Evidence that non-dreamers do dream: a REM sleep behaviour disorder model.
Journal of Sleep Research December 1, 2015 Bastien Herlin, Smaranda Leu-Semenescu, Charlotte Chaumereuil et al.
People who report never dreaming actually do produce dreams but fail to recall them. Among 289 patients with rapid eye movement sleep behaviour disorder (RBD), a condition where people act out their dreams, eight (2.8%) reported no dream recall for at least 10 years, including four who had never recalled a dream in their lifetime. Despite this, all eight non-recallers exhibited daily or near-nightly complex, scenic, dreamlike behaviours and speeches during REM sleep, such as arguing, fighting, and speaking, both by report and on video-polysomnography. They did not recall dreams even after sudden awakenings from REM sleep. These non-recallers did not differ cognitively, clinically, or in sleep measures from matched dream-recallers with RBD. The findings provide strong evidence that non-recallers produce dreams but do not recall them.