Dream Content Research Articles

REM sleep behavior disorder: Relation between aggressiveness and emotions expressed in dream enactment and cognitive and anxiety/depression status

Aggressiveness and negative emotions in dreams reports of patients with alfa-synucleinopathies have been associated with cognitive dysfunction. Observation of dream enactment episodes could be a more precise method to capture dream content in patients with REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD). Our objective was to assess the relation between aggressive and emotional dream enactment episodes in patients with RBD and cognition and depression/anxiety.Motor events (ME) during REM sleep were classified by visual inspection of video-PSG files. Cognition and anxiety/depression were assessed with MoCA and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), respectively. Multivariate regression analysis was performed, with MoCA or HADS scores as predictors, age and DED as co-variates and aggressive, negative and positive ME frequency (raw values, per total and per complex indexes) as the dependent variable.We included 15 patients with isolated RBD and 12 and 4 with RBD associated with Parkinson's disease and Dementia with Lewy Bodies, respectively. They presented a total of 873 ME. There was a significant positive association between HADS score and violent/complex and negative emotion/complex indexes. There was a significant positive association between MoCA score and violent/complex index.A significant correlation between depression/anxiety severity and negative emotion and aggression ME frequency agrees with the dream continuity hypothesis and suggests that REM sleep acts as a regulator of emotional experience. Patients with a higher prevalence of aggressive ME had higher scores in cognitive testing, suggesting that the elaboration of these complex movements could depend on the integrity of cognitive functions.

Relationships between self-esteem-related dream content and explicit and implicit measures of self-esteem

While there is evidence of continuity between waking life and dream content, findings with regard to personality are questionable due to methodological issues. In addition, previous studies have used explicit measures, although one could assume that dream content, which is formed implicitly, should have a closer relationship with implicit measures of personality. We investigated how explicit and implicit measures of self-esteem are related to two possibly pertinent variables of dream content. We analyzed 1359 dreams collected from 85 participants. We found that one dream content variable, the proportion of self-esteem-relevant dreams, was significantly related to self-esteem, corroborating the idea of a continuity between waking life and dreaming. Interestingly, the relationship was present only for dreams relevant to social self-esteem. This finding can be considered an example of the well-known sociality bias of dreams. Contrary to our expectations, these results were obtained only for explicit measures but not for implicit ones.

Gay Dreams: Exploring the Relationship Between Sexual Orientation and Dream Content in Men.

Although numerous individual factors influencing dream content have been explored, research on the link between sexual orientation and dreaming remains limited. This study examined this relationship among 119 German-speaking men (mean age = 31.97 years), including 55homosexual and 64heterosexual participants. Participants completed a questionnaire on their waking life sexuality and dreams and provided two dream reports. Homosexual men reported more sexual partners in waking life and lower satisfaction with their sexual orientation compared to heterosexual men. No significant differences were found in dream recall frequency, emotional tone, nightmare frequency, or distress, though homosexual men reported more sexual dreams. Dream reports showed no significant differences in sexual interactions or the number of sexual partners between groups, but homosexual men's dreams featured a higher ratio of male to female characters and more romantic relationships with men. These findings partially align with the continuity hypothesis, suggesting that the dream content of homosexual men reflects their social interactions and romantic preferences. Overall, the study suggests that homosexual and heterosexual men share a similar dream pattern. The implications of these findings highlight the importance of considering sexual orientation in dream research to better understand the intersection of sexuality and unconscious processes.

Motivations Behind Dreams: Its Linguistic Concept And Behavioral Impact

Dreams are a precious window into the human soul, where all the waves of minds, emotions, and cultures are concentrated. On this basis, this study deals with phenomena that affect general human consciousness and even the daily life of Arab students. Therefore, this study used the scientific and professional literature on dreams to identify their relationship to Arab students' engagement in dreaming during sleep and wakefulness and how this influences dream content. The sample for this study is selected from among the undergraduate students of Prince Sattam University, Al-Kharj, after obtaining approval from the university ethics committee. The sample was selected from male and female college students, including the College of Education and Business Administration. A total of 79 students participated in the study. The participants were men and women. The structured questionnaire consists of several derived sleep components, including dream motivation, dream recall, and the effects of dreams on behavior. The researcher obtained a correlation coefficient, proving that the questionnaire's scale and internal consistency are very high for these items. Most dreams were forgotten, and reports of these dreams reflected waking experiences in particular. Based on this data, the researcher concluded that "students' dreams had little impact on academic and general decisions," meaning that dreams did not have much impact on students.

