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The Dynamics of Affect Across the Wake-Sleep Cycle: From Waking Mind-Wandering to Night-Time Dreaming

Pilleriin Sikka, Katja Valli, Antti Revonsuo, Jarno Tuominen

April 9, 2021 preprint DOI: 10.31234/osf.io/f9av6 (opens in new tab)

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Study at a glance

AI-extracted from the abstract
Characteristics Observational study
Sample size 32
Population Healthy adults
Topics Dreaming
Keywords Affect linguistics Valence chemistry Dream Mind-wandering Wakefulness Consciousness Feeling Developmental psychology Cognition Cognitive psychology Electroencephalography Psychotherapist
Citations 2
Key findings The positivity bias characteristic of waking experiences decreases across the wake-sleep continuum, and conclusions about affective nature depend on whether self-ratings or verbal reports are analyzed.

Abstract

Affective experiences occur across the wake-sleep cycle—from active wakefulness to resting wakefulness (i.e., mind-wandering or daydreaming) to sleep (i.e., dreaming). Yet, we know little about the dynamics of affective experiences across these states. Here, we investigated the within-person fluctuations in the prevalence and valence of affect experienced during mind-wandering and night-time dreaming. We compared the affective ratings of 328 mind-wandering and 529 dream episodes from 32 healthy adults. In a sub-sample, we additionally analysed the affective ratings of 548 waking episodes from 15 participants. Results showed that mind-wandering was more positively valenced than dreaming, and that both mind-wandering and dreaming were more negatively valenced than active wakefulness. We also compared participants’ self-ratings of affect with external ratings of affective experiences described in verbal reports regarding the same episodes. With self-ratings all the episodes were predominated by positive affect. However, the affective valence of verbal reports changed from positively valenced waking reports to affectively balanced mind-wandering reports to negatively valenced dream reports. Together, the findings show that (1) the positivity bias (i.e., more positive than negative affect) characteristic to waking experiences decreases across the wake-sleep continuum, and (2) conclusions regarding the affective nature of subjective experiences depend on whether self-ratings of affect or the verbal reports describing these experiences are analysed. These findings contribute to our understanding of the nature and possible function of affective experiences across different states of consciousness and call for more integration between the fields of emotion research, mind-wandering research, and dream research.

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

Cited by 1

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