Emotions in the Diary and REM Dreams of Young and Late Adulthood Women and Their Relation to Life Satisfaction.

Expanding on studies of the incidence and valence of emotions in dreams and their relationship with waking life satisfaction, home and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep dreams were collected from 30 late adulthood and 28 young women who had filled out a life satisfaction scale. Four positive and 4 negative dream emotions were self-rated. Both groups reported more emotions, with greater intensity, in home dreams than in REM dreams, particularly the older group. Regardless of age, intensity of negative emotions was lower in laboratory dreams than in home dreams, but there was no difference for positive emotions. The older women's home dreams had fewer negative emotions, with lower intensity, than did the young women's. Life satisfaction did not differ between age groups and was not significantly related to dream emotions. These results reinforce the distinction between home and laboratory dreams and question the relation between dream emotions and life satisfaction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dream emotions, waking emotions, personality characteristics and well-being--A positive psychology approach.

The study aimed to discover whether personality characteristics and waking emotions relate to dreaming emotions. There were 123 participants, ranging in age from 17 to 82 years. It was hypothesized that participants with significant positive emotional trait and state ratings in waking life would experience more positive dreams. Data collection utilized diaries and questionnaires, including Hartmann's Boundary Questionnaire, IPIP Emotional Stability Scale, Staats' Hope Scale, Adult Dispositional Hope Scale, and the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule to assess personality and attitudinal characteristics. Participants recorded and rated their waking and dream emotions over a 3-week period. Median correlations between corresponding waking and dream emotions were .58 for positive emotions and .47 for negative emotions. There were also low, but significant correlations between some personality characteristics and participants' tendency to experience positive or negative emotions in dreams. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Predictors of Outcome of Dream Interpretation Sessions: Volunteer Client Characteristics, Dream Characteristics, and Type of Interpretation

105 volunteer clients completed single sessions of dream interpretation using the Hill (1996) model, with half randomly assigned to waking life interpretation and the other half to parts of self interpretation in the insight stage of the Hill model. No differences were found between waking life and parts of self interpretations, suggesting that therapists can use either type of dream interpretation. Volunteer clients who had positive attitudes toward dreams and presented pleasant dreams had better session outcome; in addition, volunteer clients who had pleasant dreams gained more insight into their dreams. Results suggest that therapists doing single sessions of dream interpretation need to be cautious about working with dreams when volunteer clients have negative attitudes toward dreams and present unpleasant dreams.     

Ordinary and Recurrent Dream Recall of Active, Past and Non-recurrent Dreamers During and After Academic Stress

The role of stress in the onset and frequency of recurrent dreams was investigated by comparing dream recall of students undergoing naturalistic stress conditions. Thirty nine students in active, past and non-recurrent dream groups (n = 13) recorded frequency of nights per week involving overall and recurrent dream recall in the week prior to mid-term examinations and in a neutral study week in second semester. Self-report measures of everyday hassles and uplifts, anxiety and positive and negative affect experienced during these conditions were also collected. Anxiety and negative affect were reported as significantly higher in the pre-examination week. Overall the groups reported dreams on significantly more nights in the pre-examination week than the post examination week. Recurrent dream nights increased during the stress week for the active recurrent dream group but there was no change in recurrent dream recall for the other groups. These findings are consistent with theories that the experience of emotional stress is a critical factor in the onset and persistence of recurrent dreams.     

The Home Dreams and Waking Fantasies of Boys and Girls Between Ages 9 and 15: A Longitudinal Study

In this longitudinal developmental study, 12 boys and 12 girls provided home dreams and waking fantasies at 3 age levels: 9–11, 11–13, and 13–15. A total of 299 dreams and 286 fantasies were coded by 2 independent raters using Hall and Van de Castle (1966) content categories. In addition, word counts and bizarreness ratings were completed. There were very few changes in the dreams or waking fantasies of either boys or girls, but dream reports were longer at ages 13–15, the aggression/friendliness percent increased over the course of the study, joint-sex peer groups became more frequent, and girls showed a decline in animal percent. The tendency in a wide range of societies for men to dream mostly about other men and for women to dream equally of women and men was found in both the dreams and waking fantasies. Dreams and fantasies differed markedly, with dreams containing more outdoor and unfamiliar settings, and more bizarreness. In dreams the children tended to portray themselves as victims of aggression and recipients of friendliness, but in fantasies they took a more active role as aggressors and befrienders. It is suggested that the children in this study portrayed themselves in their dreams as they conceived of themselves in everyday life, while in their waking fantasies they imagined themselves as they would have liked to be.     

