Continuity Hypothesis Of Dreaming Research Articles

Postmemory dreaming: Nightmares of war in third‐generation descendants of Polish and Russian survivors of World War II

AbstractVarious manifestations of intergenerational memory transmission have been discussed in many scientific fields. Surprisingly, little attention has been paid to these phenomena in the context of dreams. Yet, the sphere of dreaming seems the most informative illustration of how the tragic past influenced the second and third‐generation descendants of trauma survivors. Based on my talks with two descendants of WWII survivors—a Russian woman and a Polish man—I define “postmemory dreams” as night visions affected by cultural representations of historical events. The theoretical background of my study is Hirsch's concept of postmemory, Hall's continuity hypothesis of dreaming, and anthropological dream research. Postmemory dreams reflect and are shaped by the ethos of remembering and commemorating the war—the ethos often imposed by political forces and propaganda—in which the dreamers live. In the cases of my interviewees, these are the Polish ethos of victimhood and the Russian ethos of heroism.

Dreaming during the COVID-19 lockdown: a comparison of Italian adolescents and adults.

Based on the continuity hypothesis of dreaming, we have studied the effects of lockdown measures on Italian adolescents’ and adults’ dreams during the first wave of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. A sample of 475 subjects (73.9% women; 48.4% adolescents; ages 12-70 years, M=25.10, SD=12.2) was recruited via the Internet between April 17, 2020 and May 18, 2020. Participants were asked to provide socio-demographic data, as well as to report their Most Recent Dream. Results indicated that adults’ dreams were the longest, as well as characterized by higher emotional intensity, predominantly negative emotions, and a higher presence of sensory impressions. Furthermore, results indicated that the participants, especially adolescents, who were most directly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic reported the strongest effects on their dreams. Results also indicated that women recall dreams more often than men, in addition to reporting higher emotional intensity, predominantly negative emotions, and a higher presence of sensory impressions. Finally, results of the Thematic Analysis of Elementary Contexts showed that adults’ dreams seem to be centered, above all, on both pleasant memories linked to experiences that are now forbidden (i.e., traveling, meeting friends) as well as on nightmares, while adolescents’ dreams focused on relationships with others. Finally, both adults and adolescents reported dreams related to the experience of home confinement, which they described in terms of the negative emotions they experienced. In sum, the findings of this study indicate that the COVID-19 lockdown measures, understood as a contextual and traumatic event, significantly affect people’s oneiric lives, regardless of age.

Partners and Ex-Partners in Dreams: A Diary Study.

Romantic relationships are an important part of human life and thus, according to the continuity hypothesis of dreaming, one’s romantic partner should show up in dreams quite frequently. The present study is based on 1612 dream reports provided by 425 students. The findings confirmed the hypothesis that partner dreams are more frequent than ex-partner dreams and, thus, support the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. Moreover, interactions with ex-partners within the dream were more often negatively toned compared to dreamed interactions with the partner. Unexpectedly, we also found more positive emotions and friendliness in ex-partner dreams compared to partner dreams, indicating that partner dreams are more mundane. To conclude, dreams reflect important aspects of romantic partnerships and their break-ups and, thus, can be very helpful in psychotherapy.

Animals in Dreams of Children, Adolescents, and Adults: The UK Library Study

Animal dreams have fascinated mankind for ages. Empirical research indicated that children dream more often about animals than adults and dogs, cats, and horses are the most frequent animals that appear within dreams. Moreover, most dreamer-animal interactions are negative. The present study included 4849 participants (6 to 90 yrs. old) reporting 2716 most recent dreams. Overall, 18.30% of these dreams included animals with children reporting more animal dreams that adolescents and adults. The most frequent animals were again dogs, horses, and cats; about 20% of the dream animals were in fact pets of the dreamers. About 30% of the dream animals showed bizarre features, e.g., metamorphosing into humans or other animals, bigger than in real life, or can talk. Taken together, the findings support the continuity hypothesis of dreaming but also the idea that dreams reflect waking-life emotions in a metaphorical and dramatized way. Future studies should focus on eliciting waking-life experiences with animals, e.g., having a pet, animal-related media consumption, and relating these to experiences with animals in dreams.

