Lucid dreaming—being aware that one is dreaming while still asleep—is rare but can be trained by regularly questioning whether current experience is real or a dream. Virtual reality (VR) scenarios containing dream-like elements enhanced this training. Over four weeks, volunteers who received VR-assisted lucid dreaming training showed significantly greater increases in lucid dreaming than those who received no training. Eye-signal-verified lucid dreams during polysomnography supported these behavioral results. Potential mechanisms include synthetic dream-like experiences, incorporation of VR content into dream imagery as memory cues, and dissociative effects of VR that may amplify lucid dreaming training during wakefulness.
Lucid dreaming, where people experience waking-like self-reflection during dreams, is linked to more wake-like brain activity in the prefrontal cortex. This multi-centre study, combining four investigations, examined whether fragmented sleep increases the chance of lucid dreaming. Results showed that self-reported awakenings, polyphasic sleep schedules, and physiologically measured wake-REM sleep transitions were associated with lucid dreaming. However, neither self-assessed sleep quality nor physiologically measured numbers of awakenings showed an association. The findings suggest a nuanced relationship, where certain types of sleep fragmentation, but not all, may relate to lucid dreaming, and the authors discuss possible causal mechanisms.