Neuroscience Letters
July 27, 2006
338 citations
Mystical experiences—specifically a state of union with God—are associated with activation in multiple brain regions. In Carmelite nuns, fMRI revealed significant activity in the right medial orbitofrontal cortex, right middle temporal cortex, right inferior and superior parietal lobules, right caudate, left medial prefrontal cortex, left anterior cingulate cortex, left inferior parietal lobule, left insula, left caudate, left brainstem, and the extra-striate visual cortex. These findings suggest that such experiences are mediated by several brain regions and systems rather than a single area.
Neuroscience Letters
October 28, 2010
Joon Hwan Jang, Wi Hoon Jung, Do‐hyung Kang et al.
267 citations
Long-term meditation practitioners show greater functional connectivity within the default mode network, specifically in the medial prefrontal cortex, compared to non-meditators, even when not actively meditating. This suggests that regular meditation practice may produce lasting changes in brain regions involved in internalized attention and self-referential thought.
Neuroscience Letters
December 10, 2004
Pehr Granqvist, Mats Fredrikson, Patrik Unge et al.
189 citations
A double-blind experiment with 89 participants found no evidence that weak, complex waveform transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) fields evoke a sensed presence of a sentient being, mystical experiences, or other somatosensory effects. The magnetic fields tested were about one million times weaker than ordinary TMS fields. Although earlier claims reported such effects in up to 80% of the general population, this replication found no effects in the entire group or in individuals high in suggestibility. Personality characteristics—absorption, signs of abnormal temporal lobe activity, and a new-age lifestyle orientation—significantly predicted outcomes, suggesting that suggestibility, not the magnetic fields, may account for previously reported effects. These results strongly question earlier claims.
Neuroscience Letters
August 15, 2008
105 citations
Mystical experiences—intense feelings of union with God—are common across cultures, but their brain activity had not been measured with EEG. In 14 Carmelite nuns, EEG was recorded during a resting state, a control condition, and a mystical condition. Compared to the control condition, the mystical condition showed increased theta power at frontal, central, and parietal electrodes, and greater gamma1 power at right temporal and parietal sites. Higher ratios of delta/beta, theta/alpha, and theta/beta appeared at several electrodes. Coherence increased in a frontal-parietal theta band and in several alpha-band pairs across both hemispheres. These results indicate that mystical experiences involve measurable changes in brain electrical activity across multiple cortical areas.
Neuroscience Letters
February 13, 2008
Jiřı́ Wackermann, Marc Wittmann, Felix Hasler et al.
95 citations
Psilocybin, a hallucinogenic substance, alters the internal representation of time by increasing the loss rate of the internal duration representation. In two double-blind, placebo-controlled experiments—one with 12 subjects receiving graded doses and another with 9 subjects receiving a very low dose—participants repeatedly reproduced time intervals between 1.5 and 5 seconds. The parameter kappa from the 'dual klepsydra' model was used to assess effects. At 90 minutes after intake, psilocybin significantly increased kappa, indicating a higher loss rate of internal time representation. These findings may relate to qualitative changes in subjective time during altered states of consciousness.
Neuroscience Letters
January 16, 2013
José L. Moreno, Terrell Holloway, Vinayak Rayannavar et al.
44 citations
Hallucinogenic drugs like LSD, mescaline, and psilocybin all bind strongly to the serotonin 5-HT(2A) receptor. Drugs that affect metabotropic glutamate 2/3 (mGlu2/3) receptors can alter the cellular and behavioral effects of hallucinogens. In mice, chronic treatment (21 days) with the mGlu2/3 receptor antagonist LY341495 (1.5 mg/kg) reduced the hallucinogenic-like effects of LSD (0.24 mg/kg). This treatment decreased binding of a radiolabeled tracer to 5-HT(2A) receptors in the somatosensory cortex of normal mice, but not in mice lacking the mGlu2 receptor. It also reduced head-twitch behavior and the expression of certain genes (c-fos, egr-1, egr-2) that are normally triggered by hallucinogenic drugs. These results suggest that repeatedly blocking mGlu2 receptors dampens the 5-HT(2A) receptor-mediated effects of LSD.