The Characteristics and Prevalence of Dream Bizarreness, Inter-individual Differences and Their Relation to Quality of Life

Abstract

ABSTRACT Objective As existing findings are inconclusive, this paper aims to provide a thorough analysis of the bizarreness of everyday dreams and to explore its relations to the emotional quality of dreams and the dreamers’ quality of life. Method 61 women’s two week long dream journal (502 dreams) were analyzed using two different kinds of scales in order to capture the bizarre qualities of the reports. The emotional qualities of the dreams were also classified. At the end of the dream log participants filled in the WHOQOL-100 questionnaire to evaluate the different aspects of their quality of life. We examined the frequency and distribution of the distinct forms of distortions in every day dreams by using descriptive statistics. We carried out one-way analysis of variance to analyze the connection between the emotional tone of dreams and their bizarreness. To explore how the inter-individual differences in the qualities of dreams relate to the dreamers quality of life, Spearman correlation and Linear regression were calculated. Results According to our findings, although most home reported dreams contain some bizarre elements, they are rarely extremely unrealistic, and there is also a considerable amount of totally mundane dreams. The distortions are not randomly distributed but are mostly related to those parts of the reports which are created during the process of narrative formation. Our findings implicate substantial individual differences regarding the bizarreness and emotional tone of everyday dreams, and both of them correlate with some aspects of the subject’s quality of life. Conclusions Those theories should be favored, which can accommodate both unrealistic and totally mundane reports, and can account for the interpersonal differences in this quality of dreams.