Modeling precognitive dreams as meaningful coincidences.

Precognitive dreams—dreams that seem to foretell the future—may be explained as accidental 'hits' that are more likely to be noticed and interpreted as meaningful by people who have high dream recall and a belief in the paranormal. A study of 50 college students found that tolerance of ambiguity, the ability to accept uncertain or contradictory information, supports both storing and recalling ambiguous dream content and attributing it to paranormal causes. The model's fit did not depend on sex or age. Alternative models confirmed the roles of tolerance of ambiguity and belief in the paranormal but did not confirm dream recall frequency as a crucial factor.

Study at a glance

Abstract

50 college students completed the Anomalous Experiences Inventory, the AT-20 measure of tolerance of ambiguity, and a frequency of dream recall questionnaire. Using path analysis we show that precognitive dreams can be modeled as accidental 'hits' with increased dream recall and the interpretation of such hits as 'meaningful coincidences' seems facilitated by a belief in the paranormal. As predicted, both factors are affected by tolerance of ambiguity, which provides the flexibility required to store and recall ambiguous dream information while simultaneously allowing dream recallers to assume a paranormal origin of their 'precognitive' dreams. Moreover, the fit of the proposed model did not depend on sex or age. Alternative models that provided a better fit to the data validated the roles of tolerance of ambiguity and belief in the paranormal in eliciting experiences of precognitive dreaming, but frequency of dream recall was not confirmed as a crucial factor.