mystical experience

“…Similarly, in clinical studies psilocybin has been shown to decrease death anxiety, and this effect is mediated by the psilocybin occasioned mystical experience (Griffiths et al, 2016). Moreton, Szalla, Menzies, and Arena (2020) also posit that reduced death anxiety may be a mediator of the therapeutic effects of psychedelics and propose several mechanisms that might underly this effect.…”

Psychedelics, Mystical Experiences, and Meaning Making: A Renegotiation Process With the Challenges of Existence

“…This is evidenced through individuals' maintenance of conscious awareness throughout psychedelics' disruption or dissolution of brain networks responsible for self/other processing, including the default mode network and salience network (Lebedev et al, 2015;Smigielski et al, 2019Smigielski et al, , 2020. Still, the phenomenological aspects of these alterations may be alarming, with many individuals reporting challenging experiences during this disruption that may encompass a feeling or fear of dying or belief that one has died (Carbonaro et al, 2016;Davis et al, 2020;Garcia-Romeu et al, 2014;Moreton et al, 2020). Watts et al (2017) reported patients' emphasis that being able to stop resisting and let go into these experiences was perceived by them as instrumental in their recovery from depression, a process also emphasized and described as being a precursor to mystical experiences by Moreton et al (2020) and Roseman et al (2018).…”

“…I think I must have gone along through the life of Christ identifying in a very total sort of way-reliving the life in some way until finally dying and going into the tomb. (Doblin, 1991, p. 18) Considering the emphasis placed by existential-humanistic perspectives on confronting death in order to live a meaningful life, it is not surprising that this confrontation has been posited as underpinning psychedelics' therapeutic effects (Moreton et al, 2020). Supporting this claim are studies that have found reduced death anxiety and enhanced life meaning or purpose to be common among survey respondents who reported psychedelic use (Davis et al, 2020;Yaden et al, 2017).…”

“…Its use in PAT was designated a "breakthrough" treatment by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for treatment-resistant depression, indicating that it may provide better results than any current pharmaceutical or talk therapy for this severe and life-threatening illness (Reiff et al, 2020). Psychedelic experiences vary widely but may include acute periods of intense, labile emotions (Carbonaro et al, 2016;Garcia-Romeu et al, 2014;Moreton et al, 2020) that have been hypothesized as being necessary to "let go" before enabling mystical experiences (Roseman et al, 2018;Watts et al, 2017). Characteristics of mystical experiences include a positive mood, sense of inner/outer unity, transcendence of time and space, ineffability, and a noetic quality (MacLean et al, 2012).…”