Frontiers in Psychology
August 6, 2018
Stuart Fogel, L. Bryan Ray, Valya Sergeeva et al.
37 citations
The extent to which newly learned material is incorporated into dreams is related to individual differences in cognitive abilities. Using a computational linguistic approach to measure semantic similarity between waking experiences and dream reports, the study found that the richness of incorporation of a spatial or motor memory task into early hypnagogic dreams correlated with reasoning abilities (r=0.41), while incorporation into later dreams correlated with verbal abilities (r=0.46). Memory performance improvements were related to dream incorporation (r=0.47) for early but not late dreams, but this relationship was not mediated by cognitive abilities, suggesting a direct link between reasoning and dream incorporation.
Behavioral Sleep Medicine
January 1, 2021
Jason G Ellis, Joseph De Koninck, Célyne Bastien
27 citations
Lucid Dreaming Training for insomnia (LDT-I) may help reduce insomnia severity, anxiety, and depression. In an open-label trial of 48 adults with Insomnia Disorder, participants completed four training modules over two weeks. One month later, insomnia severity, anxious symptomology, and depressive symptomology all showed significant reductions. The effect on insomnia severity was large. The authors caution that these preliminary results require further testing before LDT-I can be established as a non-pharmacological treatment for insomnia.
Brain Sciences
August 10, 2024
Emma Desjardins, Lina Gaber, Emily Larkin et al.
2 citations
Adolescents hospitalized after a suicide attempt reported more frequent nightmares, more negative mood before sleep, during dreams, and in the morning, and dream content with more destructive themes, failures, self-directed aggression, and death-related aggression compared to matched non-suicidal adolescents. In suicidal adolescents, only negative dream mood predicted morning mood, whereas in normative adolescents both positive and negative dream mood predicted subsequent waking affect. The findings suggest that nightmare-reducing therapies could benefit suicidal adolescents who experience frequent nightmares.
Sleep Medicine
April 1, 2016
Alexandra D Pérusse, Joseph De Koninck, Maude Pedneault-Drolet et al.
Patients with primary insomnia have dreams with less positive emotions and more negative content compared to good sleepers, consistent with their waking experiences. In a five-night polysomnography study with 12 patients and 12 controls aged 30–45, dream recall frequency was similar between groups when collected via forced REM-sleep awakenings. Controls' dreams tended to include more positive emotions, while patients' dreams were characterized by more negative elements. Subjectively, controls rated their dreams as more pleasant, joyful, and vivid. Elevated negative dream content was associated with lower sleep efficiency in insomnia. The findings suggest hyperarousal may worsen presleep negative mentation, contributing to poorer sleep quality.
Consciousness and Cognition
December 1, 2011
Reza Amini, Catherine Sabourin, Joseph De Koninck
Adding word associations to a machine learning model improved its ability to automatically score the emotional tone of dream reports. Using a sample of 458 dreams, the model's accuracy for detecting negative emotional tone rose from 59% to 63%, and it achieved 77% accuracy for positive emotional tone for the first time. Word associations were based on how often words co-occur with their definitions in a dictionary and encyclopedia.
Behavioral Sleep Medicine
January 1, 2009
Mélanie St-Onge, Pierre Mercier, Joseph De Koninck
Imagery rehearsal therapy reduced nightmare frequency in children aged 9 to 11 with frequent primary nightmares. Twenty children without PTSD were randomly assigned to treatment or a waiting list. The treated group showed a significant decrease in nightmare frequency compared to the waiting-list group, and this reduction lasted over a 9-month follow-up. Effects on distress after nightmares could not be measured due to few nightmares, and overall nightmare distress was not significantly reduced. The therapy appears promising for reducing nightmare occurrence, though further research is needed to confirm its effect on distress.