Age could play an important role in how psychedelic use relates to mental health, according to new research from our Department of Psychology.
Researchers found that adults with a history of using classic psychedelics, such as psilocybin (magic mushrooms) and LSD, reported lower levels of anxiety and depression than non-users, but only in younger age groups.
The associations became weaker with increasing age and were no longer evident among older adults.
The research comes amid growing scientific interest in the potential of psychedelic-assisted therapies for mental health conditions such as depression and anxiety.
The study was led by PhD researcher Giammarco Di Gregorio under the supervision of Dr Marco Bocchio and Dr Michael Lengieza.
Important factor to explore
The research, published in Scientific Reports (Nature Portfolio), analysed survey responses from 1,088 adults aged 18 to 55 and over.
Participants were asked about their lifetime use of psychedelic substances and completed established measures of anxiety, depression, wellbeing and life satisfaction.
The research team stresses that the findings do not establish a causal relationship between psychedelic use and mental health.
Instead, it identifies an association between lifetime psychedelic use and current mental health, while highlighting age as an important factor that should be explored in future research.
Age-related association
To gather their results, the researchers grouped participants according to whether they had used classic psychedelics, non-classic psychedelics such as ketamine or MDMA, a combination of both, or neither.
They found that people in their twenties and early thirties who had used classic psychedelics reported lower anxiety and depression scores than comparable non-users.
The association gradually declined with age.
The findings remained even after researchers accounted for factors such as how often people used psychedelics, when they last used them and their typical dosage.
Further investigation
Researchers believe these findings could help guide future clinical studies exploring psychedelic-assisted therapies.
They say age should be considered when assessing who may benefit most from such treatments.
The study was observational and relied on participants reporting their own experiences.
Because of this, the researchers cannot determine whether psychedelic use directly led to differences in mental health.
The team now hopes to build on the work through longer-term studies that track people before and after psychedelic experiences.
This could help researchers better understand how age influences outcomes over time and whether the patterns seen in this study are also present in clinical settings.
