Magic Mushrooms Desynchronize Your Brain For Up To Three Weeks

Tripping on magic mushrooms causes brain activity to become less organized and more random, with these effects lasting for several weeks. Having observed this phenomenon in action, the authors of a new brain-imaging study suggest that this scrambling of connectivity patterns may lead to more flexible cognition, which could explain how psychedelics help to alleviate depression and other mental health conditions.

The researchers recruited seven people to take a high dose of either psilocybin - the psychoactive compound in shrooms - or methylphenidate, the generic form of Ritalin. Participants had an average of 18 MRI brain scans in the weeks before and after their trip, as well as during the experience, in order to reveal the acute and persistent effects of the drug.

Initially, the study authors found that each person had a highly defined and completely unique pattern of network connectivity, like a kind of neural fingerprint that could be used to identify any given individual. Immediately after taking psilocybin, however, connectivity patterns became more chaotic, to the point that participants could no longer be distinguished from one another based on their brain activity.

“The brains of people on psilocybin look more similar to each other than to their untripping selves,” explained study author Nico Dosenbach in a statement . “Their individuality is temporarily wiped out. This verifies, at a neuroscientific level, what people say about losing their sense of self during a trip.”

Such a finding is not new, and numerous previous studies have suggested that psychedelics work by triggering an “entropic” brain state whereby the rigid patterns of communication between brain networks breaks down. This effect has predominantly been observed in relation to the default mode network (DMN), which controls our everyday cognition and coordinates activities such as daydreaming, introspection, and autobiographical recall.

Analyzing their scans, the study authors found that the DMN becomes radically desynchronized under the acute effects of psilocybin, before largely re-establishing itself once the drug wears off. However, in comparison to its pre-psilocybin state, connectivity within this fundamental network remained looser for three weeks after the psychedelic trip had finished.

“The idea is that you’re taking this system that’s fundamental to the brain’s ability to think about the self in relation to the world, and you’re totally desynchronizing it temporarily,” explains study author Joshua Siegel. “In the short term, this creates a psychedelic experience. The longer-term consequence is that it makes the brain more flexible and potentially more able to come into a healthier state.”

The persistent weakening of connectivity patterns within the DMN has previously been linked to the so-called psychedelic afterglow effect, whereby people often notice a reduction in their habitual mental chatter and an increased capacity to reshape their thought patterns after taking psilocybin, LSD, or other similar drugs. According to the study authors, this subtle yet lasting desynchronization of brain networks may underlie the reported therapeutic effects of psychedelics.

“That’s exactly what you’d want to see for a potential medicine,” says Dosenbach. “You wouldn’t want people’s brain networks to be obliterated for days, but you also wouldn’t want everything to snap back to the way it was immediately. You want an effect that lasts long enough to make a difference.”

The study is published in the journal Nature .