A large UK study has uncovered an unusual association between psilocybin and diet, with researchers finding that people who reported psilocybin use were more likely to report following a vegetarian diet and consuming less red meat.
The research examined data from more than 21,000 adults and explored the relationship between psychedelic use, dietary behaviour and attitudes towards the environment.
The findings, published in Scientific Reports on 11 September 2026, add a different perspective to the growing body of research surrounding psychedelic substances. Rather than focusing specifically on therapeutic outcomes, the researchers looked at whether psychedelic use was associated with broader lifestyle behaviours.
The study found several associations involving psilocybin, including vegetarianism, red meat consumption, wholemeal bread and some other dietary habits. It also found an association between psychedelic use and more pro-environmental attitudes.
However, the researchers emphasised an important limitation: the study was observational and retrospective, meaning it cannot establish that psilocybin use caused changes in people’s diets or environmental attitudes.
What was the study investigating?
Research into psychedelics has expanded considerably in recent years, with many studies examining compounds such as psilocybin and LSD in relation to mental health and psychological wellbeing.
The researchers behind this study were interested in a broader question.
Could psychedelic use be associated with everyday behaviours such as food choices?
They specifically investigated whether lifetime use of psilocybin and LSD was associated with:
- Vegetarianism
- Consumption of red meat
- Fruit and vegetable intake
- Other reported dietary habits
- Attitudes towards the environment
The researchers also wanted to explore whether environmental attitudes might help explain any relationship between psychedelic use and dietary choices.
More than 21,000 adults were included
The study used data from two major UK birth-cohort studies:
- The 1958 National Child Development Study
- The 1970 British Cohort Study
The relevant data were collected during a follow-up around the year 2000, when participants in the two cohorts were approximately 42 and 30 years old respectively.
Across the analyses, the study included approximately 21,837 to 21,855 participants.
Researchers examined participants’ reported psychedelic use alongside dietary behaviour and environmental attitudes.
The analysis classified psychedelic use according to whether participants had:
- Never used the substance
- Used it previously but not within the past year
- Used it within the past year
The researchers also accounted for several other factors, including sex, education, alcohol consumption, cocaine use, cohort membership and authoritarian attitudes.
Psilocybin use and vegetarianism
One of the most noticeable findings involved vegetarian diets.
After statistical adjustment, researchers estimated that approximately 14% of recent psilocybin users were vegetarian, compared with around 4% of people who had never used psilocybin.
Among people who had used psilocybin in the more distant past, the estimated figure was around 9%, compared with 6% among people who had never used it.
In the researchers’ statistical model, people who had used psilocybin within the previous year were approximately 3.5 times as likely to be vegetarian as never-users.
The association was smaller among people whose psilocybin use occurred further in the past.
These figures attracted attention because the difference was observed even after the researchers adjusted for a number of potentially relevant variables.
What about LSD?
The researchers did not only examine psilocybin.
They also looked at lifetime and recent LSD use to determine whether similar patterns were present.
The relationship with vegetarianism appeared weaker for LSD.
Around 10% of recent LSD users were estimated to be vegetarian compared with approximately 6% of people who had never used LSD. However, the researchers reported that this difference was not statistically significant.
Earlier LSD use was associated with a smaller increase in the likelihood of being vegetarian in the statistical model.
This distinction is important because the findings were not identical across the two psychedelic substances.
Psilocybin and red meat consumption
Vegetarianism was not the only dietary behaviour investigated.
The researchers also looked at individual food categories, including red meat.
Both recent and earlier psilocybin use were associated with lower reported red meat consumption.
The study also found associations between previous psilocybin use and greater consumption of:
- Salads
- Raw vegetables
- Wholemeal bread
Recent psilocybin use was also associated with greater reported wholemeal bread consumption.
Earlier psilocybin use was associated with fewer reported biscuits and cakes.
These results might sound like evidence of a generally healthier diet, but the researchers were more cautious.
Most of the differences in individual dietary behaviours were relatively small, and the study did not establish that psilocybin users have a universally healthier diet.
Not every dietary association pointed in the same direction
The findings were not simply a case of psychedelic users reporting healthier choices across every food category.
For example, the analysis found associations between earlier LSD use and slightly lower fruit consumption, while earlier LSD use was also associated with greater reported chip consumption.
This is one reason the researchers examined individual food behaviours instead of creating a single overall “healthy diet” score.
The authors noted that grouping foods into healthy and unhealthy categories can itself be debatable.
Instead, the study reported results for individual foods and dietary behaviours.
Overall, the observed differences were generally modest.
A possible connection with environmental attitudes
Another important part of the research concerned environmental attitudes.
Participants who reported psychedelic use were more likely to express pro-environmental attitudes.
The researchers then investigated whether these attitudes could statistically explain some of the relationship between psychedelic use and dietary behaviour.
Their mediation analysis suggested that environmental attitudes were consistent with full statistical mediation of the association between psilocybin use and vegetarianism.
The analysis also suggested that environmental attitudes partly mediated the association between psilocybin use and lower red meat consumption.