Adolescents’ dreams under COVID-19 isolation

Based on the continuity hypothesis of dreaming, we have studied the effects of quarantine/isolation on the dreams of Italian adolescents during the time of the COVID-19 pandemic. A sample of 235 subjects (73.2% girls;ages 12–18 years, M = 16.08, SD = 1.7) was involved. Participants were asked to complete part of the MADRE Questionnaire, as well as to report their Most Recent Dream by responding to specific questions related to this dream content (e.g., positive vs. negative emotions, realism/bizarreness, and presence of sensory impressions). Results indicated that participants most strongly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic reported the strongest effects on their dreams, as well as longest dreams. Results also indicated that girls recall dreams more often than boys, in addition to reporting higher emotional intensity, predominantly negative emotions, and more nightmares, including recurrent ones. Finally, the most recent dreams were set in both indoor and outdoor settings, with many family members and friends present. They were marked by strong negative emotions, especially related to dangerous, violent, and frustrating situations. In sum, the findings of this study indicate that the method of quali-quantitative dream content analysis is a very informative approach for studying the effects of significant contextual and catastrophic events on people’s inner lives. © 2021. All Rights Reserved.

“Baby, you can drive my car” – Means of transportation in a long dream series

Using transportation means like cars, public transportation is an important part of modern life style. Thus, it is not unexpected that transportation also plays a significant role in dreams. In a long series (N = 11,463 dreams) of one dreamer (single-case study) about 16% of the dreams included some form of transportation. The dreamer who is driving cars very rarely, dreamed more often about being a co-driver than a driver – in contrast to persons who drive a car regularly, supporting the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. On the other hand, several dreams were “creative”, i.e., don’t reflect any actual waking-life experiences of the dreamer, for example, traveling in a spaceship or submarine. Car trouble dreams were frequent (40% of the car driving dreams) even though the dreamer never experienced car trouble in waking life, e.g., malfunctioning brakes. This supports the idea of Patricia Garfield that this dream type is metaphorically linked to feelings of not being in control in waking life. Very interesting topics for future research would be studying the relationship of “creative” dreams, i.e., dreams that did not reflect directly the actual waking-life experience of the dreamer, and his or her waking life and the possible metaphoric link between car trouble dreams and waking-life stress.

Attributes of the Dream Self related to anxiety upon awakening and its dimensionality

The traditional interpretation of dreams has failed to live up to expectations insofar as it is purported to obtain relevant information for clinical use. Nor does conceiving of dreams as a by-product of the random nature of neuronal processes appear to permit useful information to be obtained from them. In order to verify this point, this study aimed to test the possibility of obtaining valid and reliable information from dream content based on the attributes of the Dream Self; that is, the character of the actual dreamer who appears in the dream. Information was collected from 235 dreams of 169 people with a mean age of 29.8 years. This was achieved with a self-report questionnaire evaluating 186 attributes of the Dream Self. Attributes related to anxiety upon awakening were subjected to exploratory factor analysis. There were 99 attributes related to anxiety upon awakening and with 44 of them it was possible to find a solution with 3 easily interpretable factors. These factors had alpha coefficients of between .78 and .90 and were related to anxiety upon awakening. The results obtained did not support the idea that dreams are a random phenomenon. Furthermore, it was possible to evaluate dreams through 3 dimensions of the Dream Self: Emotional-Social Unease, Threat-Avoidance and Strangeness-Confusion. It was possible to partially explain these dimensions by means of the continuity hypothesis of dreaming and Revonsuo’s (2000) evolutionary theory.

Fever Dreams: An Online Study.