Dreaming conundrum.

Dreaming, a common yet mysterious cognitive phenomenon, is an involuntary process experienced by individuals during sleep. Although the fascination with dreams dates back to ancient times and gained therapeutic significance through psychoanalysis in the early twentieth century, its scientific investigation only gained momentum with the discovery of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep in the 1950s. This review synthesises current research on the neurobiological and psychological aspects of dreaming, including factors influencing dream recall and content, neurophysiological correlates, and experimental models, and discusses the implications for clinical practice.

Validation of the International REM Sleep Behavior Disorder Study Group Symptoms Severity Scale (IRBD-SSS): a new tool to assess RBD clinical severity.

Currently, no standard scale has been validated to assess overall severity of RBD symptoms in the home environment. We aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the International RBD Severity Scale (IRBD-SSS), a new tool designed by the International RBD Study Group. Two versions of the IRBD-SSS were created, one for the patient (IRBD-SSS-PT) and another for the bedpartner (IRBD-SSS-BP), both consisting of 3 components, namely vocalizations, body movements and injury, with a fourth component (patient version only) evaluating dream content. To score each dimension, the frequency and severity/impact of behaviors during the previous month are multiplied. Psychometric properties of the IRBD-SSS were assessed, including reproducibility. A total of 188 subjects including n = 132 RBD patients (n = 94 isolated RBD and n = 38 symptomatic RBD) and n = 52 bedpartners were enrolled from eight Sleep centers across France and Italy. Participants completed the scale at baseline and after one week. Acceptability of the scale was excellent in patients (97%) and bedpartners (98%). Internal consistency was acceptable for IRBD-SSS-PT (Cronbach α = 0.75) while slightly low for IRBD-SSS-BP (Cronbach α = 0.49). Concurrent validity was good for both patient (r = 0.70;p < 0.001, see Figure) and bedpartner (r = 0.69;p < 0.001) IRBD-SSS. Reproducibility was high for IRBD-SSS-PT (Lin's coefficient of agreement = 0.85 [0.81;0.90]) and good for the IRBD-SSS-BP (0.79 [0.68;0.90] (p < 0.001). Both the patient and bedpartner versions of the IRBD-SSS showed excellent acceptability, acceptable internal consistency, good external validity and high reproducibility. IRBD-SSS is a useful tool to test the severity of RBD symptoms in clinical settings and clinical trials. NCT04071899.

Automatic dream content analysis finds effects of gender, age, and blindness on word use.

Automatic dream content analysis finds effects of gender, age, and blindness on word use.

The Dream Experience and Its Relationship with Morning Mood in Adolescents Hospitalized after a Suicide Attempt.

Suicidality in adolescents has been associated with emotional distress, stressful life events, relationship issues, and nightmares to name a few. This study explored the actual dream content and the mood at pre-sleep, during a reported dream, and in the morning in 33 adolescents admitted to the hospital on account of a suicide attempt. In all aspects, hospitalized adolescents were compared to 33 matched adolescents who had followed the same protocol. In accordance with the Continuity and the Threat Simulation theories of dream formation, it was hypothesized that the waking-life experiences of suicidal adolescents would transpire in both dream mood and content as well as in the frequency of nightmares. Dreams were analyzed by independent judges using traditional dream content scales, including for the presence of negative and destructive themes and types of interpersonal relationships. As predicted, more suicidal adolescents experienced frequent nightmares, which was significant. A higher negative mood at pre-sleep, within dreams, and at post-sleep was also observed. Furthermore, their dreams contained a higher prevalence of destructive themes and failures, as well as self-directed and death-resulting aggressions. Regression analyses indicated that morning mood was most accurately predicted by positive and negative dream mood in the normative adolescents, whereas only negative dream mood appeared to predict subsequent waking affect in suicidal participants. Our results underline the valuable potential of implementing nightmare-reducing therapies in the presence of suicidal adolescents who suffer from frequent nightmares.

A New Way of Analysing Dreams on Its Profoundest Level: The Development of Motif Analysis and Phase Model (MAP) as an Extension of Structural Dream Analysis (SDA).

