Psychedelics, Positive Psychology, and Positive Humanities

Public and scientific interest in the effect of psychedelic drugs on wellbeing has risen significantly. Preliminary data show that psychedelic drugs, specifically classic psychedelics (DMT, psilocybin, mescaline, and LSD), may have the potential to treat mood disorders and increase wellbeing through their acute subjective effects. The acute subjective effects and enduring effects of psychedelics on wellbeing seem to relate to positive psychological frameworks (e.g., resilience factors and PERMA) considerably. Moreover, optimizing acute subjective effects indicates the importance of set (individual’s internal (mental) factors) and setting (individual’s external factors) in psychedelics administration as moderating factors. A new subfield in positive psychology, positive humanities, has the potential to inform set and setting studies significantly. This literature review investigates the potential for positive psychology and positive humanities in enhancing psychedelic studies, specifically the research areas of acute subjective effects and set and setting. Due to the seeming alignment between the operation of psychedelic drugs and both positive psychology and the positive humanities, there appear to be opportunities for research and scholarship at the intersection of these fields.