In the psychology subfield of oneirology, a lucid dream is a type of dream wherein the dreamer realizes that they are dreaming during their dream. The capacity to have lucid dreams is a trainable cognitive skill. [1] During a lucid dream, the dreamer may gain some amount of volitional control over the dream characters, narrative, or environment, although this control of dream content is not the salient feature of lucid dreaming. [2] [3] [4] [5] An important distinction is that lucid dreaming is a distinct type of dream from other types of dreams such as prelucid dreams and vivid dreams, although prelucid dreams are a precursor to lucid dreams, and lucid dreams are often accompanied with enhanced dream vividness. Lucid dreams are also distinct state from other lucid boundary sleep states such as lucid hypnagogia or lucid hypnopompia.
In formal psychology, lucid dreaming has been studied and reported for many years. Prominent figures from ancient to modern times have been fascinated by lucid dreams and have sought ways to better understand their causes and purpose. Many different theories have emerged as a result of scientific research on the subject. [6] [7] Further developments in psychological research have pointed to ways in which this form of dreaming may be utilized as a therapeutic technique. [8]
The term lucid dream was coined by Dutch author and psychiatrist Frederik van Eeden in his 1913 article A Study of Dreams, [5] though descriptions of dreamers being aware that they are dreaming predate the article. [5]
Psychologist Stephen LaBerge is widely considered the progenitor and leading pioneer of modern lucid dreaming research. [9] He is the founder of the Lucidity Institute at Stanford University.
Paul Tholey laid the epistemological basis for the research of lucid dreams, proposing seven different conditions of clarity that a dream must fulfill in order to be defined as a lucid dream: [10] [11] [12]
Later, in 1992, a study by Deirdre Barrett examined whether lucid dreams contained four "corollaries" of lucidity:
Barrett found less than a quarter of lucidity accounts exhibited all four. [13]
Subsequently, Stephen LaBerge studied the prevalence among lucid dreams of the ability to control the dream scenario, and found that while dream control and dream awareness are correlated, neither requires the other. LaBerge found dreams that exhibit one clearly without the capacity for the other. He also found dreams where, although the dreamer is lucid and aware they could exercise control, they choose simply to observe. [2]
The practice of lucid dreaming, is central to both the ancient Indian Hindu practice of Yoga nidra and the Tibetan Buddhist practice of dream Yoga. The cultivation of such awareness was a common practice among early Buddhists. [14]
Early references to the phenomenon are also found in ancient Greek writing. For example, the philosopher Aristotle wrote: "often when one is asleep, there is something in consciousness which declares that what then presents itself is but a dream." [15] Meanwhile, the physician Galen of Pergamon used lucid dreams as a form of therapy. [16] In addition, a letter written by Saint Augustine of Hippo in AD 415 tells the story of a dreamer, Doctor Gennadius, and refers to lucid dreaming. [17] [18]
Philosopher and physician Sir Thomas Browne (1605–1682) was fascinated by dreams and described his own ability to lucid dream in his Religio Medici , stating: "...yet in one dream I can compose a whole Comedy, behold the action, apprehend the jests and laugh my self awake at the conceits thereof." [19]
Samuel Pepys, in his diary entry for 15 August 1665, records a dream, stating: "I had my Lady Castlemayne in my arms and was admitted to use all the dalliance I desired with her, and then dreamt that this could not be awake, but that it was only a dream." [20]
In 1867, the French sinologist Marie-Jean-Léon, Marquis d'Hervey de Saint Denys anonymously published Les Rêves et Les Moyens de Les Diriger; Observations Pratiques ("Dreams and the ways to direct them; practical observations"), in which he describes his own experiences of lucid dreaming, and proposes that it is possible for anyone to learn to dream consciously. [21] [22]
In 1913, Dutch psychiatrist and writer Frederik (Willem) van Eeden (1860–1932) coined the term "lucid dream" in an article entitled "A Study of Dreams". [23] [15] [22]
Some have suggested that the term is a misnomer because Van Eeden was referring to a phenomenon more specific than a lucid dream. [24] Van Eeden intended the term lucid to denote "having insight", as in the phrase a lucid interval applied to someone in temporary remission from a psychosis, rather than as a reference to the perceptual quality of the experience, which may or may not be clear and vivid. [25]
In 1968, Celia Green analyzed the main characteristics of such dreams, reviewing previously published literature on the subject and incorporating new data from participants of her own. She concluded that lucid dreams were a category of experience quite distinct from ordinary dreams and said they were associated with rapid eye movement sleep (REM sleep). Green was also the first to link lucid dreams to the phenomenon of false awakenings. [26]
