By Katie Pickard, Executive Director
For years, people have come to Unlimited Sciences with a simple but profound question: Why isn’t anyone studying this? Whether it’s parents wondering how psychedelics might help them show up more patiently for their kids, or integration facilitators noticing patterns in community healing, the reality is that countless important questions about psychedelics remain unanswered.
Every research project requires significant funding, visibility, and collaboration to come to life. That’s why we’re building the Community Psychedelic Research Roadmap: a living platform where your ideas can be submitted, upvoted, and credited as we collectively shape the future of psychedelic science.
This isn’t just about publishing another academic paper. It’s about amplifying the wisdom of real people and directing research efforts toward what matters most to communities actually engaging with psychedelics.
What is the Community Research Roadmap?
The roadmap is an open and transparent way to spotlight the questions our community is asking about psychedelics. Each idea helps us identify where more research is urgently needed and what topics are most relevant to people navigating psychedelic experiences in their daily lives.
Unlike traditional lab-based research, which often controls variables in tightly managed environments, our approach emphasizes naturalistic research: the study of psychedelics in the real world. This means paying attention to context: how factors like setting, community, culture, lifestyle, and personal history shape outcomes.
Naturalistic research allows us to gather evidence that more closely reflects the lived realities of psychedelic use. It bridges the gap between clinical trials and everyday practice, making science more inclusive, relevant, and applicable.
Why It Matters
For too long, psychedelic research has been limited to narrow clinical questions. While those studies are essential, they don’t capture the full picture of how psychedelics are actually being used: or how people’s lives change after those experiences.
Through our Psychedelic Info Line, we often hear questions that no current research can answer:
- Does psilocybin help parents become more patient or compassionate?
- How do integration practices differ across communities, and which ones truly help people heal?
- What long-term changes stick after a psychedelic journey, beyond the ceremony itself?
Each of these unanswered questions is an opportunity for research that could transform not just academic understanding, but real-world health, wellbeing, and community resilience.
By contributing to the roadmap, you help shape a collective agenda for psychedelic science: ensuring that funding, attention, and energy flow toward the questions that matter most.
Ideas Already Emerging
The roadmap is just beginning, but the ideas shared so far reveal the depth and diversity of what people want to see studied:
- The HOPE Registry: A global online survey capturing the long-term health effects of psychedelic use.
- Integration in Community: Do group circles, especially those led by LGBTQIA+ facilitators, improve outcomes compared to individual integration?
- Psychedelics and Compassion: Do people report becoming more loving toward themselves and others after mushroom use?
- Connection to Earth: How do psilocybin experiences in nature influence environmental values and stewardship?
- Workplace Resilience: Can psychedelics reduce burnout, increase mental health, or improve leadership skills?
- Preparation Matters: How does the quality of preparation impact the safety and effectiveness of psychedelic journeys?
- Parenting and Psychedelics: Can psychedelic experiences help parents of children with disabilities cope with stress: or help parents in general become more present?
- Trauma and Neurodivergence: Does psilocybin’s role in trauma recovery extend to people navigating autism or ADHD?
- Beyond the Ceremony: What lasting changes: positive or negative: emerge after repeated psychedelic use?
Each of these questions has come directly from people like you. By surfacing them, we’re giving voice to community knowledge and creating a clear path for researchers and funders to follow.
How You Can Get Involved
The roadmap will grow as more ideas are shared. Here’s how you can be part of it:
- Upvote Research Ideas: Vote, comment, and discuss. Your engagement helps us prioritize which studies need to happen first.
- Submit Your Own Idea: Whether it’s a burning question you’ve carried for years or a new observation from your community, add your perspective to the roadmap.
- Support the Work: Every research project requires resources. By donating, sharing, or advocating, you help turn ideas into actionable studies.
Together, we can ensure psychedelic research doesn’t just happen behind closed doors, but reflects the real questions, struggles, and hopes of everyday people.
Shaping the Future of Psychedelic Science
Unlimited Sciences is committed to building a bridge between community wisdom and scientific rigor. The Community Psychedelic Research Roadmap is our way of honoring your voice and making sure it guides the future of real-world psychedelic research.
This isn’t just about data: it’s about people, healing, and creating a body of knowledge that reflects the diversity of psychedelic experiences.
We invite you to co-create this future with us. Share your ideas. Spark conversations. Help us chart a research path that will benefit individuals, families, and communities for generations to come. The future of psychedelic research is community-driven. The roadmap starts with you.