ble correlation anyway. The total consumption of tablets, which was the important variable, would be unchanged. Makes sense to me.The results cannot be fully trusted as fact, because full experimental protocol was not employed in this research. Causation can’t be proved just from correlation, because there are always other elements and factors involved. The authors of the article supported their conclusion that total MDMA consumption directly affects 5-HT levels by saying “As frequency of MDMA use did not relate to either total consumption or to measures of subjects’ 5-HT levels, we believe causation to be most parsimonious explanation of the results.” I too feel that that causation is a likely and probable explanation. The frequency of use was not indicated to affect anything; it doesn’t matter if there were inaccuracies in the reporting of said frequency. The rest of the evidence seems to be fairly un-biased.Does this mean that MDMA makes users depressed? Such an extrapolation cannot be asserted with full confidence at this point in time. There are too many other factors. The cognitive impairment found in other studies to be present in MDMA users (10, 23-28) are not necessarily caused by lowered levels of 5-HT. The impairment could be related to premorbid abilities, or use of other drugs or combinations of drugs. (20)However, I do agree with the researchers when they assert that abnormally low levels of 5-HT have a large role in depression, aggression, and violent suicide. This has been deduced theoretically (15) and predicted 5-HT deficits in groups with the aforementioned characteristics have been demonstrated empirically (29, 30). Depression has been treated rather successfully with drugs that increase levels of serotonin, which indicates that the deficit of this neurotransmitter played a role in the depression. (30). There is also extensive case-study evidence of observed depression and...