In 1975, Dr. Keith Hearne had the idea to exploit the nature of rapid eye movements (REM) to allow a dreamer to send a message directly from dreams to the waking world. Working with an experienced lucid dreamer (Alan Worsley), he eventually succeeded in recording (via the use of an electrooculogram or EOG) a pre-defined set of eye movements signaled from within Worsley's lucid dream. This occurred at around 8 am on the morning of April 12, 1975. Hearne's EOG experiment was formally recognized through publication in the journal for The Society for Psychical Research. Lucid dreaming was subsequently researched by asking dreamers to perform pre-determined physical responses while experiencing a dream, including eye movement signals. [27] [28]
In 1980, Stephen LaBerge at Stanford University developed such techniques as part of his doctoral dissertation. [29] In 1985, LaBerge performed a pilot study that showed that time perception while counting during a lucid dream is about the same as during waking life. Lucid dreamers counted out ten seconds while dreaming, signaling the start and the end of the count with a pre-arranged eye signal measured with electrooculogram recording. [30] [31] [32] LaBerge's results were confirmed by German researchers D. Erlacher and M. Schredl in 2004. [33]
In a further study by Stephen LaBerge, four subjects were compared either singing while dreaming or counting while dreaming. LaBerge found that the right hemisphere was more active during singing and the left hemisphere was more active during counting. [34]
Neuroscientist J. Allan Hobson has hypothesized what might be occurring in the brain while lucid. The first step to lucid dreaming is recognizing one is dreaming. This recognition might occur in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, which is one of the few areas deactivated during REM sleep and where working memory occurs. Once this area is activated and the recognition of dreaming occurs, the dreamer must be cautious to let the dream continue but be conscious enough to remember that it is a dream. While maintaining this balance, the amygdala and parahippocampal cortex might be less intensely activated. [35] To continue the intensity of the dream hallucinations, it is expected the pons and the parieto-occipital junction stay active. [36]
Using electroencephalography (EEG) and other polysomnographical measurements, LaBerge and others have shown that lucid dreams begin in the rapid eye movement (REM) stage of sleep. [37] [38] [39] LaBerge also proposes that there are higher amounts of beta-1 frequency band (13–19 Hz) brain wave activity experienced by lucid dreamers, hence there is an increased amount of activity in the parietal lobes making lucid dreaming a conscious process. [40]
Paul Tholey, a German Gestalt psychologist and a professor of psychology and sports science, originally studied dreams in order to resolve the question of whether one dreams in colour or black and white. In his phenomenological research, he outlined an epistemological frame using critical realism. [41] Tholey instructed his subjects to continuously suspect waking life to be a dream, in order that such a habit would manifest itself during dreams. He called this technique for inducing lucid dreams the Reflexionstechnik (reflection technique). [42] Subjects learned to have such lucid dreams; they observed their dream content and reported it soon after awakening. Tholey could examine the cognitive abilities of dream figures. [43] Nine trained lucid dreamers were directed to set other dream figures arithmetic and verbal tasks during lucid dreaming. Dream figures who agreed to perform the tasks proved more successful in verbal than in arithmetic tasks. Tholey discussed his scientific results with Stephen LaBerge, who has a similar approach. [44]
A study was conducted by Stephen LaBerge and other scientists to see if it were possible to attain the ability to lucid dream through a drug. In 2018, galantamine was given to 121 patients in a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, the only one of its kind. Some participants found as much as a 42 percent increase in their ability to lucid dream, compared to self-reports from the past six months, and ten people experienced a lucid dream for the first time. It is theorized that galantamine allows acetylcholine to build up, leading to greater recollection and awareness during dreaming. [45]
Teams of cognitive scientists have established real-time two-way communication with people undergoing a lucid dream. During dreaming they were able to consciously communicate with experimenters via eye movements or facial muscle signals, were able to comprehend complex questions and use working memory. Such interactive lucid dreaming could be a new approach for the scientific exploration of the dream state and could have applications for learning and creativity. [46] [47] [48] [49] Researchers have also demonstrated that individuals in a lucid dream can control and respond to feedback within a virtual environment. [50]
