Nightmare Recall Research Articles

Alexithymia and impoverished dream recall in asthmatic patients: Evidence from self-report measures

Early clinical impressions that alexithymia is associated with diminished dream recall have been supported by more recent research. The present study was designed to examine this association using self-report measures and a carefully screened clinical population. Thirty-three male and 43 female asthmatics from an outpatient clinic were administered the Toronto Alexithymia Scale, the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, and a questionnaire concerning retrospective recall of dreams and nightmares. Multiple regression analyses revealed that, among men, dream recall was negatively related to alexithymia, especially to the TAS analytical mode of thinking subscale, independent of age and neuroticism. Among women, dream and nightmare recall were positively correlated with neuroticism. These results are consistent with early clinical observations of pensée opératoire, with some research findings, and with the notion that dream recall may be differentially associated with components of alexithymia in men and women patients.

Developmental changes of parental-reported sleep disturbance symptoms in children with attention deficit disorder

The primary goal of this retrospective study was to assess parental report of current sleep disorders in school-aged attention deficit disorder (ADD) children, as well as recalled sleep problems from when the children were infants (0-12 months) and toddlers (1-3 years). Results of a sleep questionnaire completed by mothers of 48 ADD children and a comparison group of 30 patients with school problems indicate that ADD children were perceived to have significantly more sleep problems and that these problems had onset in infancy. Specific items in the questionnaire which were increased included latency to sleep onset of more than 30 min at least 3 nights per week, fatigue upon awakening, and recall of nightmares. Pediatric clinicians should be alert to possible sleep disorders in children suspected of attention disorders and should consider "sleep hygiene" measures as a component of treatment.

Dream Recall and Attitude toward Dreams

Scores of 46 part-time college students (mean age 25.8 yr., SD = 5.7, 21 women, 24 men) on a 16-item inventory measure of attitudes toward dreams were only weakly related to the students' own estimates of their dream recall frequency in the last 6 mo. (r = .31), and unrelated to a similar estimate of nightmare recall frequency.

Life stress measures and reported frequency of sleep disorders.

Scales to assess nightmare recall frequency and recalled frequency of insomnia-related disorders (sleep onset, sleep-maintenance problems, unrefreshing sleep, and restless sleep) were administered, together with the Social Readjustment Rating Scale of Holmes and Rahe to 170 part-time undergraduate students (mean age 27.4 yr., 97 men, 73 women), and together with the Life Events Inventory of Tennant and Andrews to another sample of 91 part-time undergraduates (mean age 26 yr., 53 men, 37 women). The time span for which life events and sleep disorders were to be assessed was the previous 6 mo. Pearson rs suggested that the relationships of different types of scores for life events (scores for change, for distress, for amount of control over events, weighted and unweighted scores for negative and positive events) to reports of sleep disorders were mostly weak (the largest coefficient was .29) and nonsignificant. Of all life events measures, negative life events listed on the Readjustment Scale were the most closely associated with reports of sleep disorders; all 14 coefficients involving negative events were significant and in the clinically expected direction. Further research is needed to examine whether the size of correlations between events and sleep disorders is related to factors such as readiness to recall and report negative personal experiences.

Reported nightmare frequency in Swiss university students.

Collected data on nightmare recall in 60 Swiss university students (51 men; 9 women; mean age 25.8 yr.; SD = 2.9 yr.). 50% reported having experienced at least one nightmare in the last two years, 36.7% no nightmare within this time span, and 13.3% were unable to remember.