Philosophy contributes to hallucinations research in three distinct ways. Phenomenology provides a sophisticated, critical understanding of the lived experience of hallucinations. Philosophy of cognitive science enables big-picture theorizing, synthesis of ideas, and critical engagement with new paradigms. Philosophy of science and psychiatry raises theoretically informed questions about diagnosis and categorization. These contributions reflect philosophy's methodological variety and its relevance to hallucinations researchers.
Psychotic-like experiences are linked to overprecise signal discrimination and lower decision thresholds, which may bias perceptual inference toward false positive detections. In 191 participants completing a Random Dot Motion task, drift-diffusion models showed that hallucination- and delusion-like experiences were associated with increased drift rates, a measure of sensory precision. Hallucination-like experiences also predicted lower decision thresholds. On the beads task, psychotic-like experiences correlated with higher confidence ratings but not with reduced data-gathering. These findings suggest that overprecise signal discrimination and lower decision thresholds may contribute to anomalous experiences.