Lateral eye-movements and dream recall.

Abstract

Using lateral eye-movements, the present study examined the hypothesis ,that dream recall is associated with selective activation of the right hemisphere. This hypothesis is derived from the observation that the EEG indicates a notable tendency for activation of the right hemisphere during such recall (1). No supposition is made as to the role of this hemisphere in dreaming itself (5). While findings have not been unanimous (3), there is considerable evidence that initial lateral eye-movements, made while pondering questions, are indicative of activation of the opposite hemisphere (4). In the present study, lateral eye-movements were observed while participants answered questions designed to engage the right or left hemisphere or to require dream recall. The procedure as well as the questions, except those chosen for dream recall, is detailed elsewhere (2). Examples of dream recall questions included, Imagine your last dream. Was it in color, or was it in black and white? and, Recall your last nightmare. Were you afraid of dying during it?. Basically, each of 31 participants (20 male, 11 female) was asked 22 questions, while facing the experimenter. Above the head of the latter was a TV camera; otherwise, there were no notable visual distractions. The same experimenter worked with all participants. Seven questions required verbal thought (left hemisphere), 7 visual thought (right hemisphere), and 8 dream recall. These occurred in a haphazard order. Initial lateral eye-movements were later noted from the video tapes. The ratio of right to total lateral eye-movements, R/(R+L), was calculated for each person, for each type of question. The means of these were .63 (SD = .26) for verbal questions, .50 (SD = .28) for visual questions, and .50 (SD = .28) for dream recall questions. A two-way analysis of variance yielded Fa,m = 6.45 (P < .005). This was a repeated-measures design, with regard to the types of questions. The other factor was sex, which did not approach significance, The findings suggest that the verbal questions elicit a greater number of right lateral eye-movements than do spatial and dream recall questions, but the latter may not differ from each other. This is taken as support of the initial hypothesis but leaves an interesting question which we are presently examining. Is the similarity for spatial and dream recall quesrions due to the largely visual content of dream recall or is there some other connection between dream recall and right hemispheric activity?