{"id":219163,"date":"2025-12-06T21:46:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-06T21:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/219163\/"},"modified":"2025-12-06T21:46:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T21:46:13","slug":"new-dmt-study-reveals-how-the-brain-loses-its-sense-of-self-under-the-psychedelic-compounds-influence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/219163\/","title":{"rendered":"New DMT Study Reveals How the Brain Loses Its Sense of Self Under the Psychedelic Compound’s Influence"},"content":{"rendered":"

A new neuroscience<\/a> study reports that the psychedelic compound<\/a> DMT disrupts a key brain rhythm linked to self-awareness, providing new insights into how the brain<\/a> shapes our sense of self<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The research<\/a>, published in The Journal of Neuroscience<\/a>, investigated how DMT alters the coordinated brain rhythms linked to self-referential thought and internal narrative known as alpha waves. The team noticed this connection when they identified a neural<\/a> signature associated with ego dissolution in study participants during the peak effects of DMT.<\/p>\n

A Reliable Way to Break Away From the Self<\/b><\/p>\n

Dimethyltryptamine, or DMT, is known to cause rapid and profound changes in consciousness<\/a>. Within seconds, users often report a drastic shift in the internal narrative that connects identity, memory<\/a>, and intention.<\/p>\n

Scientists refer to this experience as ego dissolution. The research team notes that DMT\u2019s rapid and intense effects make it a useful tool for studying how the brain<\/a> maintains its usual organization.<\/p>\n

Christopher Timmerman of University College London<\/a> says the work sheds light on how the brain<\/a> balances order and disorder. As he explains, \u201cThe way the brain operates between chaos and order allows for normal brain function. Criticality refers to a brain state balanced between chaos and order that helps us predict things about the environment, the way we change or adapt to it, and our self-awareness.\u201d<\/p>\n

When DMT pushes the system away from that balance, Timmerman says, the experience of self-awareness appears to destabilize as well.<\/p>\n

Monitoring Brain Activity<\/b><\/p>\n

Researchers used an electroencephalogram (EEG) to monitor the participants\u2019 alpha waves. As volunteers reached the peak effects of DMT, these rhythms not only weakened but also changed, indicating a measurable shift away from the brain\u2019s<\/a> normal balanced state.<\/p>\n

Participants rated how strongly they experienced ego dissolution as the drug<\/a> took effect. The researchers found that changes in alpha activity were associated with stronger reports of ego dissolution. This connection between subjective experience and brain activity<\/a> suggests how the brain organizes the ongoing narrative that supports identity.<\/p>\n

When the Brain Stops Stitching Time Together<\/b><\/p>\n

One of the most notable changes under DMT involves the perception of time. Users often report that the past and future seem to disappear, leaving only a vivid sense of the present.<\/p>\n

Marco Aqil, now at the University of Miami<\/a>, says this relates directly to the collapse of alpha patterns. \u201cWe rely on past narratives and future predictions to have a coherent sense of self,\u201d he explains. \u201cIn a DMT experience, people do not have a stream of consciousness over a period of time\u2014everything takes place in the present moment. This shift in criticality signatures in the alpha frequency [during a DMT experience likely reveals how] the time-extended component of the sense of self is weakened.\u201d<\/p>\n

The team sees this as evidence that alpha rhythms help connect experiences over time. When these rhythms lose their normal pattern, the mind has difficulty maintaining a sense of continuity, and the sense of self can temporarily break down.<\/p>\n

The Impact of Psychedelics on Consciousness Research<\/b><\/p>\n

Timmerman and Aqil point out that psychedelics are more than just a way to create unusual experiences in the lab. Controlled disruptions in brain activity can reveal the structure of conscious processes that are otherwise hard to study.<\/p>\n

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Both researchers argue that psychedelics offer a rare opportunity for mapping some of the core mechanisms of self-awareness. They also emphasize that psychedelics may be a powerful tool for discovering the neurological origins of human consciousness.<\/p>\n

These results do not mean that consciousness is only a matter of brain rhythms or that alpha waves alone define the self. Instead, the findings show how closely identity is linked to timing, prediction, and internal narrative, and how easily these systems can be disrupted.<\/p>\n

Fundamentally, the team\u2019s study offers one of the most detailed physiological descriptions of ego dissolution so far. While the findings do not provide answers to longstanding questions about the true origins of consciousness, they do reveal deeper insights into how psychedelic compounds can be used as tools to disrupt, and therefore study, the neural systems that maintain self-awareness.<\/p>\n

Austin Burgess is a writer and researcher with a background in sales, marketing, and data analytics. He holds a Master of Business Administration and a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, as well as a certification in Data Analytics. His work combines analytical training with a focus on emerging science, aerospace, and astronomical research.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A new neuroscience study reports that the psychedelic compound DMT disrupts a key brain rhythm linked to self-awareness,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[33096,118492,118493,18,118494,19,17,118495,33145,133,118496,118497],"class_list":{"0":"post-219163","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-consciousness","9":"tag-dmt","10":"tag-ego-dissolution","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-human-consciousness","13":"tag-ie","14":"tag-ireland","15":"tag-psychedelic-drugs","16":"tag-psychedelics","17":"tag-science","18":"tag-self-awareness","19":"tag-sense-of-self"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115674820718689997","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}