Trial reportPsychopharmacology2009
Effects of MDMA on sociability and neural response to social threat and social reward.
Trial report in Psychopharmacology, 2009. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 113 papers, 5 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
113 citing papers in PubMed, 5 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 205 citations in OpenAlex.
- A meta-analytic analysis of the acute effects of MDMA on empathy and emotion recognition in humans.Scientific reports · 2025Pooled it
- MDMA for the treatment of misophonia, a proposal.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2022Pooled it
- Neural Underpinnings of Social Stress in Substance Use Disorders.Current topics in behavioral neurosciences · 2022Pooled it
- Pooled it
- A Systematic Review of the MDMA Model to Address Social Impairment in Autism.Current neuropharmacology · 2021Pooled it
- The empathogen 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, but not methamphetamine, increases feelings of global trust.Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford, England) · 2026Trial
- Negative Affect Circuit Subtypes and Neural, Behavioral, and Affective Responses to MDMA: A Randomized Clinical Trial.JAMA network open · 2025Trial
- The 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine enhances early visual processing for salient socio-emotional stimuli.The European journal of neuroscience · 2024Trial
- MDMA enhances positive affective responses to social feedback.Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford, England) · 2024Trial
- Preliminary evidence for the importance of therapeutic alliance in MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for posttraumatic stress disorder.European journal of psychotraumatology · 2024Trial
- MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for treatment of anxiety and other psychological distress related to life-threatening illnesses: a randomized pilot study.Scientific reports · 2020Trial
- Long-term follow-up outcomes of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for treatment of PTSD: a longitudinal pooled analysis of six phase 2 trials.Psychopharmacology · 2020Trial
- Effects of MDMA on attention to positive social cues and pleasantness of affective touch.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2019Trial
- Reduction in social anxiety after MDMA-assisted psychotherapy with autistic adults: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled pilot study.Psychopharmacology · 2018Trial
- Acute effects of lisdexamfetamine and D-amphetamine on social cognition and cognitive performance in a placebo-controlled study in healthy subjects.Psychopharmacology · 2018Trial
- MDMA Impairs Both the Encoding and Retrieval of Emotional Recollections.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2018Trial
- Therapeutic effect of increased openness: Investigating mechanism of action in MDMA-assisted psychotherapy.Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford, England) · 2017Trial
- Acute effects of LSD on amygdala activity during processing of fearful stimuli in healthy subjects.Translational psychiatry · 2017Trial
- The Effects of Acutely Administered 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine on Spontaneous Brain Function in Healthy Volunteers Measured with Arterial Spin Labeling and Blood Oxygen Level-Dependent Resting State Functional Connectivity.Biological psychiatry · 2015Trial
- Intimate insight: MDMA changes how people talk about significant others.Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford, England) · 2015Trial
53 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
rationale+/-3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, "ecstasy") reportedly produces unique subjective effects, including increased sociability, feelings of closeness with others, and reduced interpersonal defensiveness. Despite their apparent importance in recreational and potential psychotherapeutic use of MDMA, the defining characteristics and neurobiological mechanisms of these interpersonal effects are poorly understood. MATERIALS AND
methodsWe investigated acute effects of MDMA on self-reported sociability and neuronal activation in response to socially threatening (angry and fearful faces) and socially rewarding (happy faces) stimuli. Assessment of social threat response focused on amygdala activation, whereas assessment of social reward focused on ventral striatum activation. Healthy volunteers (N = 9) reporting past ecstasy use completed three experimental sessions, receiving MDMA (0.75 and 1.5 mg/kg) and placebo (PBO) under double-blind conditions. During peak drug effects, participants underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while viewing standardized images depicting emotional facial expressions including angry, fearful, happy, and neutral expressions. They also completed standardized self-report measures of sociability.
resultsMDMA (1.5 mg/kg) increased self-reported sociability compared to MDMA (0.75 mg/kg) and PBO. MDMA (1.5 mg/kg) attenuated left amygdala response to angry facial expressions compared to PBO, but MDMA did not affect amygdala reactivity to fearful expressions. MDMA (0.75 mg/kg) enhanced ventral striatum response to happy expressions relative to PBO.
conclusionsThese data present the first evidence that MDMA may increase sociability in humans both by diminishing responses to threatening stimuli and enhancing responses to rewarding social signals.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.