Other researchers suggest that lucid dreaming is not a state of sleep, but of brief wakefulness, or "micro-awakening". [51] [52] Experiments by Stephen LaBerge used "perception of the outside world" as a criterion for wakefulness while studying lucid dreamers, and their sleep state was corroborated with physiological measurements. [28] LaBerge's subjects experienced their lucid dream while in a state of REM, which critics felt may mean that the subjects are fully awake. J. Allen Hobson responded that lucid dreaming must be a state of both waking and dreaming. [53]
Philosopher Norman Malcolm was a proponent of dream skepticism. [54] He has argued against the possibility of checking the accuracy of dream reports, pointing out that "the only criterion of the truth of a statement that someone has had a certain dream is, essentially, his saying so." [55]
In 2016, a meta-analytic study by David Saunders and colleagues [56] on 34 lucid dreaming studies, taken from a period of 50 years, demonstrated that 55% of a pooled sample of 24,282 people claimed to have experienced lucid dreams at least once or more in their lifetime. Furthermore, for those that stated they did experience lucid dreams, approximately 23% reported to experience them on a regular basis, as often as once a month or more. In a 2004 study on lucid dream frequency and personality, a moderate correlation between nightmare frequency and frequency of lucid dreaming was demonstrated. Some lucid dreamers also reported that nightmares are a trigger for dream lucidity. [57] Previous studies have reported that lucid dreaming is more common among adolescents than adults. [58]
A 2015 study by Julian Mutz and Amir-Homayoun Javadi showed that people who had practiced meditation for a long time tended to have more lucid dreams. The authors claimed that "Lucid dreaming is a hybrid state of consciousness with features of both waking and dreaming" in a review they published in Neuroscience of Consciousness [6] in 2017.
Mutz and Javadi found that during lucid dreaming, there is an increase in activity of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, the bilateral frontopolar prefrontal cortex, the precuneus, the inferior parietal lobules, and the supramarginal gyrus. All are brain functions related to higher cognitive functions including working memory, planning, and self-consciousness. The researchers also found that during a lucid dream, "levels of self-determination" were similar to those that people experienced during states of wakefulness. They also found that lucid dreamers can only control limited aspects of their dream at once.
Mutz and Javadi also have stated that by studying lucid dreaming further, scientists could learn more about various types of consciousness, which happen to be less easy to separate and research at other times. [59]
It has been suggested that those who suffer from nightmares could benefit from the ability to be aware they are indeed dreaming. A pilot study performed in 2006 showed that lucid dreaming therapy treatment was successful in reducing nightmare frequency. This treatment consisted of exposure to the idea, mastery of the technique, and lucidity exercises. It was not clear what aspects of the treatment were responsible for the success of overcoming nightmares, though the treatment as a whole was said to be successful. [60]
Australian psychologist Milan Colic has explored the application of principles from narrative therapy to clients' lucid dreams, to reduce the impact not only of nightmares during sleep but also depression, self-mutilation, and other problems in waking life. [61] Colic found that therapeutic conversations could reduce the distressing content of dreams, while understandings about life—and even characters—from lucid dreams could be applied to their lives with marked therapeutic benefits. [62]
Psychotherapists have applied lucid dreaming as a part of therapy. Studies have shown that, by inducing a lucid dream, recurrent nightmares can be alleviated. It is unclear whether this alleviation is due to lucidity or the ability to alter the dream itself. A 2006 study performed by Victor Spoormaker and Van den Bout evaluated the validity of lucid dreaming treatment (LDT) in chronic nightmare sufferers. [63] LDT is composed of exposure, mastery and lucidity exercises. Results of lucid dreaming treatment revealed that the nightmare frequency of the treatment groups had decreased. In another study, Spoormaker, Van den Bout, and Meijer (2003) investigated lucid dreaming treatment for nightmares by testing eight subjects who received a one-hour individual session, which consisted of lucid dreaming exercises. [64] The results of the study revealed that the nightmare frequency had decreased and the sleep quality had slightly increased.
Holzinger, Klösch, and Saletu managed a psychotherapy study under the working name of ‘Cognition during dreaming—a therapeutic intervention in nightmares’, which included 40 subjects, men and women, 18–50 years old, whose life quality was significantly altered by nightmares. [65] The test subjects were administered Gestalt group therapy and 24 of them were also taught to enter the state of lucid dreaming by Holzinger. This was purposefully taught in order to change the course of their nightmares. The subjects then reported the diminishment of their nightmare prevalence from 2–3 times a week to 2–3 times per month.
