Frontiers in Psychology
January 1, 2013
Thomas Schäfer, Jörg Fachner, Mario Smukalla
66 citations
Music can alter people's ordinary experience of space and time, challenging the concept of invariant space and time assumed in psychology. This review examines experimental evidence and subjective reports of music's influence on the representation of space and time, along with prominent explanations for these effects. It discusses the role of absorption, altered states of consciousness, changes in attention, neurophysiological processes, and models of human time processing and time experience. The research is still inconclusive, but integrating different approaches could lead to a better understanding. A working model is provided, and suggestions for further research in music psychology and cognitive psychology are outlined.
Journal of Psychedelic Studies
May 15, 2025
Marc Sherwin, Fabio Friso, Jörg Fachner et al.
4 citations
Curative songs called icaros, used by traditional healers in the Peruvian Upper Amazon alongside the psychoactive plant brew ayahuasca, may aid healing by influencing self-referential processing, promoting decentering, and facilitating beneficial introspective or meditative states. An interpretive phenomenological analysis of six participants attending an ayahuasca ritual for personal and spiritual development at the Takiwasi Center in 2018 provides pointers toward a neurophenomenology of musico-healing experiences. The work contributes a medical ethnomusicological perspective to understanding how Amazonian curative songs function under the altered state of consciousness produced by ayahuasca.
November 10, 2022
Jörg Fachner
2 citations
The Bonny Method of Guided Imagery and Music (GIM) originally used psychedelic drugs to induce an altered state of consciousness (ASC), but Helen Bonny found that deep relaxation methods and a supine position could also elicit sufficient imagery. Recent research on MDMA, LSD, and Ayahuasca shows that these drugs enhance imagery vividness by breaking down ego defenses, producing culture-specific imagery patterns that may be useful in therapy. However, imagery from relaxation methods can be voluntarily controlled and integrated, whereas drug-induced imagery may create a "floodlight state" requiring longer processing. Common factors such as setting, performance rites, suggestibility, and personal willingness also influence the ASC, highlighting the need for further investigation into how induction methods affect the ASC during these interventions.