In the last decade, there’s been a lot written about microdosing psychedelics and the practice’s potentially positive effects on mental health. As microdosing has become more common, however, experts have raised questions about how best to evaluate its effectiveness and whether larger doses of psychedelics are necessary to realize tangible benefits. And now, a new study has put microdosing’s effect on depression into perspective: it’s effective, but so is drinking a cup of coffee.
In an article for WIRED, John Semley discussed the researchers’ findings — or at least, some of them. As WIRED notes, the study in which these results were taken has yet to appear in a peer-reviewed journal; instead, the CEO of biotechnology company MindBio shared them via LinkedIn. The CEO in question, Justin Hanka, described the results of “the most vigorous placebo controlled trial ever performed in microdosing.”
Hanka noted that, in the trial, participants who microdosed LSD showed “elevations in mood, energy, feelings of social connectivity, creativity, enhanced wellbeing, reduced irritability and anger.” Where things didn’t measure up to the company’s expectations came in one very specific department: microdosing, he wrote, “is not more effective than placebo in treating Major Depressive Disorder.”
Scientists Are Having a Hard Time Researching the Effects of Microdosing
It’s not clear what the best way to quantify its effects isWhat does coffee have to do with this? Caffeine is what was used as a placebo for the study — meaning that, as Semley observed, the pills used as placebos there will have about the same amount of caffeine as a cup of coffee. Hanka was bearish on the study’s conclusions, telling WIRED that it represents “a nail in the coffin of using microdosing to treat clinical depression.” Paradoxically, it might also give more people a valid reason to reach for their morning (or afternoon) coffee.
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