Phasic Activity and Dream Recall in 5- to 8-Yr.-Olds
Perceptual and Motor Skills August 1, 1989 DOI: 10.2466/pms.1989.69.1.290 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Cross-sectional observational study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 20 |
| Population | Children aged 5 to 8 years (10 boys and 10 girls) |
| Duration | Three nonconsecutive nights per age; assessed within a month of each birthday at ages 5, 6, 7, and 8 years |
| Topics | Dreaming |
| Citations | 9 |
| Key findings | Dream recall was higher after phasic REM awakenings (26.5%) than after tonic REM awakenings (18.6%), a significant difference. The authors suggest that phasic events in REM sleep increase the likelihood that dreaming occurs or is recalled, and that dream reports from 5- to 8-year-olds can reliably reflect pre-awakening brain activation. |
Abstract
from REM awakenings are infrequent and, when present, qualitatively meager. We report here data from a cross-sectional project in which 10 boys and 10 girls were studied within a month of their birthdays at each of four ages, namely, 5, 6, 7, and 8 yr. Ten REM awakenings were scheduled for dream retrieval over three nonconsecutive nights, 10 mjn. following the initiation of REM periods beginning after 2 a.m. Awakenings were made by clock time instead of on the basis of intra-REMP physiology, so some awakenings could be classified as phasic (REM burst within 15 sec. of awakening) and some as tonic (no REM activity within 15 sec. of awakening). There was a single experimenter, and awakenings were made at the subject's bedside precisely when the researcher's digital watch indicated the scheduled minute. Given the distance from the EEG machine in an adjacent room to the subject's bedroom, this procedure meant that the experimenter could not monitor sleep tracings in the 20- to 30-sec. period prior to any awakening, so he was blind to immediate preawakening sleep patterns while conducting dream interviews. There were 777 REMP awakenings in which the 15-sec. preawakening condition was determinable (e.g., not obscured by gross body movement or electrode artifact), 567 phasic and 210 tonic. Since dream recall did not differ significantly as a function of subject's age, tonic vs phasic recall was compared among all children. In pooled data, dream recall was higher in the phasic (26.5%) than in the tonic (18.6%) condition. Evaluated by the Wilcoxon matched-pairs, signed-ranks test (excluding ties; n = 531, the difference was significant at p< .02, 2-tailed (T= 450, z = -2.35). Substantively, the result suggests that, when REM dreaming is rarely reported (and presumably rarely experienced; for supporting data see Foulkes, 1982), the added cerebrd cognitive activation associated with phasic events in REM sleep does increase the Wrehhood that dreaming will occur and/or that it wlll be sufficiently salient to be recalled. Methodologically, the data suggest that ~ostawakenin~ reports of 5- to 8-yr.-olds can reliably reflect preawakening cerebrdcognitive activation, adding to the credibhty of those reports.