In addition to a large variety of somatic symptoms, fever also affects cognition, sleep, and mood. In an online survey with 164 participants, 100 fever dream reports were submitted. Fever dreams were more bizarre and more negatively toned and included more references to health and temperature perception compared to “normal” most recent dreams – findings that are in line with the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. Future studies should follow up this line of research by conducting diary studies during naturally occurring febrile illnesses and sleep laboratory studies with experimentally induced fever. It would also be very interesting to study the effect of thermal stimulation applied during sleep on dream content. This research helps to understand subjective experiences while sleeping in an extreme condition (elevated body temperature).

Gender Differences in the Dream Content of Children and Adolescents: The UK Library Study

Abstract Although gender differences in the dreams of adults have been studied extensively, large-scale studies in children and adolescents are scarce. The UK Library Study collected 1,995 most recent dreams of children and adolescents. Boys reported more physical aggression and fewer female characters in their dreams, whereas indoor settings were more prominent in girls’ dreams, results that are consistent with the findings in adults and the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. The study indicates that dream content analysis is a valuable tool for studying the inner world of children and adolescents because dreams reflect their waking life experiences, thoughts, and concerns. It would be informative to include measures of waking life aggression, frequency of social contacts, and leisure time activities to provide evidence for direct links between waking and dreaming.

Music and dreams: A review

The purpose of this paper is to review scientific studies of music dreams and also touch the area of creative music dreams, i.e., dreams inspiring new music. Different types of music dream categories will be defined. In large sample, the percentage of music dreams in relation to all remembered dreams ranges from 4% to 8%. The literature indicates that musicians tend to experience more music dreams than non-musicians. The positive correlation between musical activities in waking life and music dream percentage supports the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. Also in line with the continuity hypothesis are the findings that music dreams are more positively toned than dreams in general. As research regarding this topic is still in its infancy, there are several interesting topics for the future studies, e.g., incubating creative music dreams, stimulating the sleeper with music, or the relationship between music and sleep-dependent memory consolidation.

With or without you? Dreaming about the romantic partner – A case study

Romantic relations do not only play a major role in pop songs like the U2 song “With or without you” but also in “real” life. Empirical data support the continuity hypothesis of dreaming as romantic partners are quite prominent in dreams; however, content analytic studies of partner dreams are quite scarce. The present dream series over a four-year time period (included a romantic relationship) of a female dreamer included 132 dream reports. Partner-related activities (sexuality, friendly interactions) are more prominent in dreams with the partner compared to dreams without the partner. After separation, the friendly interactions in partner dreams decreased and negative emotions increased. This single-case study might stimulate research to take a closer look on ex-partner dreams and test whether they are helpful – also within a clinical context (psychotherapy) – in coping with the separation.

Dreams and extraversion: A diary study

Dreams have always been fascinating and were interpreted according to cultural norms and beliefs. Based on the continuity between waking and dreaming, one would expect that personality traits are related to dream content. In the present study, of the 108 participants, mostly psychology students, 91 reported at least one dream in a dream diary for 14 days and all participants completed a questionnaire concerning socio-demographic variables, dream recall frequency and extraversion assessed by the NEO-FFI. As expected, extraverted persons had a higher dream extraversion, thus, confirming the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. In addition, extraverted persons had more physical interactions in their dreams and included more positive emotions. Further research might investigate, for example, how modern social networks including social media affect dream content.

An exploratory study on the relationship between dissociation in waking life and negative contents in dreams

Even though the relationship between nightmare and dissociation is investigated in western populations with mental illness, relevant dream studies in non-patient Chinese population, and about specific type of nightmares, are completely lacking. According to continuity hypothesis of dreaming, nightmares reflect the negative emotion, mental conditions, and symptomatology of waking life. The present study recruited 608 participants without any record of mental disorder from student recruitment day. Five-hundred-and-ninety-eight of them completed the full set of questionnaire about dissociation and nightmare. As expected, the results suggest a significant and positive relationship between dissociative experiences and nightmare frequency or 13 nightmare themes about movement restriction, paranoia of being harm, psychosomatic anxiety, and natural disaster. Not surprisingly, people who have more dissociative experiences during their waking lives may have more nightmares while dreaming. The weakness is that all correlations found are significant but low, and, the nightmare frequency is also low. They would weaken the power of support to continuity hypothesis. Even so, this study will help researchers identify specific dream types of nightmares for further analysis and provoke practitioners’ thought on how studies of dreams are beneficial for mental health.

