Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, Mississauga, Canada.
Clinical Psychology, York University, Toronto, Canada.
Harm Reduct J. 2019 Jul 10;16(1):43. doi: 10.1186/s12954-019-0308-4.
Microdosing psychedelics is the practice of consuming very low, sub-hallucinogenic doses of a psychedelic substance, such as lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) or psilocybin-containing mushrooms. According to media reports, microdosing has grown in popularity, yet the scientific literature contains minimal research on this practice. There has been limited reporting on adverse events associated with microdosing, and the experiences of microdosers in community samples have not been categorized.
In the present study, we develop a codebook of microdosing benefits and challenges (MDBC) based on the qualitative reports of a real-world sample of 278 microdosers.
We describe novel findings, both in terms of beneficial outcomes, such as improved mood (26.6%) and focus (14.8%), and in terms of challenging outcomes, such as physiological discomfort (18.0%) and increased anxiety (6.7%). We also show parallels between benefits and drawbacks and discuss the implications of these results. We probe for substance-dependent differences, finding that psilocybin-only users report the benefits of microdosing were more important than other users report.
These mixed-methods results help summarize and frame the experiences reported by an active microdosing community as high-potential avenues for future scientific research. The MDBC taxonomy reported here informs future research, leveraging participant reports to distil the highest-potential intervention targets so research funding can be efficiently allocated. Microdosing research complements the full-dose literature as clinical treatments are developed and neuropharmacological mechanisms are sought. This framework aims to inform researchers and clinicians as experimental microdosing research begins in earnest in the years to come.
微剂量摄入致幻剂是指摄入非常低剂量、亚致幻剂量的致幻物质，如麦角酸二乙酰胺（LSD）或含有迷幻蘑菇的致幻剂。根据媒体报道，微剂量摄入已经变得越来越流行，然而，科学文献中对此实践的研究却很少。目前关于微剂量摄入相关不良反应的报道有限，且社区样本中微剂量使用者的体验尚未得到分类。
在本研究中，我们根据 278 名真实世界的微剂量使用者的定性报告，制定了微剂量益处和挑战的编码手册（MDBC）。
我们描述了新颖的发现，包括有益的结果，如改善情绪（26.6%）和注意力（14.8%），以及具有挑战性的结果，如生理不适（18.0%）和焦虑增加（6.7%）。我们还展示了益处和缺点之间的相似之处，并讨论了这些结果的意义。我们探讨了物质依赖的差异，发现仅使用迷幻蘑菇的使用者报告的微剂量益处比其他使用者报告的更重要。
这些混合方法的结果有助于总结和构建活跃的微剂量使用者社区所报告的经验，为未来的科学研究提供高潜力的途径。这里报告的 MDBC 分类法为未来的研究提供了信息，利用参与者的报告来提炼最有潜力的干预目标，以便有效地分配研究资金。微剂量研究与全剂量文献相辅相成，因为临床治疗正在开发，神经药理学机制正在寻求。随着未来几年实验性微剂量研究的认真开展，这个框架旨在为研究人员和临床医生提供信息。