Assessing the dream-lag effect for REM and NREM stage 2 dreams

This study investigates evidence, from dream reports, for memory consolidation during sleep. It is well-known that events and memories from waking life can be incorporated into dreams. These incorporations can be a literal replication of what occurred in waking life, or, more often, they can be partial or indirect. Two types of temporal relationship have been found to characterize the time of occurrence of a daytime event and the reappearance or incorporation of its features in a dream. These temporal relationships are referred to as the day-residue or immediate incorporation effect, where there is the reappearance of features from events occurring on the immediately preceding day, and the dream-lag effect, where there is the reappearance of features from events occurring 5-7 days prior to the dream. Previous work on the dream-lag effect has used spontaneous home recalled dream reports, which can be from Rapid Eye Movement Sleep (REM) and from non-Rapid Eye Movement Sleep (NREM). This study addresses whether the dream-lag effect occurs only for REM sleep dreams, or for both REM and NREM stage 2 (N2) dreams. 20 participants kept a daily diary for over a week before sleeping in the sleep laboratory for 2 nights. REM and N2 dreams collected in the laboratory were transcribed and each participant rated the level of correspondence between every dream report and every diary record. The dream-lag effect was found for REM but not N2 dreams. Further analysis indicated that this result was not due to N2 dream reports being shorter, in terms of number of words, than the REM dream reports. These results provide evidence for a 7-day sleep-dependent non-linear memory consolidation process that is specific to REM sleep, and accord with proposals for the importance of REM sleep to emotional memory consolidation.     

Post-Amputation Pain Is Associated with the Recall of an Impaired Body Representation in Dreams—Results from a Nation-Wide Survey on Limb Amputees

The experience of post-amputation pain such as phantom limb pain (PLP) and residual limb pain (RLP), is a common consequence of limb amputation, and its presence has negative effects on a person’s well-being. The continuity hypothesis of dreams suggests that the presence of such aversive experiences in the waking state should be reflected in dream content, with the recalled body representation reflecting a cognitive proxy of negative impact. In the present study, we epidemiologically assessed the presence of post-amputation pain and other amputation-related information as well as recalled body representation in dreams in a sample of 3,234 unilateral limb amputees. Data on the site and time of amputation, residual limb length, prosthesis use, lifetime prevalence of mental disorders, presence of post-amputation pain, and presence of non-painful phantom phenomena were included in logistic regression analyses using recalled body representation in dreams (impaired, intact, no memory) as dependent variable. The effects of age, sex, and frequency of dream recall were controlled for. About 22% of the subjects indicated that they were not able to remember their body representation in dreams, another 24% of the amputees recalled themselves as always intact, and only a minority of less than 3% recalled themselves as always impaired. Almost 35% of the amputees dreamed of themselves in a mixed fashion. We found that lower-limb amputation as well as the presence of PLP and RLP was positively associated with the recall of an impaired body representation in dreams. The presence of non-painful phantom phenomena, however, had no influence. These results complement previous findings and indicate complex interactions of physical body appearance and mental body representation, probably modulated by distress in the waking state. The findings are discussed against the background of alterations in cognitive processes after amputation and hypotheses suggesting an innate body model.     

Stereotypical Gender-Based Emotions Are Not Detectable in Dream Reports

This study reports on the number of feelings evoked in men and women by their dream characters as well as on the relative frequency of different kinds of feelings. Thirty-five subjects recorded 320 dreams over a two-week period, submitted dream reports and a dream log of all characters that appeared in their dreams as well as any feelings involving the characters. We found that feelings were pervasive in dreams and that they were evoked by over 80% of a subject's dream characters. Further, negative and positive emotions were balanced for both men and women. We found no significant differences in the number or in the profile of feelings in men and women's dreams. The reasons for this are discussed in terms of a continuity hypothesis across dream and wake states or, on the contrary, that feelings expressed in dreams may be independent of learned gender differences.     

