Self-experimentation

'''Self-experimentation''' refers to single-subject research in which the experimenter conducts the experiment on themself. Usually, this means that a single person is the designer, operator, subject, analyst, and user or reporter of the experiment. Self-experimentation is an example of citizen science<ref>{{cite journal | title=From self-tracking to self-expertise: The production of self-related knowledge by doing personal science | journal=Public Understanding of Science | date=2020 | volume=29 | pages=124–138 | doi=10.1177/0963662519888757 | author=Nils B. Heyen | issue=2 | pmid=31778095 | pmc=7323767 | s2cid=208335554 | doi-access=free }}</ref> since it can be done by patients or people interested in their own health and well-being, as both research subjects and self-experimenters. It is also referred to as personal science or N-of-1 research<ref>{{cite journal | title=Single subject (N-of-1) research design, data processing, and personal science | journal=Methods of Information in Medicine | date=2017 | volume=56 | pages=416–418 | doi=10.3414/ME17-03-0001 | author1=Martijn De Groot | author2=Mark Drangsholt | author3=Fernando J Martin-Sanchez | author4=Gary Wolf | issue=6 | pmid=29582912 | s2cid=4387788 | url=https://www.thieme-connect.com/products/ejournals/abstract/10.3414/ME17-03-0001| url-access=subscription }}</ref>.

==Biology and medicine== {{main article|Self-experimentation in medicine}}Human scientific self-experimentation principally (though not necessarily) falls into the fields of medicine and psychology. Self-experimentation has a long and well-documented history in medicine which continues to the present day.<ref>Who Goes First?: The Story of Self-Experimentation in Medicine by Lawrence Altman</ref>

For example, after failed attempts to infect piglets in 1984, Barry Marshall drank a petri dish of ''Helicobacter pylori'' from a patient, and soon developed gastritis, achlorhydria, stomach discomfort, nausea, vomiting, and halitosis.<ref>{{cite news | title= Gut Instincts: A profile of Nobel laureate Barry Marshall| url=https://news.psu.edu/story/140921/2008/02/04/research/gut-instincts-profile-nobel-laureate-barry-marshall | author = Melissa Beattie-Moss| date=February 4, 2008 | journal= Penn State News}}</ref> The results were published in 1985 in the ''Medical Journal of Australia,''<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.mja.com.au/ |title=Medical Journal of Australia |publisher=Mja.com.au |access-date=2010-03-02}}</ref> and is among the most cited articles from the journal.<ref>{{cite journal | last =Van Der Weyden | first =Martin B |author2=Ruth M Armstrong |author3=Ann T Gregory | title =The 2005 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine | journal =Medical Journal of Australia | volume =183 | issue =11/12 | pages =612–614 | year =2005 | pmid =16336147 | url =http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/183_11_051205/van11000_fm.html#0_i1091639 | access-date = 2007-01-28 }}</ref> He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2005.

Evaluations have been presented in the context of clinical trials and program evaluations.<ref>{{cite journal | title=Self experimenting doctors | journal= BMJ | date = 12 April 2011 | volume=342 | pages=d215 | doi= 10.1136/bmj.d2156 | author=Rebecca Ghani| s2cid= 80314766 }}</ref><ref>David E.K. Hunter, "Daniel and the Rhinoceros", ''Evaluation and Program Planning'' Volume 29, Issue 2, May 2006, Pages 180-185 (Program Capacity and Sustainability). [https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2005.10.001]</ref>

==Psychology== In psychology, the best-known self-experiments are the memory studies of Hermann Ebbinghaus, which established many basic characteristics of human memory through tedious experiments involving nonsense syllables.<ref>{{cite book|first=Hermann |last=Ebbinghaus |date=1913 |title=Über das Gedächtnis. Untersuchungen zur experimentellen Psychologie |publisher=NY Teachers College}}</ref>