In her book The Committee of Sleep , Deirdre Barrett describes how some experienced lucid dreamers have learned to remember specific practical goals such as artists looking for inspiration seeking a show of their own work once they become lucid or computer programmers looking for a screen with their desired code. However, most of these dreamers had many experiences of failing to recall waking objectives before gaining this level of control. [66]
Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming by Stephen LaBerge and Howard Rheingold (1990) discusses creativity within dreams and lucid dreams, including testimonials from a number of people who claim they have used the practice of lucid dreaming to help them solve a number of creative issues, from an aspiring parent thinking of potential baby names to a surgeon practicing surgical techniques. The authors discuss how creativity in dreams could stem from "conscious access to the contents of our unconscious minds"; access to "tacit knowledge"—the things we know but can't explain, or things we know but are unaware that we know. [67]
The Dreams Behind the Music book by Craig Webb (2016) details lucid dreams of a number of musical artists, including how they are able not just to hear, but also compose, mix, arrange, practice, and perform music while conscious within their dreams. [68]
Though lucid dreaming can be beneficial to a number of aspects of life, some risks have been suggested. Those who have never had a lucid dream may not understand what is happening when they experience it for the first time.[ citation needed ] This could cause those individuals to feel a variety of different emotions as they are going through a completely new psychological experience. Feelings of stress, worry, or confusion could arise. On the other hand, the feeling of empowerment could also come up as they realize that they are now in control of their dreams. [69] Someone struggling with certain mental illnesses could find it hard to be able to tell the difference between reality and the actual dream (psychosis). [70] [71]
A very small percentage of people may experience sleep paralysis, which can sometimes be confused with lucid dreaming. Although from the outside, both seem to be quite similar, there are a few distinct differences that can help differentiate them. A person usually experiences sleep paralysis when they partially wake up in REM atonia, a state in which said person is partially paralyzed and cannot move their limbs. When in sleep paralysis, people may also experience hallucinations. Although said hallucinations cannot cause physical damage, they may still be frightening. There are three common types of hallucinations: [72] an intruder in the same room, a crushing feeling on one's chest or back, and a feeling of flying or levitating. About 7.6% of the general population have experienced sleep paralysis at least once. [73] Exiting sleep paralysis to a waking state can be achieved by intently focusing on a part of the body, such as a finger, and wiggling it, continuing the action of moving to then the hand, the arm, and so on, until the person is fully awake.[ citation needed ]
Long-term risks with lucid dreaming have not been extensively studied, [74] [75] [76] although many people have reported lucid dreaming for many years without any adverse effects.[ citation needed ]
A dream is a succession of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that usually occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. Humans spend about two hours dreaming per night, and each dream lasts around 5–20 minutes, although the dreamer may perceive the dream as being much longer than this.
A nightmare, also known as a bad dream, is an unpleasant dream that can cause a strong emotional response from the mind, typically fear but also despair, anxiety, disgust or sadness. The dream may contain situations of discomfort, psychological or physical terror, or panic. After a nightmare, a person will often awaken in a state of distress and may be unable to return to sleep for a short period of time. Recurrent nightmares may require medical help, as they can interfere with sleeping patterns and cause insomnia.
Rapid eye movement sleep is a unique phase of sleep in mammals and birds, characterized by random rapid movement of the eyes, accompanied by low muscle tone throughout the body, and the propensity of the sleeper to dream vividly.
Sleep paralysis is a state, during waking up or falling asleep, in which a person is conscious but in a complete state of full-body paralysis. During an episode, the person may hallucinate, which often results in fear. Episodes generally last no more than a few minutes. It can recur multiple times or occur as a single episode.
Nightmare disorder is a sleep disorder characterized by repeated intense nightmares that most often center on threats to physical safety and security. The nightmares usually occur during the REM stage of sleep, and the person who experiences the nightmares typically remembers them well upon waking. More specifically, nightmare disorder is a type of parasomnia, a subset of sleep disorders categorized by abnormal movement or behavior or verbal actions during sleep or shortly before or after. Other parasomnias include sleepwalking, sleep terrors, bedwetting, and sleep paralysis.
A false awakening is a vivid and convincing dream about awakening from sleep, while the dreamer in reality continues to sleep. After a false awakening, subjects often dream they are performing their daily morning routine such as showering or eating breakfast. False awakenings, mainly those in which one dreams that they have awoken from a sleep that featured dreams, take on aspects of a double dream or a dream within a dream. A classic example in fiction is the double false awakening of the protagonist in Gogol's Portrait (1835).