The Dreams of Blind Men and Women: A Replication and Extension of Previous Findings

Drawing on a sample of 372 dreams from 15 blind adults, we present two separate analyses that replicate and extend findings from previous studies. The first analysis employed DreamSearch, a software program designed for use with dream narratives, to examine the appearance of the five sensory modalities. It revealed that those blind since birth or very early childhood had (1) no visual imagery and (2) a very high percentage of gustatory, olfactory, and tactual sensory references. The second analysis found that both male and female participants differed from their sighted counterparts in the same ways on several Hall and Van de Castle (1966) coding categories, including a high percentage of locomotion/transportation dreams that contained at least one dreamer-involved misfortune. The findings on sensory references and dreamer-involved misfortunes in locomotion/transportation dreams are interpreted as evidence for the continuity between dream content and waking cognition.     

Contextualizing Images in Dreams: More Intense After Abuse and Trauma

A contextualizing image (CI) is a powerful central image in a dream which can be seen as picturing, or providing a picture-context for, the dominant emotion of the dreamer. Thus the paradigmatic dream, I was overwhelmed by a tidal wave, contextualizes the dominant emotion of fear/terror or helplessness. This study examined the question of whether CIs, scored on a blind basis, are especially frequent and intense in persons who have suffered abuse, and in persons who have suffered a recent acute trauma.Two sets of dream data were studied. A single most recent dream was obtained from each of 306 students. The contextualizing image (CI) score measuring presence and intensity of a contextualizing image, scored on a blind basis, was higher among students who reported any abuse (physical or sexual, childhood or recent) compared to those who reported no abuse.Second, a total of 451 dreams were collected in periods after trauma from ten persons who had experienced a variety of different acute traumas. In four of the ten cases, a series of dreams before as well as immediately after trauma were available. In all four of these, the CI score was higher after trauma than before, but the difference was statistically significant in only one case. The CI scores in the ten trauma subjects overall were found to be significantly higher than the CI scores in the overall student group. In each of the ten trauma cases, the mean CI score was higher than the mean CI score of the student group. The differences were even greater, with higher t values, when the 10 trauma cases were compared with the group of students who had reported no abuse. Since the student group differed greatly from the trauma group in sex distribution, age, and other ways, an age and gender matched subgroup of the students was formed. CI scores in the trauma group were significantly higher than in this matched control group.The emotions rated as contextualized by the dream images tended towards more negative than positive emotions. Fear/terror and helplessness/vulnerability were especially prominent. However, this was true in the dreams of students who reported no abuse, as well as those of students who reported abuse and the dreams of the group who had experienced trauma. The students who reported abuse tended to picture less of the positive emotions. Only the two most severely traumatized of the traumas cases showed an unusual amount of terror and helplessness contextualized. Overall, the CI score—representing intensity of the image—differentiated the groups better than did the type of emotion.     

Dream Imagery and Emotion.

The relationship between prominent visual imagery and emotion within dreams was investigated in relation to E. Hartmann's (1996) contextualizing image (CI) theory and M. Seligman and A. Yellen's (1987) dual imagery theory. Fifty-nine students recorded dreams over a 2-week period and submitted 115 dreams for analysis. Participants recorded ratings of emotion type and emotion intensity in each scene. Prominent visual images were identified and scored for intensity and detail by independent judges. As hypothesized from Hartmann's theory, there was a significant positive relationship between CI intensity and emotion intensity in the CI scene, emotion intensity generally peaked in the CI scene, and dreams containing a CI had higher overall ratings of emotion intensity than non-CI dreams. The result for the correlation of detail of prominent imagery with emotion was inconclusive, with a low positive correlation across CI scenes. This raises the possibility that the CI is not a unitary construct. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

