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Reliability and validity of the Social Cognition and Object Relations Scale (SCORS) in the assessment of dream narratives.

In this study, we aimed to investigate the application of an externally rated measure of interpersonal representations (Social Cognition and Object Relations Scale [SCORS]; Westen, 1995) to dream narratives. A total of 80 student participants enrolled at a private university in the New York City metropolitan area completed a Dream Log and affect adjective checklist (Wellman, 2002) based on a recalled dream at both 1 month and 3 months following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Using the dreams provided in this study we examined the interrater reliability of SCORS ratings, the relationship of SCORS variables to an independently rated measure of dream distortion, and the relationship of SCORS variables to participants' own ratings of dream affect. Results indicated that dreams were reliably rated using the SCORS, 3 cognitive SCORS variables were significantly related to dream distortion, and affective SCORS variables were meaningfully related to participants' own ratings of affect in their dreams. Findings from this study provide support for the application of SCORS ratings to dream narratives. We discuss implications for further research and clinical application.

Cognition↗

Dreams: the convergence of neurobiologic and psychoanalytic perspectives.

Fromm's Aristotelian statement that "Dreaming is a meaningful expression of any kind of mental activity under the condition of sleep" (Fromm, 1951, p. 25) is similar to a modern neurobiological conclusion about the dreaming process. The current data from the neurosciences lead to the definition of dreams as a neuropsychological event during sleep whose manifest contents are affect laden, visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. Their functions are adaptive and problem solving in themselves. They are part of the brain's connectionist information-processing system which channel, compare, and integrate current affect-laden memories with memories of past successful strategies. Thus, the neurobiological perspective of dreams provides an underlying neuroanatomical and information-processing matrix for the dream process that further supports the current psychoanalytic view concerning their assimilative and accommodative functions. In conclusion, I would like to return to the termination phase of Mr. M's therapy. This patient planned to leave therapy approximately 22 months after the occurrence of Dream 2, as this dream had predicted. He was to be married and move to another city. Although I felt somewhat anxious about his leaving, despite his significant progress, we agreed to a termination date. Just prior to the second-to-last session Mr. M had the following dream: It took place in a large gothic building in a zoo. It is dark and depressing and filled with cages of rhesus monkeys. I go around with a nurse to inoculate the monkeys. I am scared of the virus. My future wife appears. She is immune to the virus. She is brave and she rescues me. The patient seemed pleased in relating his dream, and it offered resolution and closure for both of us despite a paucity of discussion. Two years later I received a letter from him in which he stated that he was well and had no additional "monkey dreams."

Cognitive Science↗

Lee Acculturation Dream Scale for Korean-American college students.

This study examined acculturation as represented in dream narratives of 165 Korean immigrant college students living in the USA. A total of 165 dreams were collected and evaluated using the Lee Acculturation Dream Scale, for which locations of dream contents were coded. 39% of the dreams took place in South Korea, while 38% were in the USA. Also, 16% of the dreams included both locations, whereas 7% had no specific dream location. The dreams contained overlapping dream messages, images, scenes, and interactions in both South Korea and the USA. A two-sample t test on the mean scores of the Lee Acculturation Dream Scale indicated no significant difference between men and women.

Acculturation↗

The dream between neuroscience and psychoanalysis.

The dream is tackled sometimes from the neurobiological viewpoint, sometimes from the neuropsychological angle, or from the positions of experimental and psychoanalytical psychology. Interest in dreams started with psychoanalysis in 1900, and 53 years later the discovery of REM sleep by Aserinski and Kleitman, and subsequent psychophysiological findings took the dream into the realm of biology. The dichotomous model of REM and non-REM sleep is described, as a basis for thought-like activity (non-REM sleep) and dreaming (REM sleep). This led to Hobson and McCarley's theory of activation-synthesis, suggesting that the mind while dreaming is simply the brain self-activated in REM sleep. Psychophysiological research has shown that people dream in all phases of sleep, from falling asleep to waking, but that the characteristics of the dreams may differ in the different phases. Bio-imaging studies indicate that during REM sleep there is activation of the pons, the amygdala bilaterally, and the anterior cingulate cortex, and disactivation of the posterior cingulate cortex and the prefrontal cortex. The images suggest there is a neuroanatomical frame within which dreams can be generated and then forgotten. Psychoanalysis studies the dream from a completely different angle. Freud believed it was the expression of hallucinatory satisfaction of repressed desires. Today it is interpreted as the expression of a representation of the transference in the hic et nunc of the session. At the same time it also has symbol-generating functions which provide an outlet by which affective experiences and fantasies and defences stored as parts of an unrepressed unconscious in the implicit memory can be represented in pictorial terms, then thought and rendered verbally. From the psychoanalytical point of view, the dream transcends neurobiological knowledge, and looks like a process of internal activation that is only apparently chaotic, but is actually rich in meanings, arising from the person's affective and emotional history.

