Scientists want to know if Ecstasy could help reduce anxiety in adults with autism

MDMA pills.
(Image credit: U.S. Customs/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

A groups of researchers would like to find out if Ecstasy could help adults with autism deal with social anxiety.

The team wrote up a proposed study for Science Direct, stating that MDMA, the medical name for Ecstasy, in controlled doses could ease social anxiety. MDMA has been illegal in the U.S. since the 1980s, and is a popular party drug, with users experiencing euphoric highs. The researchers wrote that MDMA has the capacity to "help people talk openly and honestly about themselves and their relationships, without defensive conditioning intervening," and the team would look at using MDMA as a way to reduce social anxiety in adults with autism, not as a treatment for autism itself, Time reports.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.