Dreamers’ evaluation of the emotional valence of their day-to-day dreams is indicative of some mood regulation function

Barbeau, Kheana; Turpin, Chloé; Lafrenière, Alexandre; Campbell, Emma; Koninck, Joseph De

doi:10.3389/fnbeh.2022.947396

Cited by 7 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 62 publications

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“…Such a mechanism would, in turn, promote adjusted behavioral responses in real-life situations 5 , 9 . Other studies have also supported the idea that past negative memories are reprocessed and combined in dreams with new, realistic, and safe contexts, suggesting the possibility of desensitization 20 , 21 or extinction 17 functions for dreaming. Functional dreams could thus expose us to threatening situations while providing us with efficient solutions to these situations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 83%

Evidence for an emotional adaptive function of dreams: a cross-cultural study

Samson,

Clerget,

Abbas

et al. 2023

Sci Rep

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The function of dreams is a longstanding scientific research question. Simulation theories of dream function, which are based on the premise that dreams represent evolutionary past selective pressures and fitness improvement through modified states of consciousness, have yet to be tested in cross-cultural populations that include small-scale forager societies. Here, we analyze dream content with cross-cultural comparisons between the BaYaka (Rep. of Congo) and Hadza (Tanzania) foraging groups and Global North populations, to test the hypothesis that dreams in forager groups serve a more effective emotion regulation function due to their strong social norms and high interpersonal support. Using a linear mixed effects model we analyzed 896 dreams from 234 individuals across these populations, recorded using dream diaries. Dream texts were processed into four psychosocial constructs using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC-22) dictionary. The BaYaka displayed greater community-oriented dream content. Both the BaYaka and Hadza exhibited heightened threat dream content, while, at the same time, the Hadza demonstrated low negative emotions in their dreams. The Global North Nightmare Disorder group had increased negative emotion content, and the Canadian student sample during the COVID-19 pandemic displayed the highest anxiety dream content. In conclusion, this study supports the notion that dreams in non-clinical populations can effectively regulate emotions by linking potential threats with non-fearful contexts, reducing anxiety and negative emotions through emotional release or catharsis. Overall, this work contributes to our understanding of the evolutionary significance of this altered state of consciousness.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 83%

Evidence for an emotional adaptive function of dreams: a cross-cultural study

Samson,

Clerget,

Abbas

et al. 2023

Sci Rep

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“…Second, we did not measure pre-sleep waking affect. It is likely that affect the next morning would be explained more by pre-sleep waking affect rather than dream affect ( Barbeau et al, 2022a ), although there is also evidence that the effect of previous-day events on next-day affect occurs via dream affect ( Schredl and Reinhard, 2009–2010 ). To better understand the extent to which such cross-state affective continuity depends on the affective nature of dreams, it is important to measure, and control for, pre-sleep affect in future studies.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…To date, most research has focused on the relationship between dream affect and (post-sleep) waking affect level. Whereas some earlier studies supported emotion regulation theories of dreaming, demonstrating that negatively valenced dreams are associated with more positively valenced postsleep affect (e.g., Cohen and Cox, 1975) or better coping with adverse life experiences (e.g., Cartwright, 1991Cartwright, , 2010, more recent studies lend greater support for the continuity theories, reporting positive correlations between dream affect and postsleep affect (e.g., Schredl and Doll, 1998;Yu, 2007;Mallett et al, 2021;Barbeau et al, 2022a). Importantly, studies directly testing the affect regulation function of dreaming have often failed to find evidence for the affect regulation function (e.g., De Koninck and Koulack, 1975;Tousignant et al, 2022).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

Negative dream affect is associated with next-day affect level, but not with affect reactivity or affect regulation

Sikka

Engelbrektsson²,

Zhang³

et al. 2022

Front. Behav. Neurosci.

