Animal models in psychedelic research – Tripping over translation
bioRxiv Preprint Server January 14, 2026 Muad Y. Abd El Hay, Ana Cukić, Marieke L. Schölvinck et al. preprint
Psychedelic substances show promise for treating psychiatric disorders, but their therapeutic mechanisms remain poorly understood. A review of 266 rodent studies from 2014 to 2026 finds systematic disconnects between animal research and human therapy conditions. Most studies contain stress-inducing factors: only 14% reported active-phase testing, 7% environmental enrichment, and 21% refined handling; drug administration almost universally used stress-inducing methods. Behavioral assays rely on brief, constrained testing with isolated markers that fail to capture the multidimensional nature of psychedelic states. The authors argue that improving translation requires a shift from brief testing of stressed, isolated animals toward longitudinal tracking of individuals in enriched social environments.