GDS2019: Psychedelic micro-dosing: the good, the bad and the who knows what.
Professor Adam R Winstock
What a decade it has been for psychedelics. From new studies shining a light on their therapeutic applications and imaging studies revealing how they exert their action on the brain, GDS suspects that interest in these unique and rather amazing compounds is only going to increase.
This is also reflected in GDS’s finding that over the last 2 years the drug effect most novel drugs are trying to mimic are the psychedelics. 1P-LSD has allowed unregulated access in many regions, while DMT and 2-CB, while old drugs, seem to be enjoying a resurgence in popularity.
Whilst most people have been long aware of the medical, hedonistic and performance enhancing effects of stimulant drugs, the latter has only more recently become an area of potential interest for psychedelics. While past GDS research suggests micro-dosing is still a minority sport (maybe 5% of recent LSD users) and that for most dosing a micro-dose is guess work, preliminary results suggest those who have tried it do report some significant benefit.
But it’s early days. We know so little about how and if, very little doses of LSD or psilocybin make a difference. So, this year we have hooked up with some active researchers in the field (Thomas Anderson and Rotem Petranker at UBC) to deepen our understanding about the area. We’ll be asking why people started micro-dosing and about the range of positives and negative consequences of micro-dosing, as well how it compares overall to the ‘full-dose’ experience.
If you’d like to help us understand a little bit more about how psychedelics are being used and exactly what benefits they may offer to people, please take a few minutes this year to take part in the world’s biggest survey www.globaldrugsurvey.com/GDS2019