Variables influencing conditioning-evoked hallucinations: overview and future applications.

Fry, Benjamin R.; Roberts, Dominic; Thakkar, Katharine N.; Johnson, Alexander W.

Hallucinations occur in the absence of sensory stimulation and result in vivid perceptual experiences of nonexistent events that manifest across a range of sensory modalities. Approaches from the field of experimental and cognitive psychology have leveraged the idea that associative learning experiences can evoke conditioning-induced hallucinations in both animals and humans. In this review, we describe classical and contemporary findings and highlight the variables eliciting these experiences. We also provide an overview of the neurobiological mechanisms, along with the associative and computational factors that may explain hallucinations that are generated by representation-mediated conditioning phenomena. Through the integration of animal and human research, significant advances into the psychobiology of hallucinations are possible, which may ultimately translate to more effective clinical applications.

BRAIN physiology; HALLUCINATIONS; BIOLOGICAL models; NEUROBIOLOGY; SCHIZOPHRENIA; PSYCHOSES; ASSOCIATIVE memory (Psychology); INDIVIDUALIZED medicine; BIOINFORMATICS; BIOLOGICAL psychiatry; EXPERIENTIAL learning; MEDICAL research

Psychological Medicine, 2022, Vol 52, Issue 14, p2937

0033-2917

Academic Journal

10.1017/S0033291722002100