Longitudinal and transcultural assessment of the relationship between hallucinogens, well-being, and post-traumatic growth during the COVID-19 pandemic

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 13; no. 1; pp. 14052 - 12
• Main Authors: Bouso, José Carlos, Révész, Dóra, Ona, Genís, Rossi, Giordano N., Rocha, Juliana M., dos Santos, Rafael G., Hallak, Jaime E. C., Alcázar-Corcoles, Miguel Ángel
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group 11.09.2023; Nature Publishing Group UK; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: COVID-19; Disasters; Hallucinogens; Pandemics; Post-traumatic growth; Psychopathology; Surveys
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-41199-x

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on the health and wellbeing of the global population. This paper presents the results of a longitudinal transcultural study that was begun at the peak of the pandemic (in April, 2020). An online survey was used to collect data from English-, Spanish-, and Portuguese-speaking participants. The survey collected information about sociodemographics, lifestyle activities, COVID-19-related circumstances, and drug use (with an emphasis on hallucinogenic drugs), as well as involving psychometric questionnaires. Users of hallucinogenic drugs had higher psychological well-being and lower scores on psychopathology scales, both at baseline and during follow-ups. This difference was larger when users were distinguished by frequency of use, as regular users scored higher on psychological well-being and lower on psychopathology scales. Subjects with more psychological distress had lower scores for all scales of post-traumatic growth, but if they were regular hallucinogens users, they had higher scores for post-traumatic growth. When comparing the results between cultural contexts, heterogeneous results were obtained. There were more English-speaking regular users of hallucinogenic drugs. Further research should analyse the potential role of hallucinogens in large-scale catastrophes, with a special focus on post-traumatic growth.