==Chemistry== Several popular and well-known sweeteners were discovered by deliberate or sometimes accidental tasting of reaction products. Saccharin was synthetized in 1879 in the chemistry labs of Ira Remsen at Johns Hopkins by a student scientist, Constantin Fahlberg, who noticed "curious sweet taste on his fingers while eating his dinner, [and] realized that it came from something he had spilled on his hand during the day". Fahlberg subsequently identified the active compound, ''ortho''-benzoic sulfimide, and named it saccharin.<ref name="Gratzer2002">{{cite book |last=Gratzer |first=Walter |url=https://archive.org/details/eurekaseuphorias0000grat/page/14 |title=Eurekas and Euphorias: The Oxford Book of Scientific Anecdotes |date=28 November 2002 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-280403-7 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/eurekaseuphorias0000grat/page/14 14–] |chapter=5. Light on sweetness: the discovery of aspartame |access-date=1 August 2012 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sTArAZsHejkC&pg=PT34 |url-access=}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=The Pursuit of Sweet |url=https://www.sciencehistory.org/stories/magazine/the-pursuit-of-sweet/ |access-date=2024-03-24 |website=Science History Institute |language=en-US}}</ref> Cyclamate was discovered when a chemistry research student noticed a sweet taste on his cigarette that he had set down on his bench.<ref name="Gratzer2002" /> Acesulfame was discovered when a laboratory worker licked his finger.<ref name="Gratzer2002" /> Aspartame was also discovered accidentally when chemist James Schlatter spilled a solution of it on his hands, then later licked one of his fingers to pick up a piece of paper.<ref name="Gratzer2002" /><ref>{{Citation |last=Mazur |first=Robert H. |title=Discovery of Aspartame |date=2020-10-28 |work=Aspartame: Physiology and Biochemistry |page=4 |editor-last=Stegink |editor-first=Lewis D. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yTH1iI9ybl4C&pg=PA3 |access-date=2024-11-29 |edition=1 |publisher=CRC Press |language=en |doi=10.1201/9781003065289-2 |isbn=978-1-003-06528-9 |editor2-last=Filer |editor2-first=L.J.|url-access=subscription }}</ref> Sucralose was discovered by a foreign student, mishearing instructions of his supervisor, Prof. L. Hough, to "test" the compounds as to "taste" them.<ref name="Gratzer2002" />

Leo Sternbach, the inventor of Librium and Valium, tested chemicals that he made on himself, saying in an interview, "I tried everything. Many drugs. Once, in the sixties, I was sent home for two days. It was an extremely potent drug, not a Benzedrine. I slept for a long time. My wife was very worried".<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Paumgarten |first=Nick |date=2003-06-08 |title=Little Helper |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/06/16/little-helper |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240520162724/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/06/16/little-helper |archive-date=2024-05-20 |access-date=2024-12-01 |magazine=The New Yorker |language=en-US |issn=0028-792X}}</ref>

Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann first discovered the psychedelic properties of LSD five years after its creation, when he accidentally absorbed a small amount of the drug through his fingertips. Days later, he intentionally self-experimented with it.<ref name="PassieBrandt2018" /><ref>{{cite web|last1=Shroder|first1=Tom|title='Apparently Useless': The Accidental Discovery of LSD|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/09/the-accidental-discovery-of-lsd/379564/|publisher=The Atlantic|access-date=7 December 2016|date=2014-09-09}}</ref>

