Do individuals with disorders of consciousness dream and mind wander? Implications for improving diagnosis and understanding patient wellbeing.
Jasmine Walter, Thomas Andrillon, Jennifer Windt
Neuroscience of Consciousness 2025 DOI: 10.1093/nc/niaf022 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Review Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | Patients with disorders of consciousness |
| Topics | Dreaming |
| Keywords | Disorders of consciousness Local sleep Mind wandering Spontaneous thought |
| Key findings | Spontaneous thoughts and experiences such as mind wandering and dreaming may occur in patients with disorders of consciousness, with important implications for diagnosis and quality of life. |
Abstract
Fluctuations in the presence, experiential quality and contents of consciousness occur naturally during sleep and wakefulness and are core features of the healthy human mind. The purpose of this article is to consider the possibility that such fluctuations, including mind wandering and dreaming, which we refer to collectively as spontaneous thoughts and experiences (STE), may also be important elements of experience in certain patients with disorders of consciousness (DoC). The presence of these states may have urgent implications for DoC diagnosis, which centres on the detection of consciousness. Furthermore, learning more about STE in DoC may provide insight into subjective experience and quality of life in DoC, about which little is currently known. Given the challenges that exist in studying conscious experience in this population, much of the evidence about STE we consider is indirect and involves triangulation from the healthy population and other brain-injured patients. The evidence we consider is inconclusive, but it indicates that the occurrence of mind wandering and dreaming in DoC is a real possibility that, because of its important implications in these patients, requires further research. We argue that, given the possible life-or-death consequences of diagnosis in DoC, it is of pressing importance to use diagnostic measures that are sensitive to these internally directed forms of conscious experience. We also consider some lines of research that may deepen our understanding of STE in DoC, and how further knowledge about these states may impact inferences about quality of life in this population.
Comparable studies
Other narrative reviews on dreaming, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| The cognitive neuroscience of lucid dreaming | 2019 | Review | |
| Sleep and dreaming are for important matters | 2013 | Review | |
| Nightmare Disorder and Isolated Sleep Paralysis | 2020 | Review | |
| My Dream, My Rules: Can Lucid Dreaming Treat Nightmares? | 2019 | Review | |
| Dream Recall: State or Trait Variable? Part I: Model, Theories, Methodology and Trait Factors | 1996 | Review |
Citations in the library
Cites 38
- The Brain's Default Mode Network Annual Review of Neuroscience May 4, 2015
- Detecting Awareness in the Vegetative State Science September 7, 2006
- Breakdown of Cortical Effective Connectivity During Sleep Science September 29, 2005
- A Theoretically Based Index of Consciousness Independent of Sensory Processing and Behavior Science Translational Medicine August 14, 2013
- Stratification of unresponsive patients by an independently validated index of brain complexity Annals of Neurology September 22, 2016
and 33 more in the library