New VR technology emulates psychedelic experience

The psychedelic renaissance is upon us, with a plethora of research showing how substances like psilocybin, LSD, and more help with mental illnesses like treatment-resistant depression and PTSD. Curiosity regarding psychedelics is increasing as individuals recognize the potential of these mind-altering drugs to transcend perceived limitations of the self.

At the same time, technology is evolving at a rapid pace, which begs the question: Could technology like virtual reality offer comparable benefits that psychedelics offer? Obviously the answer is yes, according to a recent study on a new VR experience, Isness-D, which was made to reflect specific transcendent psychedelic effects.

It all started with creator David Glowacki, who suffered a steep fall while hiking in the mountains 15 years ago. After hitting the ground, he lay choking as blood rushed to his lungs. During this experience, Glowacki’s field of perception began to shift, he looked at his own body and realized that it was made of clustered light, reports MIT Technology Review.

He said the intensity of the light was related to the extent to which he inhabited his body, although seeing the light slowly fading wasn’t frightening – it was transformative as it seeped out of his body and into his surroundings. He took the experience as a signal that his consciousness could outlast and transcend his physical body, ultimately bringing him peace.

The lead in the Nature study brings to light similar sensations from brain researcher Jill Bolte Taylor after a left hemisphere stroke. Taylor said, “I couldn’t define the limits of my body anymore. I can’t define where to start and where to end because the atoms and molecules of my arm are merging with the atoms and molecules of the wall and all I could perceive was this energy…I was immediately drawn in by the magnificence of the energy around me. And because I could no longer see the limits of my body, I felt enormous and expansive. I felt one with all the energy that was there and it was beautiful.”

After his accident, Glowacki approached the experience he associated with death with curiosity and sought to regain that transcendence.

The new technology is designed for groups of four to five people stationed around the world. Participants are represented as a cloud of smoke with a ball of light around their heart location. The experience features energetic coalescence, meaning participants can gather in the same VR landscape and their bodies can overlap, making it impossible to tell where one begins and the other ends, leading to a sense of Connectedness and ego reduction that psychedelic experiences commonly entail.

In real life, the study finds that people often resort to conceptual relationships of ourselves and others and separate objects, rather than connected or coupled concepts. Authors define the term “self-transcendent experiences” or the transient mental states in which “the subjective sense of one’s self as an isolated entity may transiently transition into an experience of oneness with other people or one’s environment, which involves the dissolution of boundaries between them the sense of self and ‘other’”, essentially what Glowacki is pursuing with this new VR technology.

So, can humans really achieve some of these breakthroughs that psychedelics or intense life experiences can provide, just with the help of VR?

Study researchers conducted 29 Isness sessions with a total of 109 participants from August to September 2020; The results were finally analyzed by a total of 75 participants. After their experiences, participants rated the level of intensity with which they experienced 30 elements (eg, mood, mystical experiences), answered pre- and post-questionnaires about their connectedness with the other participants, and rated their level of ego-dissolution.

In the study discussion, the authors state that the experiences of the study participants, based on the questionnaires, are comparable to psychedelic experiences, in both naturalistic and laboratory settings. Qualitative analysis also revealed similarities, with participants observing that the VR program was “similar to experiences I had as somatic visions through medicinal plants. The connecting nature of energy/intent and the “threads” that seem to connect us to all living matter [is] also related to childhood dreams I had prior to any ‘psychedelic experience’.”

Others also found that Isness-D left them with a sense of connection that they had previously only experienced with the help of psychedelic consumption in the right environment. Others attributed spiritual meaning to the experience, but the strongest qualitative theme for Isness-D participants was connectedness.

“I felt connected to myself, but also to everyone else here… I think ‘connected’ is the word for me at the end of this session,” said one participant. Others said that Isness-D offers “an entirely different type of connection that I’m not familiar with, [where] all the usual disappears.”

The researchers conclude that the study confirms their speculations that multi-person VR experiences like Isness-D provide comparable self-transcendent experiences that psychedelics can provide. They suggest this technology could play a role in alleviating feelings of isolation and loneliness, especially in the wake of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

While more research is still to be done on the long-term effects of these experiences and what specifically about Isness-D provides these reported results, we could very well see a future where the quest for psychedelic-adjacent, self-transcendent experiences lies like this as easy as putting on a VR headset.