Dream research today assumes that there is a connection between dreams and waking life. However, the structural alteration of dream motifs in connection with the psychotherapeutic process and waking life has not yet been researched extensively. This study depicts the development of the new Motif Analysis and Phase Model (MAP), a dynamic method which allows research on the previous aspects. The following question was investigated as an accompanying key issue: can a connection be established between the course of the dream patterns and the agency of the dream ego as well as the dream contents and the course of the psychotherapies of the dreaming person as a whole? Four hypotheses were formulated and tested. The data material consists of 217 dreams of a male test subject. The motifs were analysed using Structural Dream Analysis (SDA) at first. Thereafter, the content was linked to the test subject's waking life in a guided interview. The findings show a strong connection between the dream content and the psychotherapies as well as the test subject's waking life. Five motifs with structural changes were found, through which the Phase Model with four phases was developed. At turning points, the transformative child motif also appears in the dreams. The course of the dream patterns and agency of the dream ego, however, has not changed. The results, the method and the generalisability were critically discussed and recommendations for future research were formulated.

The Relation Between the CBT and Characters in the Dream Content of the Depressed People

The Relation Between the CBT and Characters in the Dream Content of the Depressed People

Impact of Pre-Sleep Visual Media Exposure on Dreams: A Scoping Review.

A body of experimental research has aimed to investigate processes underlying dream formation by examining the effects of a range of pre-sleep stimuli and events on subsequent dream content. Given its ever-growing presence and salience in people's everyday lives, pre-sleep media consumption stands out as a key variable that could influence people's dreams. We conducted a scoping review to evaluate the experimental evidence of the effects of pre-sleep exposure to visual media on dream content. A systematic search on PubMed, PsycInfo, and Web of Science using terms related to moving visual media and dreams yielded 29 studies meeting the inclusion criteria. Overall, we found modest yet varied effects of pre-sleep exposure to visual media on dream content, with rates of stimulus-related incorporation ranging from 3% to 43% for REM dream reports, 4% to 30% for NREM sleep mentation reports, and between 11% and 35% for home dream reports. Our review highlights the large methodological heterogeneity and gaps across studies, the general difficulty in influencing dream content using pre-sleep exposure to visual media, and suggests promising venues for future research to advance our understanding of how and why digital media may impact people's dreams.

Coronavirus pandemic dreams in China: A qualitative research on the effect of the Wuhan lockdown on dream contents.

Coronavirus pandemic dreams in China: A qualitative research on the effect of the Wuhan lockdown on dream contents.

Targeted dream incubation at a distance: the development of a remote and sensor-free tool for incubating hypnagogic dreams and mind-wandering

Hypnagogia—the transitional state between wakefulness and sleep—is marked by “hypnagogic dreams,” during which our brains tend to forge connections among concepts that are otherwise unrelated. This process of creating novel associations during hypnagogic dreams is said to contribute to enhancing creativity, learning, and memory. Recently, researchers have proposed that mind-wandering—a form of spontaneous thought that is freely moving and characterized by transitioning thought content—might be subserved by processes similar to those engaged during hypnagogia, and may serve similar creative functions. However, to date, the relationship between hypnagogia and mind-wandering remains poorly understood, which is likely due in part to the fact that research into hypnagogia requires time-consuming, cumbersome, and costly polysomnography. In light of this, the present study had two primary aims: first, to test a novel tool—called Dormio Light—for cueing and indexing hypnagogic dream content in a cost- and time-effective manner, with the ability for remote administration; second, to use this tool to examine any relations between hypnagogic dreams and mind-wandering (defined as “freely moving thought”). Participants (N = 80, with 34 females) completed a task in which our tool prompted them to engage in hypnagogia and, separately, mind-wandering, with instructions to think about a common everyday object (Tree or Fork) while experiencing these cognitive states. Following each state, participants reported thought content and completed phenomenological questionnaires. Providing an initial validation of our tool, we successfully cued hypnagogic and mind-wandering thought content that was specific to our cues (e.g., Tree), with our incubation-rate results comparable to those found in laboratory-based studies. Further, we found evidence for some phenomenological differences between hypnagogia and mind-wandering reports. Our study offers a novel, cost- and time-effective tool with which to remotely cue and index hypnagogia and mind-wandering, and sheds light on the relationship between hypnagogia and mind-wandering, thereby providing future directions for research into these two cognitive states.

Dreams, memories, and the psychoanalytic process

Freud believed the dreamer’s wish amounted to the most powerful motive underlying all dreaming processes. Ángel Garma suggested traumatic memories might play a similar or even greater role. In the present paper, I extend Garma’s suggestion and propose that unconscious memories of interpersonal interactions are the basic components of dream narratives. Within this perspective, latent dream content includes a wealth of information about the unconscious experience of the transference situation. Through a clinical vignette, I show the reader how appropriate transference interpretations allow the identification of such transferential emotions and their reintegration within the psychoanalytic field.