Hungarian chemist and psychiatrist Stephen Szára discovered the psychedelic effects of dimethyltryptamine (DMT) via self-experimentation in 1956.<ref name="PassieBrandt2018" /><ref name="GallimoreLuke2015">{{cite book | author1=Andrew R. Gallimore | author2=David P. Luke | chapter=DMT Research from 1956 to the Edge of Time | pages=291–316 | editor1-last=Luke | editor1-first=David | editor2-last=King | editor2-first=Dave | title=Neurotransmissions: Essays on Psychedelics from Breaking Convention | location=London | publisher=Strange Attractor Press | date=3 July 2015 | isbn=978-1-907222-43-6 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wMFNEAAAQBAJ | chapter-url=https://www.buildingalienworlds.com/uploads/5/7/9/9/57999785/dmt_research_1956_edge_time_arg_dpl_final.pdf}}</ref><ref name="Gallimore2025">{{cite book | last1=Gallimore | first1=A.R. | title=Death by Astonishment: Confronting the Mystery of the World's Strangest Drug (The DMT Book) | publisher=St. Martin's Publishing Group | year=2025 | isbn=978-1-250-35776-2 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H7caEQAAQBAJ | quote=After a series of first experiments with increasing dosages in rats, Szára was satisfied that the drug was unlikely to be toxic and was ready to begin the world’s first experiments with DMT in human volunteers. First test subject: Dr. Stephen Szára.29 [...] Although Szára was unable to recall more details of this first experience, it was perfectly obvious that this was a psychedelic of an entirely different order to the largely disappointing bufotenine: “My consciousness was completely filled by hallucinations, and my attention was firmly bound to them.”32 [...] It was clear to Szára that the afore neglected DMT was the molecule everyone else had been looking for but missed: “I remember feeling intense euphoria at the higher dose levels that I attributed to the excitement of the realization that I, indeed, had discovered a new hallucinogen.”34}}</ref><ref name="Szára2007">{{cite journal | vauthors = Szára S | title = DMT at fifty | journal = Neuropsychopharmacol Hung | volume = 9 | issue = 4 | pages = 201–205 | date = December 2007 | pmid = 18510265 | doi = | url = }}</ref><ref name="Szára1956">{{cite journal |pmid=13384414 |year=1956 |title=Dimethyltryptamin: its metabolism in man; the relation to its psychotic effect to the serotonin metabolism |volume=12 |issue=11 |pages=441–442 |journal=Experientia |doi=10.1007/BF02157378|last1=Szára |first1=St. |s2cid=7775625 }}</ref> He described experiencing intense euphoria at the higher DMT doses due to his excitement about the discovery.<ref name="GallimoreLuke2015" /><ref name="Gallimore2025" /><ref name="PassieBrandt2018" />

American chemist Alexander Shulgin synthesized hundreds of compounds in search of psychoactive drugs like psychedelics and entactogens, and evaluated them via careful self-experimentation together with his wife Ann Shulgin and a small research group of good friends.<ref name="PassieBrandt2018">{{cite journal | vauthors = Passie T, Brandt SD | title = Self-Experiments with Psychoactive Substances: A Historical Perspective | journal = Handb Exp Pharmacol | volume = 252 | issue = | pages = 69–110 | date = 2018 | pmid = 30478735 | doi = 10.1007/164_2018_177 | url = }}</ref><ref name="BLTC2021">{{cite AV media | people=Connie Littlefield (director, writer), Siobhan Flanagan, Alexander Shulgin (subject), Ann Shulgin (subject), Paul F. Daley (subject), Myron Stolaroff (subject), Jean Stolaroff (subject), Wendy Perry Tucker (subject), Tania Manning (subject), Greg Manning (subject), Keeper Trout (subject), Earth and Fire Erowid, others | date=2021 | title=Better Living Through Chemistry | url=https://betterlivingthroughchemistry.org/ | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20251119233557/https://betterlivingthroughchemistry.org/ | archive-date=November 19, 2025 | type=Motion picture | language=English | location= | publisher=Better Living Through Film, Incorporated | access-date=November 17, 2025 | url-status=bot: unknown }}</ref><ref name="ShulginShulginJacob1986">{{Cite journal |last1=Shulgin |first1=A T |last2=Shulgin |first2=L A |last3=Jacob |first3=P |date=1986-05-01 |title=A protocol for the evaluation of new psychoactive drugs in man |url=https://europepmc.org/article/med/3724306 |journal=Methods and Findings in Experimental and Clinical Pharmacology |volume=8 |issue=5 |pages=313–320 |issn=2013-0155 |pmid=3724306}}</ref><ref name="PiHKAL">{{CitePiHKAL}}</ref><ref name="TiHKAL">{{CiteTiHKAL}}</ref>

A great deal of additional notable self-experimentation in the area of psychoactive drugs has also been reported.<ref name="PassieBrandt2018" />

== Further reading ==

* Lawrence K. Altman: ''Who Goes First? The Story of Self-Experimentation in Medicine.'' (1987) Wellingborough * Seth Roberts & Allen Neuringer: ''Self-Experimentation'', In: Handbook of Research Methods in Human Operant Behavior von Kennon A. Lattal & M. Perone (Eds.), S. 619–655. New York: Plenum Press (englisch).

==References== {{Reflist}}

- Hanley et al 2019, [https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/rej.2018.2059 "Review of Scientific Self-Experimentation: Ethics History, Regulation, Scenarios, and Views Among Ethics Committees and Prominent Scientists"]

Category:Scientific method * Category:Self-harm Category:Self