Fort Larry Douglas, Costines Cyril, Wittmann Marc, Demertzi Athena, Schmidt Timo Torsten
Physiology of Cognition Lab, GIGA Research, Faculty of Medicine, CRC Human Imaging Unit, University of Liège, Liège, Belgium.
Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, Medical Center - University of Freiburg, Faculty of Medicine, University of Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany; Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology and Mental Health (IGPP), Freiburg, Germany; CIRCE - Collaboration for Interdisciplinary Research on Conscious Experience, Teupitz, Germany.
Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2025 Aug;175:106178. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106178. Epub 2025 Apr 26.
In recent years, there has been a renewed interest in the conceptual and empirical study of altered states of consciousness (ASCs), induced pharmacologically or otherwise, driven by their potential clinical applications. To draw attention to the rich history of research in this domain, we review prominent classification schemes that have been proposed to introduce systematicity into the scientific study of ASCs. The reviewed ASC classification schemes fall into three groups according to the criteria they use for categorization: (1) based on the nature, variety, and intensity of subjective experiences (state-based), including conceptual descriptions and psychometric assessments, (2) based on the technique of induction (method-based), and (3) descriptions of neurophysiological mechanisms of ASCs (neuro/physio-based). By comparing and extending existing classification schemes, we can enhance efforts to identify neural correlates of consciousness, particularly when examining mechanisms of ASC induction and the resulting subjective experiences. Furthermore, an overview of what defining ASC characteristics different authors have proposed can inform future research in the conceptualization and quantification of ASC subjective effects, including the identification of those that might be relevant in clinical research. This review concludes by clustering the concepts from the state-based schemes, which are suggested for classifying ASC experiences. The resulting clusters can inspire future approaches to formulate and quantify the core phenomenology of ASC experiences to assist in basic and clinical research.
近年来，由于意识改变状态（ASC）在临床上的潜在应用，人们对其概念和实证研究重新产生了兴趣，这些改变可通过药理学或其他方式诱发。为了引起人们对该领域丰富研究历史的关注，我们回顾了为使ASC的科学研究更具系统性而提出的重要分类方案。根据分类标准，所回顾的ASC分类方案可分为三类：（1）基于主观体验的性质、多样性和强度（基于状态），包括概念描述和心理测量评估；（2）基于诱发技术（基于方法）；（3）对ASC神经生理机制的描述（基于神经/生理）。通过比较和扩展现有分类方案，我们可以加强识别意识神经关联物的工作，特别是在研究ASC诱发机制及由此产生的主观体验时。此外，概述不同作者提出的定义ASC特征，可以为ASC主观效应的概念化和量化方面的未来研究提供参考，包括识别那些可能与临床研究相关的特征。本综述通过对基于状态的方案中的概念进行聚类来结束，这些概念被建议用于对ASC体验进行分类。由此产生的聚类可以启发未来制定和量化ASC体验核心现象学的方法，以辅助基础研究和临床研究。
