Individual and Situational Predictors of Threatening Dream Content During the COVID ‐19 Pandemic
Ville Loukola, Jarno Tuominen, Eveliina Malinen, Katariina Tienhaara, Henri Olkoniemi, Antti Revonsuo, Katja Valli
Journal of Sleep Research April 2, 2026 DOI: 10.1111/jsr.70336 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Prospective observational study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | Finnish adults |
| Topics | Anxiety Dreaming |
| Keywords | Situational ethics Dream Experience sampling method Life satisfaction Depression economics Rumination Clinical psychology Developmental psychology Trait anxiety Mental health |
| Key findings | Individual factors, especially lower life satisfaction and fewer positive emotions, are better predictors of threatening dream content than situational factors. |
Abstract
Previous studies have examined how the COVID-19 pandemic affected dream recall, dream content, and nightmares. However, relatively little attention has been devoted to the individual and situational factors associated with pandemic-induced changes in dreams. The threat simulation theory of dreaming predicts that threatening situations in our waking life (situational factors) influence threatening dream content. At the same time, individual differences predispose some people to be more prone to experiencing threatening dreams more frequently than others. Using a large Finnish sample of prospective dream diaries, we analysed the relative importance of individual (e.g., belonging to a COVID-19 risk group, life satisfaction, depression and anxiety symptoms) and situational factors (e.g., daily COVID-19 worry, COVID-19 media consumption, negative and positive emotions) to determine the best predictors for threatening events and COVID-19-related threatening events in dreams. Random forest analyses revealed that individual factors were consistently better predictors than situational factors for both threatening events and pandemic-related threatening events in dreams. Lower life satisfaction was the only statistically significant predictor of threatening events and experiencing fewer positive emotions in the past 2 weeks was the only statistically significant predictor of pandemic-related threatening events in dreams. These findings suggest that the propensity to experience threatening dream content, including pandemic-related threatening events, is more of a stable trait rather than a daily fluctuating feature of dreams. In light of the threat simulation theory, it could be argued that individual variation in the proneness to simulate threatening events adaptively interacts with daily experiences to modulate threatening dream content.
Comparable studies
Other observational and cohort studies on dreaming, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lucid Dreaming: a State of Consciousness with Features of Both Waking and Non-Lucid Dreaming Student volunteers trained to become lucid and signal lucidity with horizontal eye... | 2009 | Observational study | n = 6 |
| Nightmare Prevalence, Nightmare Distress, and Self-Reported Psychological Disturbance Young adults with a mean age of 20 years | 2002 | Prospective observational study | n = 116 |
| Long-term effects of extreme situational stress on sleep and dreaming Survivors of traumatic events who complained of sleep disturbances, compared with... | 1987 | Case-control study | n = 11 |
| The relationship of nightmare frequency and nightmare distress to well‐being Adults who reported dreams | 2004 | Observational cohort | n = 147 |
| Dreaming in NREM Sleep: A High-Density EEG Study of Slow Waves and Spindles Healthy human subjects | 2018 | Observational cohort | n = 14 |
Citations in the library
Cites 14
- Aetiology and treatment of nightmare disorder: State of the art and future perspectives Journal of Sleep Research January 29, 2019
- Questionnaires and diaries as research instruments in dream research: Methodological issues. Dreaming March 1, 2002
- Dream content and psychological well-being: A longitudinal study of the continuity hypothesis Journal of Clinical Psychology 2005
- Practicing a Motor Task in a Lucid Dream Enhances Subsequent Performance: A Pilot Study The Sport Psychologist June 1, 2010
- Dreaming and the COVID-19 pandemic: A survey in a U.S. sample. Dreaming September 1, 2020
and 9 more in the library