REM sleep behavior disorder: Relation between aggressiveness and emotions expressed in dream enactment and cognitive and anxiety/depression status.
Paulo Bugalho, Marta Magriço, Vítor Mendes Ferreira
Sleep Medicine November 8, 2024 DOI: 10.1016/j.sleep.2024.11.008 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Observational study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Sample size | 31 |
| Population | Patients with REM sleep behavior disorder (isolated RBD, RBD associated with Parkinson's disease, and RBD associated with dementia with Lewy bodies) |
| Measures | MoCA, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) |
| Topics | Anxiety Depression |
| Keywords | Humans Lewy body disease Parkinson disease Polysomnography Aggression Emotions Cognition Dreams Middle aged Female Parkinson's disease Dream enactment |
| Key findings | Depression/anxiety severity correlated positively with the frequency of negative-emotion and aggressive complex motor events during REM sleep, and higher cognitive (MoCA) scores correlated positively with violent/complex events. The authors argue this supports the dream continuity hypothesis and suggests REM sleep acts as a regulator of emotional experience, with complex aggressive movements possibly depending on intact cognition. |
Abstract
Aggressiveness and negative emotions in dreams reports of patients with alfa-synucleinopathies have been associated with cognitive dysfunction. Observation of dream enactment episodes could be a more precise method to capture dream content in patients with REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD). Our objective was to assess the relation between aggressive and emotional dream enactment episodes in patients with RBD and cognition and depression/anxiety. Motor events (ME) during REM sleep were classified by visual inspection of video-PSG files. Cognition and anxiety/depression were assessed with MoCA and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), respectively. Multivariate regression analysis was performed, with MoCA or HADS scores as predictors, age and DED as co-variates and aggressive, negative and positive ME frequency (raw values, per total and per complex indexes) as the dependent variable. We included 15 patients with isolated RBD and 12 and 4 with RBD associated with Parkinson's disease and Dementia with Lewy Bodies, respectively. They presented a total of 873 ME. There was a significant positive association between HADS score and violent/complex and negative emotion/complex indexes. There was a significant positive association between MoCA score and violent/complex index. A significant correlation between depression/anxiety severity and negative emotion and aggression ME frequency agrees with the dream continuity hypothesis and suggests that REM sleep acts as a regulator of emotional experience. Patients with a higher prevalence of aggressive ME had higher scores in cognitive testing, suggesting that the elaboration of these complex movements could depend on the integrity of cognitive functions.
Comparable studies
Other observational and cohort studies on anxiety, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Effectiveness of a meditation-based stress reduction program in the treatment of anxiety disorders Patients with generalized anxiety disorder or panic disorder with or without agoraphobia | 1992 | Observational cohort | n = 22 |
| Antidepressant effects of a single dose of ayahuasca in patients with recurrent depression: a preliminary report Patients with a depressive disorder | 2015 | Observational study | |
| Patterning of Cognitive and Somatic Processes in the Self-Regulation of Anxiety: Effects of Meditation versus Exercise Regular practitioners of physical exercise or meditation | 1978 | Retrospective study | n = 77 |
| Dynamic coupling of whole-brain neuronal and neurotransmitter systems Healthy humans | 2020 | Observational study | |
| Psychedelics not linked to mental health problems or suicidal behavior: A population study Randomly selected United States adults | 2015 | Observational cohort | n = 135,095 |
Citations in the library
Cites 9
- Can observers link dream content to behaviours in rapid eye movement sleep behaviour disorder? A cross‐sectional experimental pilot study Journal of Sleep Research August 4, 2011
- The dynamics of emotional behaviors in rapid eye movement sleep Sleep November 29, 2022
- Do dreams tell the future? Dream content as a predictor of cognitive deterioration in Parkinson’s disease Journal of Sleep Research August 9, 2020
- The Functional Role of Dreaming in Emotional Processes. Frontiers in Psychology 2019
- Dream features in the early stages of Parkinson's disease. Journal of Neural Transmission November 2011
and 4 more in the library