Methodological guidelines to investigate altered states of consciousness and anomalous experiences
International Review of Psychiatry February 17, 2017 A. Moreira-Almeida, F. Lotufo-Neto
Anomalous experiences (uncommon experiences that deviate from accepted explanations of reality, such as hallucinations or telepathic experiences) and altered states of consciousness have been described across all societies and time periods, yet scientists have long neglected their study. These experiences can be investigated as subjective experiences and correlated with other data without sharing the beliefs they involve. This article presents methodological guidelines for researching them, including avoiding dogmatic prejudice and pathologizing the unusual, using theory and comprehensive literature review, applying varied criteria for pathology and normality, studying both clinical and non-clinical populations, developing appropriate research instruments, carefully choosing wording to describe the experiences, distinguishing lived experience from interpretation, considering cultural roles, evaluating report validity and reliability, and employing creativity and diversity in methods.