Nighttime in Dreams

Based on the continuity hypothesis of dreaming, a study was designed to examine whether time of day within the dream was related to dream emotions. A sample of 1,612 dreams reported by 444 participants was analyzed. As predicted, dream scenarios set at nighttime were associated with less positive and more negative emotions compared to dream scenarios set at other times of the day. In order to pursue this line of research, it would be fruitful to study the dreams of persons with specific nighttime fears.

Dreams of a romantic partner in a dream series: Comparing relationship periods with periods of being separated

Being in a relationship is a potent modulator of dream content. The present study analyzed a series of 521 partner dreams recorded over a period of seventeen years. Within in this period, there have been three relationship periods with the same partner. The results are mainly in line with the continuity hypothesis of dreaming, e.g., being separated within the dream was found more often in dreams stemming from the separation periods whereas doing something together occurred more often during relationship periods. The percentage of erotic dreams and the emotional tone of their interactions within the dream did not vary with waking-life relationship status; this might be explained by the effect of waking fantasies on dream content. The exploratory findings regarding composite/merging dream characters including the partner indicate that it might be very fruitful to study these types of dream elements (merges, composite characters, metamorphoses) in more detail because they might give clues to a possible function of dreaming like “weaving in” or integrating new information to adapt to existing cognitive and emotional schemata.

Exploring the dreams of women with breast cancer: Content and meaning of dreams.

This study examined the dreams of 34 women, (17 who had been diagnosed with breast cancer and 17 who had not) and the meaning of their dreams via dream interpretation. Results were compared between those with breast cancer and those without. As expected, the women with breast cancer had dream imagery that specifically reflected their waking day experiences in relevant ways. Furthermore, the significant difference between the two groups provides support for the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. The women with breast cancer had significantly more medical figures, torso imagery, pain, disease reference, and death imagery in their dreams. When examining the meaning of the dreams with dream interpretation, the women with breast cancer had meaning pertinent to their waking life such as insight about their disease, medical events and figures, fear, and death. The women without breast cancer interpreted their dream imagery mainly to be about their romantic relationships, future, stress, family, and friends. This research illustrates that dream imagery is specific and relevant for women with and without breast cancer, and furthermore, that they make meaning of their dream imagery in beneficial ways. Implications and future directions are discussed in relation to dream imagery, interpretation of imagery, and breast cancer.