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There is increasing evidence that sleep plays an important role in affective processing. However, it is unclear whether dreaming—the subjective experiences we have during sleep—also serves an affect regulation function. Here, we investigated the within-person relationship between negative affect experienced in dreams and next-day waking affect level, affect reactivity, and affect regulation. For 5 days, 40 participants reported their dreams and rated their dream affect and post-sleep waking affect level upon morning awakening. Thereafter, they performed an affect reactivity and regulation task which involved viewing neutral and negative pictures with the instruction either to simply view the pictures or to down-regulate the affect evoked by these pictures. Multilevel regression analyses showed that the more negative affect people experienced in their dreams at night, the more negative affect and the less positive affect they reported the next morning. However, negative dream affect was associated neither with affect reactivity to the pictures nor with the ability to down-regulate negative affect in response to these pictures. In fact, Bayesian analyses favored the null hypotheses. These findings fail to provide support for the affect regulation function of dreaming and, instead, speak for affective continuity between dreaming and post-sleep wakefulness.

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“…Психическая активность в быстром сне от психической активности в других состояниях (например, в медленноволновом сне и бодрствовании) отличается сильной эмоциональной окрашенностью и чрезвычайной активностью головного мозга, как и при переживании сильного эмоционального стресса (Ковальзон, 2021). Исследования с помощью методов нейровизуализации показали, что процессы, регулирующие сновидения и эмоциональную значимость, имеют те же нейронные субстраты, которые контролируют эмоции во время бодрствования (Scarpelli et al, 2019;Sikka et al, 2022;Barbeau, Turpin, Lafrenière, Campbell & De Koninck, 2022). Так, во сне переживаются чувства радости, удивления, гнева, страха и тревоги.…”

Section: психические механизмы в быстром снеunclassified

Диагностические Возможности Анализа Сновидений: Теоретические Предпосылки И Методические Подходы

Березина¹,

Кит²,

Комарова³

et al. 2023

РПЖ

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Введение. Нарушение некоторых когнитивных функций и общего психического состояния после массированного лечения затрудняет использование при реабилитации общепринятых опросных методов для диагностики неврологического и психологического статуса. В этой связи актуальным методом представляется анализ сновидений, который, согласно современным исследованиям, позволяет выявить на ранних этапах нарушения психологического и соматического состояния пациентов и сделать прогноз об их восстановлении. Теоретическое обоснование. В основе возможности применения анализа сновидения в качестве диагностического метода лежат современные представления о нейрофизиологических и психических механизмах сновидческой активности. Изменения сновидческой активности отмечены разными авторами при неврологических, психических и соматических заболеваниях. Все больше исследователей сходятся во мнении, что сновидения могут быть предвестниками, своеобразной «сигнальной системой» формирующихся соматических, неврологических и психических нарушений. Клинико-диагностический анализ сновидений при невротических нарушениях позволил выявить их особенности как при разных вариантах неврозов, так и на всех стадиях заболевания – от компенсации до декомпенсации. Установлено существование взаимосвязи между образами сновидений и предрасположенностью к тревожным состояниям, депрессии и астении. Обсуждение результатов. Существующие научные исследования позволяют говорить о возможности применения анализа сновидений в качестве ранней диагностики невротических состояний и соматических патологий, клинические симптомы которых еще не проявились симптоматически, но уже появляются в сновидениях. В статье выполнен обзор литературы по современным представлениям о нейрофизиологических и психических механизмах сновидений, указаны возможности применения результатов их анализа в качестве диагностической модели.

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Dreamers’ evaluation of the emotional valence of their day-to-day dreams is indicative of some mood regulation function

Cited by 7 publications

References 62 publications

Evidence for an emotional adaptive function of dreams: a cross-cultural study

Evidence for an emotional adaptive function of dreams: a cross-cultural study

Negative dream affect is associated with next-day affect level, but not with affect reactivity or affect regulation

Диагностические Возможности Анализа Сновидений: Теоретические Предпосылки И Методические Подходы

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