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Study · Randomized controlled trial · n = 31 · 2020

2 results

Detection of acute 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) effects across protocols using automated natural language processing.

Agurto C, Cecchi GA, Norel R, Ostrand R, Kirkpatrick M, Baggott MJ, Wardle MC, Wit H, Bedi G

Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology24 Jan 2020Cited by 25 (Europe PMC)

PMID31978933 (opens in a new tab)PMCIDPMC7075895 (opens in a new tab)DOI10.1038/s41386-020-0620-4 (opens in a new tab)PepBankPUB-31978933
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Summary

The detection of changes in mental states such as those caused by psychoactive drugs relies on clinical assessments that are inherently subjective. Automated speech analysis may represent a novel method to detect objective markers, which could help improve the characterization of these mental states. In this study, we employed computer-extracted speech features from multiple domains (acoustic, semantic, and psycholinguistic) to assess mental states after controlled administration of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) and intranasal oxytocin. The training/validation set comprised within-participants data from 31 healthy adults who, over four sessions, were administered MDMA (0.75, 1.5 mg/kg), oxytocin (20 IU), and placebo in randomized, double-blind fashion. Participants completed two 5-min speech tasks during peak drug effects. Analyses included group-level comparisons of drug conditions and estimation of classification at the individual level within this dataset and on two independent datasets. Promising classification results were obtained to detect drug conditions, achieving cross-validated accuracies of up to 87% in training/validation and 92% in the independent datasets, suggesting that the detected patterns of speech variability are associated with drug consumption. Specifically, we found that oxytocin seems to be mostly driven by changes in emotion and prosody, which are mainly captured by acoustic features. In contrast, mental states driven by MDMA consumption appear to manifest in multiple domains of speech. Furthermore, we find that the experimental task has an effect on the speech response within these mental states, which can be attributed to presence or absence of an interaction with another individual. These results represent a proof-of-concept application of the potential of speech to provide an objective measurement of mental states elicited during intoxication.
CC BYText from Europe PMC. Highlighted sentences are the source of results.

Results from this study2

1 result from studies that gave the peptide. 1 result from people.

  1. 01HumanRandomized controlled trialMechanism

    In healthy adults, speech changes after intranasal oxytocin were mostly driven by emotion and prosody, captured mainly by acoustic features.

    In plain wordsIn healthy adults, oxytocin changed speech mainly in emotion and tone, which acoustic measures captured.

    Peptide
    Oxytocin
    Outcome
    Direction not reportedSpeech changes after oxytocin (emotion and prosody, acoustic features)
    Study

    n = 31

    Outcome group
    Cognition and memory · Nervous system and cognition
    Studied dose
    20 IU · intranasalAs given in this study (human).

    Source sentences

    Summary
    Specifically, we found that oxytocin seems to be mostly driven by changes in emotion and prosody, which are mainly captured by acoustic features.
    1 context sentence
    Summary · context
    The training/validation set comprised within-participants data from 31 healthy adults who, over four sessions, were administered MDMA (0.75, 1.5 mg/kg), oxytocin (20 IU), and placebo in randomized, double-blind fashion.

Studies that did not test the peptide alone1

In this study, Oxytocin was a lab tool or a carrier, part of a mix, or the subject of a lab method. These results are not evidence about taking Oxytocin.

  1. 02HumanNot a test of Oxytocin aloneRandomized controlled trialOther

    In healthy adults, speech features classified MDMA, oxytocin and placebo conditions with cross-validated accuracy of up to 87% in training/validation and 92% in independent datasets.

    In plain wordsIn healthy adults, computer analysis of speech could tell drug conditions, including oxytocin, apart from placebo with high accuracy.

    Peptide
    Oxytocin
    Outcome
    Not applicableClassification of drug conditions from speech features
    Study

    n = 31

    Outcome group
    Receptor activity and mechanism · Nervous system and cognition

    Source sentences

    Summary
    Promising classification results were obtained to detect drug conditions, achieving cross-validated accuracies of up to 87% in training/validation and 92% in the independent datasets, suggesting that the detected patterns of speech variability are associated with drug consumption.
    1 context sentence
    Summary · context
    The training/validation set comprised within-participants data from 31 healthy adults who, over four sessions, were administered MDMA (0.75, 1.5 mg/kg), oxytocin (20 IU), and placebo in randomized, double-blind fashion.

    In this study, Oxytocin was a lab tool or a carrier, part of a mix, or the subject of a lab method. This result is not evidence about taking Oxytocin.

AI wrote and checked these results. AI can make mistakes, so check important results against the source.

Version history

PepBank keeps every version of the data on this study. Status changes from Retraction Watch, Europe PMC and Crossref are listed with their source.

  1. Version 2Current

    11 Oct 2026, 00:50 UTC

    Study results updated

  2. Version 1

    9 Oct 2026, 02:49 UTC

    First added · source update from Europe PMC

Subjects

Terms as the source lists them.

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