Patterns of Occurrence of Four States of Consciousness as a Function of Trait Absorption.
Journal for person-oriented research 2019 DOI: 10.17505/jpor.2019.03 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Cross-sectional study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 251 |
| Population | Convenience sample of participants who completed a battery of questionnaires |
| Topics | Lucid dreaming |
| Keywords | Obe Absorption Differentiation Hypnagogic Hypnopompic |
| Citations | 7 |
| Key findings | Higher Absorption increases differentiation among these states when comparing participants just below and just above the median, but very high Absorption decreases differentiation relative to very low Absorption. |
Abstract
Four states of consciousness are considered here: the hypnagogic state (the transitional state between waking and sleeping); the hypnopompic state (the transitional state between sleeping and waking); lucid dreaming (insight to the fact that one is currently dreaming); and the out-of-the-body experience (perceiving the world from a location outside the physical body). There are different patterns of occurrence of experience with these states of consciousness, and the present data set deriving from a cross-sectional study (a convenience sample comprising 251 participants who had completed a battery of questionnaires, as reported in Glicksohn & Barrett, 2003), enables one to plot these configurations. There are two contrasting positions on the relationship that trait Absorption will bear on the pattern of occurrence of these different profiles of subjective experience, or configuration of profiles of states. One is that higher Absorption will entail more differentiation among these states of consciousness; the other is that higher Absorption will entail less differentiation among these states. Both positions find support in the present data set: higher Absorption entails more differentiation as one moves from those respondents scoring slightly lower than the median to those scoring slightly higher than the median on Absorption, whereas very high Absorption entails less differentiation relative to very low Absorption.
Comparable studies
Other cross-sectional and survey studies on lucid dreaming, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Phenomenology of Lucid Dreaming: An Online Survey Respondents to an online survey about lucid dreams | 2014 | Online survey | n = 684 |
| Frequency of Lucid Dreaming in a Representative German Sample Representative sample of German adults | 2011 | Cross-sectional survey | n = 919 |
| Lucid dreaming: an age‐dependent brain dissociation Students aged 6-19 years | 2012 | Survey | |
| Terror and bliss? Commonalities and distinctions between sleep paralysis, lucid dreaming, and their associations with waking life experiences Adults aged 18–82 years | 2016 | Cross-sectional survey | n = 1,928 |
| Increased Lucid Dreaming Frequency in Narcolepsy Patients diagnosed with narcolepsy and healthy control subjects | 2015 | Cross-sectional study | n = 979 |
Citations in the library
Cited by 6
- Immersion, Absorption, and Spiritual Experience: Some Preliminary Findings. Frontiers in Psychology 2020
- Inner Navigation and Theta Activity: From Movement to Cognition and Hypnosis According to the Sphere Model of Consciousness IntechOpen eBooks June 26, 2020
- Conscious entry into sleep: Yoga Nidra and accessing subtler states of consciousness. Progress in Brain Research 2023
- The neurobiology of altered states of consciousness induced by drumming and other rhythmic sound patterns. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences July 16, 2025
- Examining the Relation Between Practicing Meditation and Having Peak Experiences and Lucid Dreams. A Cross-Sectional Study. Frontiers in Psychology 2022
and 1 more in the library
Cites 14
- The entropic brain: a theory of conscious states informed by neuroimaging research with psychedelic drugs Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 2014
- Psychedelics, Meditation, and Self-Consciousness Frontiers in Psychology September 4, 2018
- Prediction of Psilocybin Response in Healthy Volunteers PLoS One February 17, 2012
- Lucid dreaming incidence: A quality effects meta-analysis of 50 years of research Consciousness and Cognition June 20, 2016
- The incidence and determinants of visual phenomenology during out-of-body experiences Cortex June 6, 2008
and 9 more in the library