Imperial College London
Alternate

Professor Robin Carhart-Harris

Faculty of Medicine, Department of Brain Sciences

Visiting Professor
 
 
 
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Contact

 

+44 (0)20 7594 7992r.carhart-harris

 
 
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Assistant

 

Miss Bruna Cunha +44 (0)20 7594 7992

 
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Location

 

Burlington DanesHammersmith Campus

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Summary

 

Publications

Citation

BibTex format

@article{Erritzoe:2019:10.1177/0269881119827891,
author = {Erritzoe, D and Smith, J and Fisher, PM and Carhart-Harris, R and Frokjaer, VG and Knudsen, GM},
doi = {10.1177/0269881119827891},
journal = {J Psychopharmacol},
pages = {269881119827891--269881119827891},
title = {Recreational use of psychedelics is associated with elevated personality trait openness: Exploration of associations with brain serotonin markers.},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0269881119827891},
year = {2019}
}
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RIS format (EndNote, RefMan)

TY  - JOUR
AB  - BACKGROUND:: Recent studies have suggested therapeutic benefits of psychedelics for a variety of mental health conditions. The understanding of how single psychedelic administrations can induce long-lasting effects are, in large, still lacking. However, recent studies in both healthy and clinical populations suggest a role for personality changes. AIM:: To test support for some of these plausible mechanisms we evaluated (cross-sectional) associations between recreational use of psychedelics and 3,4-methylene-dioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) and (a) personality measures and (b) key markers of cerebral serotonergic signalling (serotonin transporter and serotonin-2A-receptor binding). METHODS:: In 10 psychedelic-preferring recreational users, 14 MDMA-preferring users and 21 non-using controls, personality was assessed using the 'big five' instrument Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R). Frontal serotonin transporter and serotonin-2A-receptor binding potentials were quantified using [11C]DASB and [18F]altanserin positron emission tomography, respectively. RESULTS:: Of the five NEO-PI-R traits, only openness to experience scores differed between the three groups; psychedelic-preferring recreational users showing higher openness to experience scores when compared with both MDMA-preferring users and controls. Openness to experience scores were positively associated with lifetime number of psychedelic exposures, and among all MDMA-preferring user/psychedelic-preferring recreational user individuals, frontal serotonin transporter binding - but not frontal serotonin-2A-receptor binding - was positively associated with openness to experience. CONCLUSION:: Our findings from this cross-sectional study support increasing evidence of a positive association between psychedelic experiences and openness to experience, and (a) expands this to the context of 'recreational' psychedelics use, and (b) links serotonergic neurotransmission to openness to experience. A modulation of perso
AU  - Erritzoe,D
AU  - Smith,J
AU  - Fisher,PM
AU  - Carhart-Harris,R
AU  - Frokjaer,VG
AU  - Knudsen,GM
DO  - 10.1177/0269881119827891
EP  - 269881119827891
PY  - 2019///
SP  - 269881119827891
TI  - Recreational use of psychedelics is associated with elevated personality trait openness: Exploration of associations with brain serotonin markers.
T2  - J Psychopharmacol
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0269881119827891
UR  - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30816797
ER  -
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