Animals↗

Divination, prognosis and prophylaxis: the Hippocratic work 'on dreams' (De victu 4) and its Near Eastern background.

Building on the results of recent scholarship concerning the coherence of the Hippocratic work De victu ('On Regimen'), this chapter discusses the close connections between Book 4, which deals with the use of dreams for medical prognosis and especially prophylaxis (which the author claims to be his own innovation), with the rest of the work. It analyses the author's position on dreams and their interpretation and his stance against professional dream interpreters. It distinguishes five categories in the author's discussion: 1. the signs, i.e. the dream images themselves; 2. the significance of the dreams; 3. explanations of the relationship between sign and significance; 4. prophylactic (dietetic) measures to prevent disease; 5. instructions as to the gods one should pray to in order to prevent disease. It explores the rationale underlying these categories and lists a number of parallels with Babylonian dream literature. It concludes that although there are important differences with respect to the use of dreams in Babylonian medicine, it is not implausible that the author of De victu 4 has borrowed some of his material from Near Eastern dream books. At the same time, the author of De victu 4 distances himself from oneiromantic practices that are very similar to what we find in Babylonia; and his elaborate interpretative system linking specific dreams to specific bodily disorders goes far beyond anything found in Near Eastern sources (but also beyond anything else in the Corpus Hippocraticum). He does accept the existence of dreams sent by the gods and of prayer to the gods in combination with dietetic prophylaxis; but his elaborate use of dietetics for preventive purposes marks an important innovation when compared to Babylonian medicine. The author is not concerned with incubation.

Dreams↗

Home and laboratory dreams: four empirical studies and a conceptual reevaluation.

Four empirical studies were presented on how the setting in which dreams are collected may influence the reporting and content of dreams of children on REM awakenings. In these studies it was shown that (1) with constant dream-sampling procedures, home and laboratory did not differ in the degree to which dream reports could be elicited from 4/5 year old children; (2) the rate of truly spontaneous reporting of dreams at home by 6/7 year olds is so minimal as to render these dreams an unfit base for generalization to typical dream life at these ages; (3) with constant dream sampling procedures, home and laboratory reports were not significantly different in content for 10/11 year olds; (4) results typically observed in uncontrolled home versus laboratory studies are replicable at the child level (ages 12/13), but probably reflect biased recall at home rather than effects of REM-monitoring procedures in the laboratory. The extant literature on home versus laboratory dream differences was reviewed, and it was concluded that even for normative dream studies, the REM-monitoring procedure is the method of choice.

Adolescent↗

DREAM ablation selectively alters THC place aversion and analgesia but leaves intact the motivational and analgesic effects of morphine.

DREAM (downstream regulatory element antagonistic modulator) is a novel transcriptional repressor for the prodynorphin gene, and genetic deletion of DREAM in mice results in a phenotype of ongoing analgesia by virtue of its effect on opioid gene expression. In the present study, we evaluated the motivational effects of opioids (morphine), cannabinoids [Delta(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)] and cocaine in mice lacking the dream gene (dream(-/-)). The aversive effects of THC were potentiated in dream(-/-) mice in a kappa-opioid receptor-dependent fashion, whereas morphine reward and the aversive effects of morphine withdrawal remained intact. The rewarding and aversive effects of cocaine were likewise unperturbed in dream(-/-) mice. Moreover, the aversive properties of lithium chloride and naloxone were unaffected by the absence of DREAM, indicating that the effect of DREAM on THC-induced dysphoria is not due to a general involvement in the behavioral response to aversive stimuli. Additionally, physical dependence to morphine and the locomotor-sensitizing effects of cocaine were unaltered in these animals. Finally, whereas the absence of DREAM reduced the analgesic efficacy of THC, morphine analgesia was unaffected in dream(-/-) mice.

Analgesia↗

Reliability in dream research: a methodological note.

The coefficients of internal consistency and retest reliability had been rarely investigated within the methodology of dream content analysis. Analyzing a dream series of elderly, healthy persons obtained from weekly telephone interviews, the internal consistency of a series of 20 dreams and retests after 4 or 22 weeks, respectively, had been computed. The findings indicate that dream recall and dream length are quite stable, but dream characteristics such as bizarreness and emotional tone underlie large intraindividual fluctuations. In order to obtain reliable measures for these variables which will be important for correlational studies, including waking-life trait measures, one has to obtain as many dreams as possible (about 20) in a very short time period. Further research is needed to extend the present findings to diary dreams and laboratory dreams.

Aged↗

Dream experience during REM and NREM sleep of patients with complex partial seizures.

This study examined the effectiveness of the cognitive processes underlying dreaming in patients with complex partial seizures (CPS), by assessing the frequency of recall and the structural organization of dreams reported after awakenings provoked alternately during REM and stage 2 NREM sleep on 12 cognitively unimpaired CPS-patients (six with epileptic focus in the right hemisphere and six in the left one). Each patient was recorded for three consecutive nights, respectively, for adaptation to the sleep laboratory context, for polysomnography and for dream collection. The frequency of dream recall was lower after stage 2 NREM sleep than REM sleep, regardless of the side of epileptic focus, while the length and structural organization of dreams did not significantly differ in REM and NREM sleep. However, the length of story-like dreams was influenced by global cognitive functioning during REM sleep. These findings indicate that in CPSs-patients the elaboration of dream experience is maintained in both REM and NREM sleep, while the access to information for conversion into dream contents and the consolidation of dream contents is much less effective during NREM rather than during REM sleep. Further studies may distinguish between these two possibilities and enlighten us as to whether the impaired memory functioning during NREM sleep is a side effect of anticonvulsant treatment.

Adult↗

Working with dreams in therapy: what do we know and what should we do?

Although a potentially helpful therapeutic tool, dream interpretation or dream work is only used occasionally in most forms of psychotherapy. Despite an interest from clinicians and clients alike in using dreams within therapy, many therapists feel unprepared to attend to their clients' dreams. The main goals of this article are to make clinicians aware that integrating dreams into their clinical practice is both accessible and potentially valuable and to allow them to make an informed decision as to what role they want dream work to play in therapy. The paper begins with a brief overview of some of the more common approaches to dream work. The literature on the usefulness and effectiveness of the clinical use of dreams is then reviewed. Finally, based on the integration of the clinical and empirical literature, several guidelines for conducting dream work are presented.

Dreams↗

REM sleep dream mentation in right hemispherectomized patients.

Investigations of dream mentation in brain damaged patients have shed some light on the controversial issue of cerebral lateralization of dreaming. To examine further the relationships between brain function and dreaming, we studied REM sleep dream recall and content in four patients having undergone right functional or anatomical hemispherectomy and eight matched control subjects. Patients were found to have the capacity to report dreams to much the same extent as control subjects. Further, the patients' dream content was overall similar to that of the control subjects. The results provide strong evidence that dreaming is not a right-hemisphere function, and that the left hemisphere may be more critical for the generation of dreams. In addition, some characteristics of hemispherectomized patients' dream content (characters, smells) are consistent with the possibility that a history of epilepsy may influence REM sleep imagery over the long term.

Adolescent↗

Visual dream content, graphical representation and EEG alpha activity in congenitally blind subjects.

It is currently claimed that congenitally blind do not have visual imagery and are therefore unable to present visual contents in their dreams. The aim of our study was to quantitatively evaluate the existence of visual imagery in born-blind dreams and to correlate it with objective measures, such as sleep EEG frequency components, namely with alpha attenuation (regarded as an indicator of visual activity), and graphical analysis of dream pictorial representations. The investigation was carried out via simultaneous recordings of dream reports and polysomnography, during nocturnal sleep at volunteers' homes; scheduled regular awakenings during the night provided the data for dream and EEG analysis. In the morning, subjects were asked to make a drawing of their dream images. Congenitally blind (n=10) were comparable to normal sighted subjects (n=9): the two groups presented equivalent visual activity indices, and no differences in the analysis of graphical representation of dreaming imagery. However, blind subjects presented a lower rate of dream recall than sighted (27% versus 42%). Both groups had significant negative correlation between Visual Activity Index (VAI) and alpha power in the central and occipital O2 derivations (blind: C4: r=-0.615, P<0.005; O2: r=-0.608, P<0.006; sighted: C4: r=-0.633, P<0.01; O2: r=-0.506, P<0.05). This correlation was weaker for the blind in O1 (r=-0.573, P<0.05) and non-existent for the sighted. Blind individuals have significantly lower alpha activity in the central derivation. In conclusion, the congenitally blind have visual content in their dreams and are able to draw it and, as expected, their VAI is negatively correlated with EEG alpha power.

Adult↗

[The dream as a tool in diagnosis, healing and life orientation in antiquity].

The dream is usually discussed in connection with the work of Freud und Jung and the dreamlore initiated by these two eminent dream scientists. Therefore the dream knowledge gathered by investigators of classical antiquity is almost forgotten, although the same diagnostic and therapeutic aims have been followed by them as they are by modern psychotherapy and medicine. Hippocrates and the other Greek physicians saw in dreams indications of bodily and psychosomatic disturbances. Dreams from the gods, especially Ascelepios, helped those who travelled from afar to be healed while sleeping in the temples. Popular dream interpretation availed itself of just as sophisticated an interpretative system as has been set up by modern depth psychologists. Dreams served to give orientation in life and warn of fateful future events. In spite of its elusive quality truth is sought in dreams today as it was in antiquity. Dream interpretation was then, and is now, one of the preferential techniques of existence.

