Near death experience drawings reveal four geometric spatial patterns

Researchers at the University of Haifa in Israel gathered 50 people who claimed to have had near-death experiences to study their memories through visual reconstructions.

Led by researcher France Lerner, the team asked participants to draw their memories as spatial scenes rather than just describing them in words. The goal was to see if these individual experiences shared a recognizable visual organization. The team collected 112 spatial representations and successfully categorized 108 of them into four distinct geometric shapes.

These categories included conical spaces like tunnels, open spaces with large curves like arches, flat horizons with gentle curves, and enclosing spaces similar to the interior of a sphere or oval. The study also looked at colors, finding that conical spaces were mostly colorless, while wide curved spaces were frequently depicted in pink and violet tones.

The researchers noted that these geometric patterns might relate to known visual phenomena, such as tunnel vision caused by oxygen loss or the Ganzfeld effect, which produces unusual perceptions under uniform visual stimulation. However, the team did not prove that these specific mechanisms caused the experiences.

The study also faced limitations, as participants were volunteers who may have had memories altered over time, and the researchers did not use a control group of people who experienced other altered states of consciousness.