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LSD enhances the emotional response to music

This within-subjects, placebo-controlled, single-blind study (n=10) found that LSD enhanced music-evoked emotions, which may have implications for psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy.

Authors

  • Robin Carhart-Harris
  • David Nutt
  • Leor Roseman

Published

Psychopharmacology
individual Study

Abstract

Rationale

There is renewed interest in the therapeutic potential of psychedelic drugs such as lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD). LSD was used extensively in the 1950s and 1960s as an adjunct in psychotherapy, reportedly enhancing emotionality. Music is an effective tool to evoke and study emotion and is considered an important element in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy; however, the hypothesis that psychedelics enhance the emotional response to music has yet to be investigated in a modern placebo-controlled study.Objectives :The present study sought to test the hypothesis that music-evoked emotions are enhanced under LSD.

Methods

Ten healthy volunteers listened to five different tracks of instrumental music during each of two study days, a placebo day followed by an LSD day, separated by 5-7 days. Subjective ratings were completed after each music track and included a visual analogue scale (VAS) and the nine-item Geneva Emotional Music Scale (GEMS-9).

Results

Results demonstrated that the emotional response to music is enhanced by LSD, especially the emotions wonder, transcendence, power and tenderness.

Conclusions

These findings reinforce the long-held assumption that psychedelics enhance music-evoked emotion, and provide tentative and indirect support for the notion that this effect can be harnessed in the context of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. Further research is required to test this link directly.

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Research Summary of 'LSD enhances the emotional response to music'

Introduction

Classic serotonergic psychedelics such as lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) produce marked alterations of consciousness and have long been reported to influence emotion. Earlier psychotherapeutic work in the 1950s and 1960s emphasised that psychedelics could reduce ego defences and facilitate emotional release, and music has historically been used both to evoke emotion and as an adjunct in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. Despite the prominence of music in clinical and ceremonial psychedelic contexts, no modern placebo-controlled study had directly tested whether psychedelics actually amplify the emotional response to music. Kaelen and colleagues set out to address that gap by testing the hypothesis that music-evoked emotions are enhanced under LSD. Healthy volunteers listened to five instrumental music tracks on two study days (placebo first, then LSD), and emotional responses were measured after each track using a visual analogue scale (VAS) and the nine-item Geneva Emotional Music Scale (GEMS-9). The study specifically predicted enhanced emotions related to transcendence (e.g. fascination, feelings of spirituality).

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Study Details

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LSD enhances the emotional response to music — Research Summary & Context | Blossom