Personality Functioning Improvement during Psychotherapy Is Associated with an Enhanced Capacity for Affect Regulation in Dreams: A Preliminary Study.

Clinical case illustrations of patients with an impairment of personality functioning (IPF) have repeatedly reported that progress during psychotherapy is reflected by alterations in dream content. However, quantitative studies based on samples of psychotherapy patients are scarce. As a core component of both personality functioning and contemporary psychodynamic dream theory, the construct of affect regulation is of specific significance in this context. To test if improvement in personality functioning in the course of psychotherapy is associated with an increasing ability to regulate affects in dreams. In a longitudinal design, affect regulation was compared in N = 94 unsolicited dream reports from the first vs. last third of long term psychotherapy of ten patients with initial IPF. Dream reports were transcribed from recordings of the sessions. Expert ratings of the level of personality functioning were obtained using the Scales of Psychological Capacities. The capacity for affect regulation was assessed using the Zurich Dream Process Coding System. Group differences were assessed using linear mixed models, controlling for dream length as well as the nested structure of this data set. Patients demonstrated an increased capacity for affect regulation in dreams that was primarily evident in three core features: the complexity of dream elements (cf., e.g., parameter attributes, p = 0.024); the extent of affective involvement in the dream ego (cf., e.g., parameter subject feeling, p = 0.014); and the flexibility to regulate the dynamics of safety/involvement processes (p ≤ 0.001). This pattern was especially prominent in a subgroup (n = 7) of patients with more pronounced improvements in personality functioning. These findings support the hypotheses that decreasing IPF during psychotherapy is associated with increases in the capacity for affect regulation in dreams. Thus, researchers and therapists can utilize dream reports to illuminate the important aspects of treatment progress in clinical practice.

The stuff that nightmares are made of: Israeli dreams in times of the Israel-Hamas war

This qualitative study explored the mortality salience effect as it manifested in the dreams of Israelis in the aftermath of the Hamas terror attack on October 7, 2023, and during the ensuing war. Over a two-month period, a sample of 242 dreams was collected via an online survey. Two forms of thematic analysis, namely, inductive and deductive, were utilized. Viewed through the theoretical lens of terror management theory, the findings suggest that exposure to the attack’s horrors and the resulting strong mortality salience were reflected in the participants’ dream contents. This indicates that the anxiety-buffering roles of the three psychological coping mechanisms—cultural worldviews, self-esteem, and close personal relationships—have been compromised. The examination of collective dream content offers a glimpse into subtle human psychic processes and how they might be affected during times of national trauma that necessitate robust psychological mechanisms to cope with the heightened mortality salience.

Evidence of an active role of dreaming in emotional memory processing shows that we dream to forget

Dreaming is a universal human behavior that has inspired searches for meaning across many disciplines including art, psychology, religion, and politics, yet its function remains poorly understood. Given the suggested role of sleep in emotional memory processing, we investigated whether reported overnight dreaming and dream content are associated with sleep-dependent changes in emotional memory and reactivity, and whether dreaming plays an active or passive role. Participants completed an emotional picture task before and after a full night of sleep and they recorded the presence and content of their dreams upon waking in the morning. The results replicated the emotional memory trade-off (negative images maintained at the cost of neutral memories), but only in those who reported dreaming (Dream-Recallers), and not in Non-Dream-Recallers. Results also replicated sleep-dependent reductions in emotional reactivity, but only in Dream-Recallers, not in Non-Dream-Recallers. Additionally, the more positive the dream report, the more positive the next-day emotional reactivity is compared to the night before. These findings implicate an active role for dreaming in overnight emotional memory processing and suggest a mechanistic framework whereby dreaming may enhance salient emotional experiences via the forgetting of less relevant information.

