If you look for a detailed phenomenological analysis of peculiar kinds of quasi-imaginative experiences—such as dreaming—you will be disappointed by the fact that there is no systematic account of this phenomenon and its related forms. The aim of this chapter is therefore to sketch a phenomenology of the dream in what seem to be its most important features. To do this, I will mainly follow two...
Introduction: Nightmares constitute a frequent parasomnia in adults in the general population and have been consistently associated with various indicators of psychological distress. Evidence suggests a significant relationship between nightmares and suicidal ideation; however, the psychological mechanisms underlying this association have not yet been fully clarified. Objective: To analyse the...
medRxivOctober 19, 2026Joel E. Gelernter, Jack Hirsch, Cassie M. Overstreet et al.
preprint
Frequent nightmares affect roughly 2-6% of the population and may reflect underlying psychopathology, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), or, when recurrent and distressing, be diagnosed as nightmare disorder (ND). The genetic basis of nightmares remains poorly understood. We performed a genome-wide association study (GWAS) meta-analysis of nightmare frequency (NF) across 207,243...
A critical evaluation and synthesis of theoretical literature has revealed that memory reactivations in sleep, which are believed to drive memory consolidation, could also be a key mechanism in the production of dream content, thus marking dreams as a reflection of memory consolidation. This proposition remains untested empirically, as research has instead focused on testing the enhancing...
This study examines dreaming in the context of prolonged collective trauma. Specifically, it investigates whether exposure to the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks in Israel, characteristics of dream life, and levels of self-compassion are associated with posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) during the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. Participants were 203 Israeli adults (79% women; age range = 21-79...
Bogotá Dreaming immerses readers in the feral dreamworlds of the discarded foot soldiers of Colombia's armed conflict and narco-economy as they try to survive through cycles of addiction and institutionalized recovery in Bogotá’s underworlds. The article is set in 2016–2017 but, like the dreams themselves, time in Romero's article is an elusive anchor, always present but not always in ways we...
ABSTRACT Background and Aims Somatization, the physical manifestation of emotional and psychological distress, is a prevalent issue in populations exposed to war and trauma. War‐related nightmares are common among displaced individuals and are linked to depression, anxiety, and somatization. Yet, the indirect role of depression‐anxiety in the association between war‐related nightmares and...
Nightmare severity and sleep disturbance may co-occur with broader posttraumatic symptoms, but overlapping questionnaire content complicates their interpretation. This study examined concurrent direct and indirect associations among these constructs in 209 young adults aged 18–29 years recruited through educational networks in Lahore, Pakistan. Participants completed the Life Events Checklist...
No direct evidence for lucid dreaming therapy as a broad therapeutic method was identified; limited studies suggest it is particularly effective in reducing nightmare frequency, but further research is needed.
World models enable agents to learn and plan in imagination, but predictions beyond their experience can become unreliable and mislead decisions. Existing uncertainty estimates derived from predictions can remain overconfident on unfamiliar state-action pairs. We propose the Lucid World Model (LucidWM), which learns doubt from experience and propagates trust through imagination. By integrating...
This study aimed to determine the rates, chronicity, and correlates of nightmares and insomnia, alone and in combination, in U.S. Army personnel at predeployment and postdeployment. Service members were assessed prior to (N = 3,952) and following (N = 1,762) a combat deployment between 2010 and 2016. Participants were categorized predeployment into nightmare and insomnia groups using the PTSD...
Frontiers in PsychologySeptember 28, 2026Andrea Signorelli, Francesco Tormen, Bruna Dal Bianco et al.
IntroductionLucid dreaming (LD) involves awareness of being in a dream during REM sleep and depends on the reactivation of metacognitive and reality-monitoring processes. This study tested whether a virtual reality (VR) intervention designed to rehearse lucid-dream-relevant metacognitive routines increases LD rates beyond baseline training, and whether generic VR exposure produces similar...
Preprint (not peer-reviewed). Version 1.0. Literature checked to 2026-09-27. Critical review of dream science covering neural correlates, dream reports versus experience, lucid-dream communication, memory and creativity claims, a causal-identification argument, and anomalous-information / precognition hypotheses. Main claim: existing evidence supports treating dreams as sleep-generated...
Dream reports exhibit reproducible organization at multiple scales. We analyzed >75,000 reports from four platforms: 30,241 reports by 5,524 Dreamseer users and ~45,000 from DreamBank, Reddit r/Dreams, and the Sleep and Dream Database. Within reports, emotional valence declined from beginning to end. Forward and reversed trajectories were distinguishable in all five corpus-language samples with...
Preprints.orgSeptember 21, 2026Xianqun Yi, Hongsheng Li
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The convergence of generative artificial intelligence and brain-computer interface technology is pushing artificial dreaming from science fiction into the scope of academic inquiry. Existing research has focused primarily on technical implementation pathways and sensory fidelity goals; while fragmented ethical and risk warnings exist, there remains a lack of systematic assessment of the...
Gabapentin is widely prescribed for neuropathic and radicular pain syndromes. While somnolence and dizziness are well-recognized adverse effects, severe vivid nightmares may constitute an underreported psychiatric side effect that can significantly impair quality of life and treatment adherence. We present two cases of gabapentin-induced severe vivid nightmares in patients treated for spinal...
Objectives The study examined the psychometric properties of the Nightmare Distress Questionnaire (NDQ) in veterans with a provisional posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) diagnosis and trauma-related nightmares.Method Participants were 659 Australian Defence Force veterans who completed online questionnaires for a larger study investigating military-civilian transition. Analyses included...
High-frequency EEG activity during sleep, reflecting cortical hyperarousal, has recently been incorporated into aetiology models of nightmares. However, its precise role remains insufficiently understood because experimental approaches to manipulate hyperarousal during sleep are limited. In the present study, we investigated whether re-presenting a relaxation-associated odour cue during sleep...
Frontiers in SleepSeptember 9, 2026Brian D. Robertson, Emily F. Wargo, Joel Fay
Objective Nightmares are a common, distressing condition among individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and are associated with impaired sleep quality and elevated suicide risk. First responders carry a substantial burden of occupational trauma and PTSD yet are under-represented in nightmare-treatment research. NightWare is an FDA-authorized prescription wearable that monitors...
The present study explores the parallel mediating roles of problematic online gaming and maladaptive daydreaming on the relationship between life satisfaction and mindfulness in esports-involved gamers in Türkiye. This research area has attracted growing scholarly interest due to its potential implications for esports-involved gamers' mindfulness and life satisfaction. The present study...