A naturalistic study watches what happens in real life instead of setting up the conditions. In psychedelic research that may mean recording people who already plan to take a substance, or following trial participants after the controlled part ends. It gains realism and loses control.
Examples include a study that used wireless EEG on 35 experienced people taking inhaled DMT in natural settings (Pallavicini et al., 2021), and a survey of 953 microdosers compared with 180 people who did not microdose (Rootman et al., 2022). The 2026 EPISODE depression trial added a 6- and 12-month follow-up that its authors call naturalistic: after week 12, participants could seek other treatments and no controlled comparison was kept (Mertens et al., 2026, follow-up).
Naturalistic results can’t show cause and effect on their own. People choose what to take and often expect benefits, substances are rarely verified, and other life changes go unmeasured. They are useful for spotting patterns that controlled trials can then test.
Sources
- Pallavicini et al., Journal of Psychopharmacology, 2021
- Rootman et al., Scientific Reports, 2022
- Mertens et al., Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 2026
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