内侧额叶负波受负性情绪下责任感影响：最后通牒任务的ERP研究

采用事件相关电位技术探讨人脑的内侧额叶负波在最后通牒任务中是否受不同情绪状态的影响并且其差异是否与责任感这一人格特质有关.结果发现,相对于负性情绪及公平情境,MFN的波幅在正性情绪和不公平情境中显著较大;相对于正性情绪和公平情境,在负性情绪和不公平情境中责任感人格维度得分越高,MFN波幅越正.结果表明,MFN反映的是对决策情境的认知评价且正性情绪更有利于对决策情境的觉知;责任感通过削弱由不利情境带来的认知反应来压制个体对于决策情境的敏感性,以追求更好的决策结果.这为MFN在真实的社会互动任务中表现出来的差异提供了具有较高生态学效度的神经电理学证据.     

Attachment styles and emotional content, stress, and conflict in dreams of romantic partners.

Expanding on previous research investigating the link between dreams and attachment, participants in committed dating relationships were recruited to fill out dream diaries for 1 week. It was hypothesized that when dreaming about romantic partners (attachment figures), dream content would vary by attachment style, such that insecurely attached individuals would experience a different quality of dream, emotionally and cognitively. At Time 1, participants completed a self-report measure of attachment style, and then completed a dream diary at home each morning for 7 days. Dreams that contained romantic partners were coded by double-blind research assistants for emotional content, with a focus on attachment-related emotions and stressful expressions. Anxious-attached and avoidant-attached participants experienced significantly more stress and conflict, and scored significantly higher on specific emotions such as anxiety and jealousy in such dreams. Secure scores did not correlate with any specific or general emotion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A reply to Hobson (2005).

J. A. Hobson's (2005) commentary merely repeats his past theoretical assertions (see record 2005-02950-002). It asks questions that rest on the refuted hypothesis that real dreaming occurs only in REM sleep and that are already answered in the author's critique. Despite many studies, there is still no evidence that neurophysiological changes during REM are responsible for any unique formal features in dreams. As for the psychological consequences of the neuromodulatory environment during REM, there are no studies. Most important, Hobson overlooks a key point in regard to a new neurocognitive approach to dreams: The many parallels between dreaming and waking cognition raise the intriguing possibility that relatively small changes from waking to sleeping can account for the unique features of dreams, rendering his REM-based speculations irrelevant. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dream relevance and the continuity hypothesis: Believe it or not?

The dream-related beliefs of two university samples were surveyed and analyzed: (a) the belief that dreams contain important information; and (b) the belief that dreams reflect aspects of waking life. In addition, this study investigated the relationships between dream-related beliefs and both dream content and waking life measures of health, mood, and self-construal. The majority of participants maintained the belief that dreams contain important information, and participants were most likely to believe that dreams reflect relationships and decisions being made. Those believing that dreams reflect their spirituality scored higher on metapersonal self-construal and reported fewer deaths in their dreams. In contrast, those maintaining the belief that dreams reflect physical health scored lower on physical functioning and reported more body parts in their dreams. Within this demographic, findings suggest a common belief in dream relevance and waking-dreaming continuity. Further research is needed in order to fully account for possible sources of these beliefs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotions before, during, and after dreaming sleep.

The aim of this study was to provide a preliminary overview of the emotions before, during, and after dreaming sleep in Chinese people. One hundred Chinese participants were included in the study. Cheerful emotions, including interest, exhilaration, and enjoyment, were pervasive in the collected dreams, although anxiety was also a common type of emotion. Positive correlations were found between the intensities of dream, presleep, and postsleep emotions. Significant reductions in intensity were noted in the analyses of emotions preceding dreaming sleep versus emotions following dreaming sleep. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Erythrocyte agglomeration and survival studies in citrate-phosphate-dextrose (CPD) units.

