The prospective pilot study will address the critical need for more precise characterizations of the acute visual effects of the drug psilocybin by measuring the impact of acute psilocybin intoxication on a perceptual task known as visual surround suppression, compared to an active placebo control.
The proposed pilot study will address the critical need for more precise characterizations of the acute visual effects of the drug psilocybin by measuring the impact of acute psilocybin intoxication on a perceptual task known as visual surround suppression, compared to an active placebo control. The data collected in the proposed experiment will make important contributions to knowledge of how psilocybin impacts contextual processing in the brain. Moreover, this will in turn inform the neurobiology of visual surround suppression in general, providing the first investigation of links between surround suppression and serotonergic pathways in humans. Furthermore, the impact of psilocybin on surround suppression will complement recent discoveries of differences in surround suppression present in certain clinical populations. Taken together, these points suggest that this relatively simple and straightforward study could have significant payoff in its contribution to knowledge, not only of the effects of psilocybin but also of key brain processes underpinning human vision and context processing more broadly.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
BASIC_SCIENCE
Masking
TRIPLE
Enrollment
10
25 mg capsules (white opaque, Capsugel Vcaps Plus HPMC size 2)
100 mg capsules (white opaque, Capsugel Vcaps Plus HPMC size 2)
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States
Psychophysical Descrimination Threshold - No Surround Suppression (NS) Dose 1
No surround suppression condition for visual psychophysics tasks, consisting of perceptual judgments (e.g., subject reported which of two visual stimuli presented appeared to have higher contrast). Based on these responses, psychophysical discrimination thresholds are calculated using an adaptive staircase technique and reported in units of percent contrast. .
Time frame: 3 hours after dose 1
Psychophysical Descrimination Threshold - No Surround Suppression (NS) Dose 2
No surround suppression condition for visual psychophysics tasks, consisting of perceptual judgments (e.g., subject reported which of two visual stimuli presented appeared to have higher contrast). Based on these responses, psychophysical discrimination thresholds are calculated using an adaptive staircase technique and reported in units of percent contrast. .
Time frame: 3 hours after dose 2
Psychophysical Descrimination Threshold - Orthogonal Surround Suppression (OS) Dose 1
Orthogonal surround suppression condition for visual psychophysics tasks, consisting of perceptual judgments (e.g., subject reported which of two visual stimuli presented appeared to have higher contrast). Based on these responses, psychophysical discrimination thresholds are calculated using an adaptive staircase technique and reported in units of percent contrast. Orthogonal surround suppression condition (OS).
Time frame: 3 hours after dose 1
Psychophysical Descrimination Threshold - Orthogonal Surround Suppression (OS) Dose 2
Orthogonal surround suppression condition for visual psychophysics tasks, consisting of perceptual judgments (e.g., subject reported which of two visual stimuli presented appeared to have higher contrast). Based on these responses, psychophysical discrimination thresholds are calculated using an adaptive staircase technique and reported in units of percent contrast. Orthogonal surround suppression condition (OS).
Time frame: 3 hours after dose 2
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Psychophysical Descrimination Threshold - Parallel Surround Suppression (PS) Dose 1
Parallel surround suppresion condition for visual psychophysics tasks consisting of perceptual judgments (e.g., subject reported which of two visual stimuli presented appeared to have higher contrast). Based on these responses, psychophysical discrimination thresholds are calculated using an adaptive staircase technique and reported in units of percent contrast. Parallel surround suppression condition (PS). .
Time frame: 3 hours after dose 1
Psychophysical Descrimination Threshold - Parallel Surround Suppression (PS) Dose 2
Parallel surround suppresion condition for visual psychophysics tasks consisting of perceptual judgments (e.g., subject reported which of two visual stimuli presented appeared to have higher contrast). Based on these responses, psychophysical discrimination thresholds are calculated using an adaptive staircase technique and reported in units of percent contrast. Parallel surround suppression condition (PS). .
Time frame: 3 hours after dose 2