The Salvia divinorum Research and Information Center - Shroomery

Daniel Siebert Speaks…
Because the reports were so inconsistent, I began to wonder if
the "placebo effect" might be responsible for many of the
effects people were experiencing, including my own. To
investigate this, I decided to conduct an informal double-blind
experiment using volunteers from the Salvia divinorum Emailing
List. This is an e-mail discussion forum I founded a
couple of years ago, which is dedicated to Salvia divinorum
and other psychoactive Labiatae. I located a source for a large
amount of Salvia splendens leaf. In order to determine if this
material would be suitable for use in the experiment, I sent
samples of the doses I intended to use for the study to three
people who had already tried Salvia splendens several times
and claimed to be able to distinguish its effects. Unanimously
they concluded that this material was indeed active and thus
should be quite suitable for the experiment. I then selected a
placebo herb. I chose Viola odorata leaf, because it was the
most similar herb in appearance and texture that I could come
up with that did not have effects that were likely to be
confused with those that were being associated with Salvia
splendens. I then sent out coded packets containing premeasured
doses of Salvia splendens and the placebo herb to
61 volunteers. They were instructed to ingest the samples and
then to report any effects experienced on a questionnaire that
had been provided to them. People were allowed to choose
between smoking the herb samples or ingesting them
sublingually. Some people chose to do both. So I collected
two sets of data based on method of ingestion.
The purpose of the experiment was to determine if people
would be able to distinguish Salvia splendens from the
inactive placebo herb. If Salvia splendens does produce a
significant effect, this should show up in the data obtained
from the questionnaires. Unfortunately, only 31 of the
volunteers completed the experiment and returned the
questionnaires, so the amount of information I had available
to work with was relatively small. Nevertheless, I think that
the results are meaningful. The results of the experiment
showed that most people reported no effects from either herb.
Of those that did report "Salvia splendens-type effects" (about
35%), the numbers were essentially equal for Salvia
splendens and the placebo. This suggests that Salvia
splendens is no more effective than the placebo in producing
"Salvia splendens-type effects." This is definitely the case for
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