We have previously reported increased tendency to agglomeration in CPD-stored erythrocytes. In the present study we investigated the deterioration pattern of fresh units, as detected by agglomeration, free hemoglobin levels, ATP levels, osmotic fragility, and certain enzymatic activities. When the negative test was converted to a positive one, the 24-h survival values of these units were determined by autotransfusion. A positive agglomeration occurred while viability was still above 70%. Fresh units had high ATP levels and negative agglomeration while old units had low ATP levels and positive agglomeration. However, in intermediate-storage units, no definite correlation between ATP and agglomeration was found. Agglomeration seems to reflect the degree of changes in stored erythrocytes. However, further studies are needed before this test may serve for prediction of post-transfusion viability.     

Alterations in copper and collagen metabolism in the Menkes syndrome and a new subtype of the Ehlers-Danlos syndrome

Cultured fibroblasts of 13 patients with the Menkes syndrome and two with a new subtype (type IX) of the Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (E-D IX patients) showed many very similar abnormalities in their copper and collagen metabolism. Both cell types had markedly increased copper concentrations and 64Cu incorporation, and this cation accumulated in metallothionein or a metallothionein-like protein, as previously established for Menkes cells. Histochemical staining indicated that copper was distributed diffusely throughout the cytoplasm in both cell types, this location being consistent with the accumulation in metallothionein. Both fibroblast types also had markedly low lysyl oxidase activity and distinctly increased extractability of newly synthesized collagen, whereas no abnormalities were present in cell viability, duplication rate, prolyl 4-hydroxylase activity, or collagen synthesis rate. A high negative correlation (P less than 0.001) was found in the pooled group of Menkes and E-D IX cells between cellular copper concentration (r = 0.804) or 64Cu incorporation (r = 0.863) and the logarithm of lysyl oxidase activity. There was also a high positive correlation (P less than 0.001) between cellular copper concentration and incorporation (r = 0.869). One of the two E-D IX patients was also shown to have similar changes in lysyl oxidase activity and collagen extractability in the skin biopsy specimen, suggesting that the abnormalities observed in cultured cells are similar to those present in vivo. The only distinct abnormality found in the cells of the parents of the E-D IX patients was an increased 64Cu incorporation in those of the mother, this finding being consistent with X-linked inheritance of the disorder.     

Lucid dreaming frequency and change blindness performance.

There are reports of lucid dreaming being cued by the recognition that a dream event is bizarre from the point of view of waking life. However, for dreams in general, there is a lack of ability to notice or question bizarre occurrences. A waking-life analog of this inability is here proposed to be change blindness. In change blindness tasks, a prominent alteration to a photograph occurs repeatedly, but it is rare for these changes to be spotted immediately. It was hypothesized that lucid dreamers would perform better on change blindness tasks than would nonlucid dreamers. Contrary to the hypothesis, individuals who reported having lucid dreams more than once per month (n = 13), occasional lucid dreamers (n = 13), and nonlucid dreamers (n = 12) were found not to differ significantly on performance on 6 change blindness tasks. How the usually proficient unconscious detection of errors during waking life is disabled during dreams remains to be determined, but it does not seem from the results here to have a simple relationship with the waking-life phenomenon of change blindness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Effects of Menstrual Cycle on Dreaming

In this study we have investigated the effect that the menstrual cycle has on dreams, sleep quality and mood. A total of 16 women, university students, with a regular menstrual cycle of 28 days, not on any form of hormonal treatment were tested over five weeks. Methods of diary of dreams, daily self-evaluation of mood and weekly self-assessment of quality of sleep were adopted. Mood scores varied significantly during the menstrual cycle (p < 0.05) with improvement of mood around the time of ovulation and worsening during the pre-menstrual phase of the cycle. Sleep quality did not vary significantly during the menstrual cycle. During the pre-ovulatory phase of the cycle dreams had the highest levels of incongruity (p < 0.05), number of positive emotions (p < 0.0005), number of male-non-self-characters (p < 0.005) and erotic content (p < 0.001). While during the pre-menstrual phase dreams were longer (p < 0.05) and with a larger number of female characters (p < 0.005) and of negative emotions (p < 0.0005). These results suggest that the hormonal variations during the menstrual cycle may have an effect on dreaming. Both the preovulatory oestrogen peak and the presence of progesterone during the luteal phase may enhance memory processes involved in the dream production.