About Me
My name is Brendan (he/him/his).
I’ve been interested in drugs and how they effect the human mind for my entire adult life. Like so many others, I had profound and formative experiences with psychoactive substances. I have grown to appreciate and respect the power of these extraordinary states of consciousness. I’ve seen how much healing they can catalyze as well as some of the harm their use can do. It has been a central passion of my life to assist others in benefiting from these medicines while helping them to avoid unnecessary harms.
I have been volunteering with DanceSafe for many years, providing free drug checking and relaying harm reduction information at music festivals. I’ve also volunteered as psychedelic peer support at festivals and have been trained with the Zendo Project.
I am currently pursuing a Masters degree in mental health counseling with the hopes of becoming a licensed psychedelic-assisted therapist.
Personally, and politically, I feel strongly that we as human beings have a right to alter our own consciousness as we see fit. I strive to diminish the stigma associated with drug use of all kinds and advocate for an absolute end to the War on Drugs. By providing these services, I sincerely hope to improve people’s relationships with drugs – to help them benefit more with less ill-effects.
My academic background is in Philosophy and Neuroscience. I have published a few studies in scientific journals (below). I bring that with me in this work through my understanding of how the brain and body interact with psychoactive substances (neuropharmacology and pharmacokinetics).
To get a better sense of my thoughts, check out my blog.
Published Works
Here is a list of a few of the scientific works I have authored or contributed to. I used to work primarily with people who were incarcerated, so many of the papers I worked on are on topics related to that field.
Abnormal frontostriatal activity in recently abstinent cocaine users during implicit moral processing
Investigations into the neurobiology of moral cognition are often done by examining clinical populations characterized by diminished moral emotions and a proclivity toward immoral behavior. Psychopathy is the most common disorder studied for this purpose. Although cocaine abuse is highly co-morbid with psychopathy and cocaine-dependent individuals exhibit many of the same abnormalities in socio-affective processing as psychopaths, this population has received relatively little attention in moral psychology…
The structural brain correlates of callous-unemotional traits in incarcerated male adolescents
Youth with severe conduct problems impose a significant cost on society by engaging in high levels of antisocial and aggressive behavior. Within this group, adolescents with high levels of callous- unemotional traits have been found to exhibit more severe and persistent patterns of antisocial behavior than youth with severe conduct problems but normative levels of callous-unemotional traits. Existing neuroimaging studies, along with theoretical accounts of psychopathology, suggest that…
Implicit morality: A methodological survey
A large hunk of research in moral psychology is devoted to self-reports, which represent the end product of a complex and diverse bundle of underlying cognitive processes.1 There is more to the moral processing, however, than what can be discerned from introspection or straightforward paper-and-pencil methodologies. A complete account must include all of the processes — explicit or implicit, articulated or unspoken — that go into everyday moral responses.
Development of an expert-rater assessment of trauma history in a high-risk youth forensic sample
Exposure to childhood trauma is particularly prevalent among incarcerated juveniles. Although there is a growing understanding of the detrimental impact trauma exposure can have on child and adolescent development, childhood maltreatment can be very difficult to accurately measure. Integration of self-report trauma histories as well as supplemental file reports of trauma exposure may provide the most accurate estimate of experienced trauma among youth in correctional settings…