Sleep
August 12, 2020
Carlo Cipolli, Fabio Pizza, Claudia Bellucci et al.
People with narcolepsy type 1 recalled detailed dream experiences after 75% of naps that included sleep onset REM periods (SOREMPs) and after 25% of naps without REM sleep. Story-grammar analysis showed that dreams from daytime SOREMP naps are organized as hierarchically ordered sequences of events, called dream-stories, which are longer and more complex in the first and fourth SOREMP naps and comparable in structure to dreams from nighttime REM sleep. This similar structural organization suggests that the cognitive processes underlying dreaming are highly, though not uniformly, effective during daytime SOREMP sleep, and investigating these dreams may clarify links between brain physiology and psychological processes in REM dreaming.
Frontiers in Neuroscience
January 1, 2020
Carlo Cipolli, Fabio Pizza, Claudia Bellucci et al.
People with narcolepsy type 1 (NT1) report dreams after about 80% of naps that begin with REM sleep (SOREMP naps), as often as healthy people report dreams after nighttime REM sleep. However, after NREM naps, NT1 patients report dreams only about 30% of the time, compared to 60% for healthy subjects. This study tested whether the low NREM dream recall in NT1 is due to a failure to generate dreams or a failure to recall them. Seventeen NT1 patients and 25 subjects with excessive daytime sleepiness took multiple daytime naps and reported dreams, white dreams (sense of having dreamed but no content), or no dreams. White dreams were more frequent in NT1 patients (42.86% vs. 17.
Brain Research Bulletin
January 15, 2010
Michela Mazzetti, Claudia Bellucci, Katia Mattarozzi et al.
People with narcolepsy-cataplexy (NC) produce longer and more complex dream reports after the first REM period of the night than healthy controls, suggesting their dream-generation cognitive processes reach optimal functioning earlier. In a study of 14 NC patients and matched controls, dream recall rates were similar (about 90%), but NC patients' spontaneous reports after the first REM awakening were longer and more structurally complex, and half also provided prompted reports of additional dream content. After the third REM awakening, both groups gave prompted reports at similar rates. The findings indicate that in NC the brain mechanisms for constructing dream narratives become fully active earlier in the night, and raise the question of whether prompted and spontaneous reports describe the same or different dreams.
Brain Research Bulletin
October 22, 2008
Carlo Cipolli, Claudia Bellucci, Katia Mattarozzi et al.
People with narcolepsy with cataplexy (NC) experience longer and more complex dream stories during the first REM sleep period of the night compared to healthy individuals. Dream recall rates were similar between groups, at about 85%. The findings suggest that the cognitive processes that generate dreams reach their optimal functioning earlier in the night in NC patients than in normal subjects.
Journal of Sleep Research
December 1, 2004
Carlo Cipolli, Igino Fagioli, Michela Mazzetti et al.
Presleep stimuli are often incorporated into dream contents. A study of 12 participants tested whether such incorporation improves memory consolidation. Participants memorized nonsense sentences before each sleep onset during a night, reported dreams and recalled sentences after each REM awakening, and gave unexpected morning reports. Dream reports were parsed into content units. Night reports more often contained valid incorporations than pseudo-incorporations. Content units common to night and morning reports—indicating better consolidation—were significantly more frequent for incorporated contents than for other contents. However, recall of words from incorporated sentences was not significantly better. The findings partially support a generation effect operating during sleep, benefiting retention of actively processed information.