LSD microdosing shows potential sustained attention gains in women, but none in men
A pilot study suggests that low doses of LSD may have different effects on sustained attention in women and men. The findings, presented at the ECNP annual congress in Munich, are preliminary, but they add to growing evidence that people may not all respond to psychedelic microdosing in the same way.
A recent study has found that low doses of LSD may improve sustained attention in women, but not in men. The findings, presented at the ECNP annual congress in Munich, are preliminary and need to be confirmed in larger studies. The research involved 48 healthy volunteers, with 24 women, who underwent a two-week period of microdosing, receiving either placebo or four low doses of LSD containing 15 micrograms each.
Women who received the placebo had slower reaction times and more attention lapses on a task requiring sustained attention compared to men. However, under low-dose LSD, women responded about 8% faster and had fewer attention lapses than with placebo, and this improvement persisted at follow-up. No similar improvement was observed in men given microdoses.
Lead researcher Iva Totomanova cautions that the results do not imply that low-dose LSD generally improves cognition or that women are generally more responsive to LSD than men. The study's authors suggest that the effects may depend on the individual, the cognitive task, and the circumstances of use. Further research is needed to understand the sex differences in response to microdosing and to explore the potential of personalized medicine in the context of psychedelic pharmaceuticals.
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