Sleep, hypothalamus, and stigma

Dear colleagues, The current issue of the European Archives of Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences covers some topics not being at the center of current psychiatric research but nevertheless stimulating and potentially interesting to the field. In a representative German sample of 2,019 persons drawn from households, Schredl [1] investigated nightmare frequency and frequency of various nightmare topics. The five most common themes were falling, being chased, being paralyzed, being late, and the death of close persons. The author concludes that “even though several effects can be explained by the continuity hypothesis of dreaming, further research is needed to investigate the (possible metaphoric) relationship between nightmare topics and waking-life stressors”. Based on four well-described cases, Rossell et al. [2] develop a new cognitive model of delusions. All of these four cases had delusions as a consequence of post-traumatic brain injury without having a prior psychiatric illness. Overall, semantic processing was impaired in the four cases relative to a normative healthy control sample of 32 subjects. The cases performed better on tasks that required categorical identification, relative to the novel production of semantic information, which was poor in all four of the cases. These data are interpreted as preliminary evidence to support the notion of impaired semantic processing in persons with delusions. The dysfunction of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis is connected to the pathophysiology of affective syndromes. In the well done selective overview, Pompili et al. [3] suggest that the overactivity of the HPA axis may well predict the onset of mood disorders and perhaps even suicidal behavior via abnormalities in the serotonergic system. A lot of attention is paid to the hypothalamus in affective disorders, while thalamic dysfunction and structural abnormalities are not a focus of research. In the study by Radenbach et al. [4], however, it was found that lithium treatment seems to have an impact on thalamic volumes in patients with bipolar disorder. Comparing patients with bipolar disorder and controls, no significant difference was found in this parameter, while subdividing the patient group into those treated with lithium compared to those without treatment revealed the above-mentioned difference. The study points to the importance of taking medication into account when researching biological parameters in major psychiatric disorders. Furthermore, it supports the notion of a neuroplastic effect of mood stabilizers and specifically lithium in psychiatric illnesses. The prepulse inhibition (PPI) of the startle reflex is often used as a biological parameter allowing to bridge the gap between psychiatric diseases and their animal models [5]. The paper by Molina et al. [6] explored whether there is a difference between the PPI and neuropsychological deficits in chronic schizophrenia. This study suggests that PPI deficits in schizophrenia may not be contributing to cognitive deficits typical to this illness, although it has to be taken into account that the patients revealed a non-significant PPI decrease. Finally, we want to draw attention to an interesting paper by Rusch et al. [7] exploring links between meritocratic worldviews and stigma. They measured just world believes for self and others as well as endorsement of the Protestant ethic in 85 people with schizophrenia, schizoaffective or affective disorder and in 50 members of the general public. Stigmatizing attitudes toward people with mental illness were assessed by self-report. The Protestant ethic may increase (self-)stigmatizing attitudes; just world believes for oneself, on the other hand, may lead to the unexpected implicit self-blame in stigmatized individuals. The authors conclude that public anti-stigma campaigns and initiatives to reduce self-stigma among people with mental illness should take worldviews into account. Furthermore, self-stigmatization might well be an overlooked finding however decreasing the willingness to seek psychiatric help [8].

Frequency of sport dreams in athletes

Empirical studies largely support the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. For example, it has been shown in past research that sport students dream more often about sports than psychology students do, presumably reflecting their engagement in sport activities and sport theory. The present study tested the hypothesis whether frequency of sport dreams is related to the amount of time spent on waking sport activities for elite athletes. As expected, the amount of time spent with sport activity was directly related to the frequency of sport dreams. Secondly, the amount of competitions was also related. The findings also indicated that other factors such as emotional involvement associated with competitions might be of importance in explaining the relationship between waking activities and dream events. Future studies using longitudinal designs will shed more light on this relationship and will help derive a more precise formulation of the continuity hypothesis.

Nightmare frequency and nightmare topics in a representative German sample

Nightmares are defined as disturbing mental experiences that generally occur during REM sleep and often result in awakening. Whereas the number of publications addressing nightmare frequency and psychopathology, nightmare etiology and treatment is increasing rapidly in the last few years, nightmare content has been studied very rarely in a systematic way, especially in adults. The present study investigated nightmare frequency and the frequency of various nightmare topics in a representative German sample. The five most common themes were falling, being chased, paralyzed, being late, and the deaths of close persons. Even though several effects can be explained by the continuity hypothesis of dreaming, further research is needed to investigate the possible metaphoric relationship between nightmare topics like falling or being chased and waking-life stressors.

Work-related dreams as related to job and life satisfaction in hairdressers

Empirical studies largely support the continuity hypothesis of dreaming. The present study investigated the frequency and the emotional tone of dreams of hairdressers. A relationship was found between daytime mood (job satisfaction) and dream emotions. Life satisfaction that was low, on the other hand, was related to a heightened frequency of work-related dreams. It would be promising to study persons with different professions (stressful and demanding jobs) in order to study the effect of work-related variables and dreaming.