ArticleScience advances2024
MDMA enhances empathy-like behaviors in mice via 5-HT release in the nucleus accumbens.
Article in Science advances, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 24 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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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.
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Who cites it
24 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 28 citations in OpenAlex.
- Can ketamine and other glutamate receptor modulators be considered entactogens?Psychiatry research · 2025Pooled it
- αMolecular psychiatry · 2026Article
- Progress in pain mechanisms and management.Signal transduction and targeted therapy · 2026Review
- History, pharmacology and therapeutic mechanisms of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA).British journal of pharmacology · 2026Review
- Stereoselective, sex-dependent 5-HTNeuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2026Article
- Psychedelics and Autism Therapy: A Review of Current Research and Future Directions.Current issues in molecular biology · 2026Review
- Serotonin modulates nucleus accumbens circuits to suppress aggression in mice.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Perinatal hyperandrogenization and immune activation in rodents model subtypes of autism.Translational psychiatry · 2026Article
- The entactogen MDMA (3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, "Ecstasy") disrupts helping behaviour while reinforcing electrophysiological indicators of potentially associated synaptic plasticity in male Sprague-Dawley rats.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2026Article
- The Vitamin D-Gut-Brain Axis in Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Bidirectional Crosstalk.International journal of general medicine · 2026Review
- I've got a friend somewhere: control of social behavior across striatal subregions.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2026Review
- Therapeutic modulation of empathy: pharmacological, neurostimulation, and behavioral approaches.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Review
- Exploring MDMA assisted therapy in eating disorders: mechanisms, clinical evidence, and future directions.Journal of eating disorders · 2025Review
- The neurons in NAc core receiving ACC excitatory afferents contribute to chronic postoperative pain.iScience · 2025Article
- Serotonin modulates nucleus accumbens circuits to suppress aggression.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Heightened empathic responses led by imbalanced cortico-amygdala circuit inbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- 5-HTMolecular psychiatry · 2025Article
- Dysfunction of the paraventricular thalamus-prelimbic cortex circuit underlies maternal separation-induced deficits in contagious pain.Science advances · 2025Article
- Article
- Brain circuits that regulate social behavior.Molecular psychiatry · 2025Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
11 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
MDMA (3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine) is a psychoactive drug with powerful prosocial effects. While MDMA is sometimes termed an "empathogen," empirical studies have struggled to clearly demonstrate these effects or pinpoint underlying mechanisms. Here, we paired the social transfer of pain and analgesia-behavioral tests modeling empathy in mice-with region-specific neuropharmacology, optogenetics, and transgenic manipulations to explore MDMA's action as an empathogen. We report that MDMA, given intraperitoneally or infused directly into the nucleus accumbens (NAc), robustly enhances the social transfer of pain and analgesia. Optogenetic stimulation of 5-HT release in the NAc recapitulates the effects of MDMA, implicating 5-HT signaling as a core mechanism. Last, we demonstrate that systemic MDMA or optogenetic stimulation of NAc 5-HT inputs restores deficits in empathy-like behaviors in the
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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.