Some researchers and clinicians describe the development of stimulant-induced psychosis as an evolving process. Panel members depicted MA users as having brief and transient psychotic episodes before a full-blown psychosis emerges after more extensive chronic use. MA users often recognize these early psychotic effects and try to stave them off by self-medicating with alcohol or decreasing drug use. In several articles, Ellinwood and colleagues describe the evolution of MA-induced psychosis as progressively abnormal behaviors--beginning at moderately high doses--with intense feelings of curiosity about the environment and patterns of exploration that result, for example, in examining the punctuation periods in a magazine text for evidence of a secret code (Ellinwood et al., 1973). - www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov