Dreaming

Characteristics of dreams and further connections to REM sleep

       In adults, dreams are often story-like and narrative, and often seem to connote something meaningful about our lives (this will be discussed more thoroughly later,or go to Dreams as doors to the unconscious mind...). As REM sleep typically makes up 25% of our sleep, dreaming does not occur rapidly, as many remember their dreams to be when first waking up.  Research has shown that the longer one spends in a state of REM sleep, or the more periods of REM sleep one may experience in a given night’s sleep, the more dreaming she will usually report upon waking up. One bout of REM sleep can occur along with several different dreams, which would explain why we sometimes awake bearing memories of a couple story lines or seemingly disassociated - yet vivid - images.

       Dreaming and REM sleep were, and still are, thought to be so associated that researchers often examined whether changes in the activities of REM sleep were reflected in changes in dream narratives.  For example, as discussed earlier a defining characteristic of REM sleep is rapid eye movement. Rapid movement of the eyes, however, sometimes does not consistently occur throughout a state of REM.  Researchers once proposed that dreaming only occurs in the presence of rapid eye movement. In general, it was thought that perhaps phasic changes or differing states in REM sleep were responsible for inconsistencies in dream narratives (go to Activation-Synthesis Model).  However, research was unable to support this theory at the time and instead brought us to the understanding that, despite the physiological processes necessary for dreams to occur, dreams seemed to carry out rather independently of physiological changes during REM sleep. And therefore, dreams were determined to be complicated and symbolic, and any measurable physiological factors of REM couldn’t be connected very well to the symbolic nature of dreaming.  It was thought that dreaming had to be explained psychologically rather than physiologically, after all.