Light language refers to unknown utterances, speech, or sound patterns that can sometimes flow out of one’s mouth during meditation, prayer, trance, or other altered states of consciousness. We are excited to announce that the IONS Light Language Study is now live!
The study is open to English-speaking, psychologically healthy adults who have personally had at least one experience of uttering light language outside of a religious context. Learn more to find out if you are eligible to participate!
Glossolalia: Speaking in Tongues
Many people have heard the term “speaking in tongues”—the scientific term is glossolalia—and this most often occurs in the charismatic Christian church environment during visits of the Holy Spirit. However, within the New Age movement, a similar phenomenon occurs outside of the religious setting and is typically referred to as light language (although it is also known as angelic language, the tongues of angels, or tonguespeak). There are numerous studies on speaking in tongues—including from psychological, neurological, biological, and linguist perspectives—but despite its rising visibility, non-religious glossolalia remains largely unexplored in the scientific literature.
One exception is psychiatric glossolalia, which includes mentally ill individuals who speak nonsensical words and utterances as a symptom of their psychiatric condition. For this reason, the current study includes a brief psychological survey.
The brief psychological survey is part of the first stage of the overall study—a self-administered online survey. The second part of the survey is a personal interview. The full online survey includes demographic questions, a mindfulness survey, questions about absorption, mystical experiences, personality traits, consciousness, incorporation, and personal light language experiences. The total survey is expected to take 20-30 minutes to complete. Learn more to find out if you are eligible to participate.
Following the survey, a personal interview is scheduled to more deeply explore individual light language experiences, when/how they originated, under what conditions they emerge, and whether the meaning of the content can be understood or interpreted by the speaker. The semi-structured, recorded interview is expected to take 15-45 minutes to complete and will be held over video. This study will provide the first systematic characterization of non-religious glossolalists, offering insights into their psychological traits, altered states of consciousness, and lived experiences. Findings will contribute to expanding the scope of glossolalia research beyond religious settings and may inform broader understandings of human consciousness, self-transcendence, and culturally diverse pathways to altered states.
The investigators of the Light Language (Non-Religious Glossolalia) Study are IONS Director of Research, Helané Wahbeh, ND, MCR and Siri Zemel, PhD.
