A neurophenomenological approach to non-ordinary states of consciousness: hypnosis, meditation, and psychedelics

Timmermann, Christopher; Bauer, Prisca R.; Gosseries, Olivia; Vanhaudenhuyse, Audrey; Vollenweider, Franz X.; Laureys, Steven; Singer, Tania; Antonova, Elena; Lutz, Antoine

doi:10.1016/j.tics.2022.11.006

Cited by 49 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 187 publications

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“…S5), no such correlations were found for self-report scales tapping into the same concept. Our results thus encourage future employment of in-depth phenomenological methods within neurocognitive experiments, especially when targeting altered states of consciousness and pre-reflective characteristics of experience, such as the sense of self (30). In conclusion, the present results highlight the PMC as a central region contributing to an integrated embodied perspective in conscious experience.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 67%

“…Here we propose that an explicit integration of first-person methods, as outlined by the framework of neurophenomenology (28)(29)(30), can overcome these limitations through a) collaboration with long-term practitioners of mindful-awareness and insight (vipassana) meditation able to volitionally induce and sustain states of altered self experience, and b) a detailed phenomenological interview approach (31) that supports awareness of pre-reflective (self-) experience and facilitates translation of such first-person descriptions into an intersubjectively valid frame of reference. The utility of collaborating with long-term mindfulness meditators in the context of studying the self is supported from various angles: First, a central aim of Buddhist practice is an experiential insight into the illusory nature of selfhood, and while this soteriological aim cannot be mapped directly onto the philosophical and scientific concepts of minimal and embodied selfhood, the traditional descriptions of such meditative states lend support to the idea that relevant phenomenological changes with profound alterations in the sense of self do occur (32)(33)(34).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…folk-psychological intuitions) and, on the other hand, guide attention towards pre-reflective facets of this experience (e.g. subtle inner acts or "micro-gestures" associated with an experience) (28,30,(41)(42)(43). Methodologically, such reports may yield novel results by accounting for otherwise disregarded variations in cognitive states when analyzing neurophysiological data (44).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Suspending the embodied self in meditation attenuates beta oscillations in posterior medial cortex

Trautwein¹,

Schweitzer²,

Dor-Ziderman³

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Human experience is imbued by the implicit sense of being an embodied agent, differentiated from but acting on an external world. Because this basic, embodied sense of self is both pervasive and implicit (i.e., pre-reflective), its investigation requires broad means of manipulation, as well as rigorous first-person methodology for mapping ensuing subjective changes, in parallel to neuroscientific monitoring. Here we show that advanced meditative states, embedded within a neurophenomenological design combining brain recordings and principled phenomenological interviewing techniques can be leveraged to that end: Forty-six long-term meditators were trained in modulating their embodied self-experience by dissolving their sense of boundaries. The induced states were monitored with magnetoencephalography and subjective changes were mapped using phenomenological interviews. Hypotheses were pre-registered and researchers blinded during data analysis. Results demonstrated high beta-band oscillatory power reductions in frontoparietal and posterior medial cortices (PMC). Importantly, the PMC reductions were driven by participants who reported radical alterations of their embodied self-experience, including the complete suspension of the sense of agency, first-person perspective, and self-location. The neural changes were correlated with lifetime meditation practice and interview-derived experiential changes – but not with classical self-report scales – thus demonstrating the validity and added value of the employed neurophenomenological approach. These results highlight beta oscillations in the PMC as the central neural process that mediates the integrated embodied perspective in conscious experience. More broadly, they offer a first large-scale implementation of a pragmatic neuroscientific approach for studying consciousness that builds on rigorous examination of experience.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 67%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Suspending the embodied self in meditation attenuates beta oscillations in posterior medial cortex

Trautwein¹,

Schweitzer²,

Dor-Ziderman³

et al. 2023

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…S7 ). Future studies—combining neuroimaging with time-resolved measures of subjective experience and/or experience-sampling plus extensive within-subject data collection—could leverage improvements in data volume and quality for more nuanced “neurophenomenological” analyses ( 68 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human brain effects of DMT assessed via EEG-fMRI

Timmermann

Roseman

Haridas

et al. 2023

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Psychedelics have attracted medical interest, but their effects on human brain function are incompletely understood. In a comprehensive, within-subjects, placebo-controlled design, we acquired multimodal neuroimaging [i.e., EEG-fMRI (electroencephalography-functional MRI)] data to assess the effects of intravenous (IV) N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) on brain function in 20 healthy volunteers. Simultaneous EEG-fMRI was acquired prior to, during, and after a bolus IV administration of 20 mg DMT, and, separately, placebo. At dosages consistent with the present study, DMT, a serotonin 2A receptor (5-HT2AR) agonist, induces a deeply immersive and radically altered state of consciousness. DMT is thus a useful research tool for probing the neural correlates of conscious experience. Here, fMRI results revealed robust increases in global functional connectivity (GFC), network disintegration and desegregation, and a compression of the principal cortical gradient under DMT. GFC × subjective intensity maps correlated with independent positron emission tomography (PET)-derived 5-HT2AR maps, and both overlapped with meta-analytical data implying human-specific psychological functions. Changes in major EEG-measured neurophysiological properties correlated with specific changes in various fMRI metrics, enriching our understanding of the neural basis of DMT’s effects. The present findings advance on previous work by confirming a predominant action of DMT—and likely other 5-HT2AR agonist psychedelics—on the brain’s transmodal association pole, i.e., the neurodevelopmentally and evolutionarily recent cortex that is associated with species-specific psychological advancements, and high expression of 5-HT2A receptors.

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“…Several diverse fields are studying, reviewing, and arguing about psychedelics; ethics and policy (Miceli McMillan, 2022 ; Smith and Appelbaum, 2022 ), psychotherapy and psychopharmacology (Greenway et al, 2020 ), neurobiology (Vollenweider and Preller, 2020 ), sociology (Andrews and Wright, 2022 ), and anthropology (Hunter, 2015 ) (to name a few). The field is “opening the doors of perception” into novel insights concerning human extensional questions about consciousness (Yaden et al, 2021 ; Timmermann et al, 2023 ), religion (Johnson, 2021 ; Cole-Turner, 2022 ), and death (Moreton et al, 2020 ; Sweeney et al, 2022 ). The renewed psychedelic interest is, rightfully so, calling attention to our barbaric history of colonization.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%