How Low-Doses Of Psychedelics Compliment High Dose Experiences: Observational Evidence In Naturalistic Settings

The paper explores how people use low-doses of psychedelics to complement high-dose therapeutic and spiritual experiences. The paper is motivated by two understudied trends in psychedelics-assisted therapy. First, the existing literature (Polito $ Liknaitzky, 2021) treats low and high-dose psychedelics as distinct wellness strategies, but there are numerous anecdotal reports of people using high and low doses as compliments. Second, upcoming political reforms in the United States will permit state-certified sub-clinical practitioners to facilitate psychedelic experiences and provide harm-reduction counselling. To study a population at the intersection of these emerging trends, we conducted a secondary analysis of 41 interviews from a private-sector wellness company that provides psychedelics educational materials and coaching. Exploratory analysis reveals that high-dose psychedelics are most often meaningful for belief re-appraisal and acute mental illness, while lose-dose experiences are beneficial for behavioural change, relationship development, and managing episodic stress. Low-dosing appears to help users “integrate” the existential and therapeutic insights from high doses by improving in-the-moment mindfulness of everyday challenges. Broken down by substance type, Psilocybin is more often reported to help with conflict resolution in both personal and professional contexts, while LSD promotes sustained individualized focus in most professional contexts. As a robustness check, we ran transcribed interviews through a semi-supervised topic modelling algorithm; models are noisy given the open-ended nature of the interviews, but select phrases related to the differences between high and low dosing are apparent. Further clinical validation is warranted to study how low-dose psychedelics may be a promising adjunct to current psychotherapy protocols, especially for work-related stress.