Exploration of dreams in Charaka Samhita – an Ayurveda text and their content analysis of prodromal dreams in various conditions

IntroductionResearch into dreams, have shown the association between increased frequency of distressing dreams, specific content themes (analysed using the Hall Van de Castle system) and greater incidence of progression of neurological conditions and dementia. The history of predicting illnesses by the content of dreams, in the western world is popularly traced backed to the ancient Greek medicine. This stimulates the curiosity if any such practices existed in the ancient medical practises of the eastern world. Ayurveda is one such traditional system of medicine, that is native to the Indian subcontinent. Charaka Samhita is one of the oldest texts on Ayurveda consisting of 8 sections and 120 chapters totally. This text was selected for the purpose of this review, with the line of enquiry such as what does Ayurveda say about dreams associated with illnesses? What are the contents of such dreams? Furthermore, the dream content analysis was done using the Hall Van de Castle system, which is probably the first time being done on an Ayurveda text content.Objectives1) To explore if, Charaka Samhita mentions, describes dreams in relation to illnesses, stages of illnesses and their prognosis. 2) To analyse content of the dreams seen in prodromal stage of illnesses.Methods1-The Charaka Samhita text was scanned chapter by chapter, to answer the questions- a) What are the types of dreams? b) Are any associated with illnesses? c)Are any dreams mentioned in the prodromal stage of illnesses? d)What do they imply? e)What are their contents? 2- The contents of prodromal dreams were analysed against the categories of Hall Van de Castle system.ResultsAs per Charaka Samhita, the types of dreams are, i) those based on what was seen ii) heard iii) reflected upon iv) desired v) imagined vi) those of prophetic type and vii) those caused by illnesses. Specific dreams in the prodromal stage, predict manifestation of specific illnesses (mild or fatal). In the diverse dream contents (18 themes mentioned) ranging from things animals to gods and demons, except the elements of the past, rest of the general categories occur, at least once. The categories characters, objects, activities and social interactions were more common than the rest.ConclusionsThus akin to the ancient Greek medicine, Ayurveda too had the practice of predicting illnesses based on the dream contents.Disclosure of InterestNone Declared

Associations Between Both Adaptive and Maladaptive Personality Constructs and Emotional Load and Content of Adult Dreams

Background: It seems that personality and dreams are relatively stable interwoven constructs that show many shared characteristics across cultures. The present study aimed to predict the emotional load and content of dreams using both original constructs and two extracted spectrum factors of adaptive and maladaptive personalities. Methods: The cross-sectional study data was collected from 704 Iranian adults using the brief version of the Personality Inventory for DSM-5, the brief version of the Big Five Inventory, Schredl’s Dream Emotions Manual, and the Content Analysis of Dreams Manual. Pearson correlations, hierarchical regressions, exploratory factor analysis, and analysis of variance were used to analyse the data. Results: Factor analysis revealed two factors for the adaptive and maladaptive spectrums of personality. Adaptive and maladaptive constructs of personality are almost equally related to both the negative and positive loads of dreams, while the negative load of dreams is more strongly predicted by the maladaptive spectrum factor ( R2: 13% vs. 7%, ∆ R2: 8% vs. 2%). Negative load is characterized by low agreeableness and high negative affectivity, while positive load is characterized by high agreeableness and low detachment. Compared to most negative dream content such as distress, dreamers with happy content reported higher adaptive traits and lower maladaptive traits. Conclusions: The emotional load and content of dreams are significantly related to both specific constructs and spectrum factors of adaptive and maladaptive personalities. Psychologists can refer to personality profiles when analysing the emotional load and content of dreams of adults.

“The Ghostly Terrors of the Nursery”: Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu and Childhood Trauma

This essay contends that emotional oscillations between subordination and emancipation are responsible for the inconclusivity and evasiveness of Le Fanu’s plots, which critics often emphasise but rarely try to explain. The parallels between, on the one hand, the dual structures that pervade Le Fanu’s works and, on the other, the binaries of latent dream thoughts and manifest dream content, the familiar and the uncanny, which Sigmund Freud employs in his explorations of the unconscious, shed significant light on the motivational forces at work in Le Fanu’s oeuvre. Le Fanu uses displacement and condensation, the major operations Freud attributes to dream work, to create an outside world, which reveals itself as an upended world within. This essay tries to demonstrate the psychological significance of central motifs in Le Fanu’s works, such as the double and the closed room. In light of later psychoanalytical insights into the influence of childhood traumatisation on the creativity of writers, Le Fanu appears absorbed by the incorporation of his innermost mortifications and yearnings into the defamiliarisations of his fiction. On the basis of Gothic patterns, he produces psychological fiction avant la lettre. He anticipates George Orwell’s dissection of mental processes in terms of manipulative social engineering, H.P. Lovecraft’s fantastic evocations of a Jungian collective unconscious, and literary interiorisation by modernist techniques, developed not long after Le Fanu’s death by the likes of James Joyce and Virginia Woolf.