Psychological support can be distinguished from psychotherapy: Clarifications for future empirical work.
General hospital psychiatry January 1, 2026 Jonathan R Schettino, Katherine Cheung, Sandeep M Nayak et al.
A debate exists in psychedelic research about whether the interpersonal interactions with participants before, during, and after acute drug effects should be called 'psychological support' (focused on safety) or 'psychotherapy' (also aiming for efficacy). The authors propose definitions and criteria for both forms, then test them on 11 published classic psychedelic clinical trials. Their procedure categorized 10 of 11 studies as more consistent with one label or the other, but achieved clear distinctions in only 4 studies. They argue that higher-quality data on the interpersonal interaction is needed to distinguish the two, and suggest ways their criteria can be used to empirically test the relative safety and efficacy of psychological support versus psychotherapy in psychedelic medicine.