The long-term objective of this project is to characterize how psilocybin affects visual perception and the brain's representation of the visual environment. It is known that psilocybin alters aspects of visual perception, but the underlying brain mechanisms contributing to these effects are poorly understood. The proposed work will address these questions in a large, diverse sample of healthy human subjects by using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure the brain's responses to visual stimuli. The proposed research will document which brain areas mediate the effects of psilocybin. The technique of fMRI will be employed to measure brain activity in different brain areas while subjects are performing a visual perceptual task.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
BASIC_SCIENCE
Masking
DOUBLE
Enrollment
80
The effects of different doses of psilocybin (0 - 14 mg) will be compared.
University of California, Berkeley
Berkeley, California, United States
RECRUITINGAmplitude and pattern of fMRI cortical responses
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) responses to visual stimuli will be recorded.
Time frame: Functional MRI recordings will begin approximately 30 minutes after oral administration of experimental or comparator arm treatment and will continue for up to two hours.
Perceptual measurements
Within-subject inferential statistical testing will be used to assess the effects of doses of psilocybin (0-14 mg) on participants' abilities to update prior expectations based on new information. Specifically, paired t-tests will be used to contrast perceptual measures collected at MRI scan sessions.
Time frame: Statistical tests will be performed after all data collection is complete.
Voxelwise modeling
Voxelwise modeling results will be quantified by measuring the amount of variance in fMRI responses to presentation of stimuli that is accounted for by the model in each voxel. Cross-validation using held-out data will be used to assess possible overfitting and to facilitate unbiased interpretations. Model weights associated with each parameter will be contrasted between the effects of doses of psilocybin (0-14 mg) and quantified for individual brain areas using paired t-tests and appropriate corrections for multiple comparisons.
Time frame: Modeling of fMRI data will be performed within subjects after experiment data collection is complete.
Participant-reported Subjective Effects
Within-subject inferential statistical testing will be used to assess the effects of doses of psilocybin (0 - 14 mg) on subjective effects. Specifically, paired t-tests and between-group effect sizes with 95% confidence intervals will be used to contrast patient-reported outcomes (MEQ-30, ChEQ, 11D-ASC and POMS-SF), corrected for multiple comparisons.
Time frame: Statistical tests will be performed after all data collection is complete.
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