Diagnosis↗

Dream seminar for chronic schizophrenic patients.

A novel form of group therapy which I call the Dream Seminar was introduced on an inpatient milieu treatment unit for chronic schizophrenic patients at a Veterans Hospital. The purpose was to help patients understand and appreciate their dreams in a special group setting. It was hypothesized that the Dream Seminar would diminish insomnia and night fears, that the examination of dream experiences, no matter how bizarre or frightening, would be potentially healing, and that patients' attitudes toward dreams as well as delusions and hallucinations might change. It was also hypothesized that by limiting the focus of the Dream Seminar to the manifest dream content, the images and internal sequences of the dream, and by not allowing free association, the connective unconscious of the group would be brought into the open and balance the more conventional therapies of the rest of the program. This paper is a clinical report based on five years' experience with the Dream Seminar.

Adult↗

Erik Erikson's dream specimen paper. A classic revisited.

This paper offers an overview of Erik Erikson's contribution to psychoanalysis, contrasting the humanistic perspective from which he viewed psychoanalysis with the biological perspective adopted by Heinz Hartmann. The vehicle for this comparison and for the explication of Erikson's extension of the work of Freud and Hartmann is Erikson's analysis of Freud's Irma dream, as presented in his Dream Specimen paper. I hope to show that: (1) Erikson's analysis of Freud's Irma dream provides a masterful illustration of the richness and complexity of past and current life themes and conflicts that inform the dreamer's construction of the manifest surface of the dream. (2) Erikson's examination of the relationship between the manifest content of the dream and the current life context of the dreamer leads him to propose a connection between trauma and the origins of the dream. This view complements Freud's discovery of the instinctual motivation for dreaming and anticipates subsequent discoveries concerning the role of dreams and REM sleep in defensive ego functioning and adaptation. (3) The Dream Specimen paper presents readers with a humanistic ego psychology that rests upon--but is subtly different from--the work of Hartmann and the other biologically oriented analysts of his day. In this sense, Erikson's paper is an elegant "specimen" of ego psychology carried to its most creative heights.

Dreams↗

A cognitive-psychological model of REM dream production.

Based on the methodological assumption that cognitive-psychological study of dream processes (psychoneirics) can be pursued in like manner as in cognitive-psychological study of speech processes (psycholinguistics) and on the substantive assumption that speech and dreaming may share some common production routines, a cognitive-psychological model of dream formation is proposed. A generalized psycholinguistic model of speech production is presented, and then each sequential stage of that model is examined for its aptness to the process of dream production. It is concluded that there are major differences between speech and dream production at both the input and the output levels (message formulation in the linguistic sense is absent in the instigation of the dream; the dream itself is a multimodal perceptual simulation), but it is proposed that midrange stages of speech and dream production may be largely identical. This model is shown to be consistent with various formal properties of the dream, including its central paradox of controlled formal organization in the face of contents that may be "senseless," trivial, or obscure. The model also is shown to suggest several new research paradigms that might be employed both to test its own utility and to generate data more generally relevant to the question of how mental functions are organized during rapid eye movement sleep.

Cognition↗

From the wings of night: dream work with people who have acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.

Nurses who work with seriously ill and dying patients are engaged in helping them live fully until they die. Most theories of death and dying deal with conscious activities only. Yet many people find relief form the fear and loneliness of life-threatening illness if given the opportunity to express their totality, meaning their unconscious as well as conscious processes. Working with the mind may not be enough. Attending to the unconscious through dream work can allow inner healing to occur, which can support that person as he or she moves into the unknown. The article describes the AIDS Dreamwork Project, the goals of which are to understand patients better and to help them better understand themselves, to help them live and die more consciously, and to discern patterns in their dreams that may be unique to people with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. Six themes have been identified in the dreams collected so far: wake-up dreams; reassurance dreams; dreams of opposition, separation, or coming together; transition dreams; transformation dreams; and spiritual or archetypal dreams.

Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome↗

Variety and intensity of emotions in nightmares and bad dreams.

Nightmares are usually defined as frightening dreams that awaken the sleeper. This study uses the waking criterion to distinguish between nightmares and bad dreams and investigated the variety and intensity of emotions reported in each form of disturbing dream. Ninety participants recorded their dreams for 4 consecutive weeks and, for each dream recalled, noted the emotions present and their intensities on a 9-point scale. Thirty-six participants reported at least one nightmare and one bad dream over the 4 weeks covered by the log, while 29 reported having had at least one bad dream but no nightmares. Nightmares were rated as being significantly (p < 0.001) more intense than bad dreams. Thirty percent of nightmares and 51% of bad dreams contained primary emotions other than fear. The findings support the claim that awakening can serve as an indirect measure of nightmare intensity and raise important implications for the operational definition of nightmares.

Adult↗