In simple terms, the statistical results are consistent with the possibility that environmental attitudes are connected to both psychedelic use and certain dietary choices.
But this does not demonstrate that psilocybin directly causes someone to become more environmentally conscious or change their diet.
Why environmental attitudes are interesting
Diet and environmental behaviour are closely connected in several areas of public discussion.
For some people, reducing meat consumption is linked to concerns about environmental impact, animal welfare or sustainability.
The researchers therefore considered environmental attitudes as a possible factor connecting psychedelic use with vegetarianism and red meat consumption.
Their results provide a potential direction for future research.
Rather than assuming that psychedelic experiences directly change eating habits, researchers could investigate whether changes in attitudes, values or perceptions occur over time and whether those changes are subsequently associated with lifestyle choices.
That question cannot be answered by the current study alone.
The study cannot prove psilocybin caused dietary changes
This is perhaps the most important point when interpreting the findings.
The study was a retrospective observational study.
Participants were not randomly assigned to take psilocybin or remain psychedelic-naive. Instead, researchers analysed information that had already been collected from large population cohorts.
The dietary behaviour, environmental attitudes and psychedelic-use information were measured during the same survey period.
Because of this, researchers cannot determine whether psychedelic use occurred before the dietary behaviour being reported.
For example, someone may have already followed a vegetarian diet or held strong environmental views before ever using psilocybin.
It is therefore not possible to conclude from this study that psilocybin causes vegetarianism or causes people to reduce their consumption of red meat.
Other limitations researchers identified
The study also had several other limitations.
Participants were not asked detailed questions about how frequently they used psychedelics or the circumstances surrounding their experiences.
Factors such as the context of psychedelic use, the individual’s expectations and the nature of the experience were therefore not captured in detail.
The researchers also examined multiple dietary outcomes.
When many statistical tests are conducted, there is a greater possibility that some individual associations could appear statistically significant by chance.
The authors therefore emphasised the need for future research to test whether the observed relationships can be replicated.
What does this mean for psychedelic research?
The study represents an interesting shift away from the most commonly discussed areas of psychedelic research.
Much of the public and scientific attention surrounding psilocybin has focused on its potential therapeutic applications and its effects on mood, perception and psychological wellbeing.
This research instead asks whether psychedelic use is associated with longer-term lifestyle characteristics.
The findings do not establish a health benefit from changing dietary behaviour after psychedelic use, nor do they demonstrate that psilocybin produces these changes.
Instead, they identify relationships that researchers can investigate further.
Future prospective research could follow people over time and measure dietary behaviour and environmental attitudes before and after psychedelic experiences.
That approach could provide stronger evidence about the direction of any relationship.
Why a prospective study could be important
A future longitudinal study could collect information about participants before psychedelic exposure and then follow them over months or years.
Researchers could potentially measure:
- Dietary preferences before psychedelic use
- Changes in meat consumption
- Changes in vegetarian or vegan status
- Environmental attitudes
- Frequency and context of psychedelic use
- Other lifestyle changes
This would make it easier to determine whether dietary changes actually follow psychedelic experiences or whether the observed relationship is largely explained by characteristics that existed beforehand.
The current study provides an observational starting point, but prospective research would be needed to investigate causality more directly.
A broader look at psilocybin and lifestyle
The findings contribute to an expanding area of psychedelic research examining what happens beyond the immediate psychedelic experience.
Researchers are increasingly interested in whether psychedelic experiences may be associated with changes in attitudes, values, behaviour and relationships with the natural environment.
The latest study does not answer those questions definitively.
What it does provide is a large population-level dataset showing that psilocybin use, vegetarianism, red meat consumption and environmental attitudes are statistically associated in this UK cohort data.
Whether these relationships reflect direct effects, shared underlying characteristics or other factors remains an open research question.
The bigger picture
The relationship between psilocybin and diet is still far from established.
This study does not show that taking psilocybin leads people to become vegetarian, eat less meat or adopt a healthier diet.
Instead, it identifies an unusual pattern in a large UK dataset and suggests that environmental attitudes may be relevant to some of the associations.
The researchers themselves point towards the need for future prospective studies to investigate these relationships further.
As psychedelic research continues to expand, studies examining broader lifestyle and behavioural patterns may provide additional questions for researchers to explore alongside the better-known clinical research areas.
For now, the findings are best understood as an association worth investigating, rather than evidence of a causal effect.
Source & Further Reading
This article was inspired by a report published by News-Medical on 15 September 2026 covering the study and its findings.
News-Medical: A study of more than 21,000 adults found an unusual link between psilocybin and diet.
Read the full News-Medical report
The underlying research was published in Scientific Reports on 11 September 2026.
Research paper: Teixeira, P. J., Cherniak, A. D. & Forstmann, M. (2026). Lifetime classic psychedelics use is associated with positive environmental attitudes and adopting a vegetarian diet.
Read the original research in Scientific Reports
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-026-71275-x
This article is provided for research and educational purposes. It does not constitute medical advice or recommend the use of psilocybin or other controlled substances.