In the field of psychology, the subfield of oneirology is the scientific study of dreams. Research seeks correlations between dreaming and knowledge about the functions of the brain, as well as an understanding of how the brain works during dreaming as pertains to memory formation and mental disorders. The study of oneirology can be distinguished from dream interpretation in that the aim is to quantitatively study the process of dreams instead of analyzing the meaning behind them.
Celia Elizabeth Green is a British parapsychologist and writer on parapsychology.
An oneirogen, from the Greek ὄνειρος óneiros meaning "dream" and gen "to create", is a substance or other stimulus which produces or enhances dreamlike states of consciousness. This is characterized by an immersive dream state similar to REM sleep, which can range from realistic to alien or abstract.
Closed-eye hallucinations and closed-eye visualizations (CEV) are hallucinations that occur when one's eyes are closed or when one is in a darkened room. They should not be confused with phosphenes, perceived light and shapes when pressure is applied to the eye's retina, or some other non-visual external cause stimulates the eye. Some people report CEV under the influence of psychedelics; these are reportedly of a different nature than the "open-eye" hallucinations of the same compounds. Similar hallucinations that occur due to loss of vision are called "visual release hallucinations".
A dream diary is a diary in which dream experiences are recorded. A dream diary might include a record of nightly dreams, personal reflections and waking dream experiences. It is often used in the study of dreams and psychology. Dream diaries are also used by some people as a way to help induce lucid dreams, and are regarded as a useful tool in improving dream recall. The use of a dream diary was recommended by Ann Faraday in The Dream Game as an aid to memory and a way to preserve details, many of which are otherwise rapidly forgotten no matter how memorable the dream originally seemed. Keeping a dream diary conditions a person to view remembering dreams as important. Dreams can be recorded in a paper diary or via an audio recording device. Many websites offer the ability to create a digital dream diary.
A recurring dream is a dream which is experienced repeatedly over a long period. They can be pleasant or nightmarish and unique to the person and their experiences.
Pre-lucid dreaming is the beginning stages of inducing the lucid dreaming process. At this stage, the dreamer considers the question: "Am I asleep and dreaming?" The dreamer may or may not come to the correct conclusion. Such experiences are liable to occur to people who are deliberately cultivating lucid dreams, but may also occur spontaneously to those with no prior intention to achieve lucidity in dreams.
Paul Tholey was a German Gestalt psychologist, and a professor of psychology and sports science at the University of Frankfurt and the Technical University of Braunschweig.
Hypnopompia is the state of consciousness leading out of sleep, a term coined by the psychical researcher Frederic Myers. Its mirror is the hypnagogic state at sleep onset; though often conflated, the two states are not identical and have a different phenomenological character. Hypnopompic and hypnagogic hallucinations are frequently accompanied by sleep paralysis, which is a state wherein one is consciously aware of one's surroundings but unable to move or speak.
Stephen LaBerge is an American psychophysiologist specializing in the scientific study of lucid dreaming. In 1967 he received his bachelor's degree in mathematics. He began researching lucid dreaming for his Ph.D. in psychophysiology at Stanford University, which he received in 1980. He developed techniques to enable himself and other researchers to enter a lucid dream state at will, most notably the MILD technique, which was used in many forms of dream experimentation. In 1987, he founded The Lucidity Institute, an organization that promotes research into lucid dreaming, as well as running courses for the general public on how to achieve a lucid dream.
Secondary consciousness is an individual's accessibility to their history and plans. The ability allows its possessors to go beyond the limits of the remembered present of primary consciousness. Primary consciousness can be defined as simple awareness that includes perception and emotion. As such, it is ascribed to most animals. By contrast, secondary consciousness depends on and includes such features as self-reflective awareness, abstract thinking, volition and metacognition. The term was coined by Gerald Edelman.
The activation-synthesis hypothesis, proposed by Harvard University psychiatrists John Allan Hobson and Robert McCarley, is a neurobiological theory of dreams first published in the American Journal of Psychiatry in December 1977. The differences in neuronal activity of the brainstem during waking and REM sleep were observed, and the hypothesis proposes that dreams result from brain activation during REM sleep. Since then, the hypothesis has undergone an evolution as technology and experimental equipment has become more precise. Currently, a three-dimensional model called AIM Model, described below, is used to determine the different states of the brain over the course of the day and night. The AIM Model introduces a new hypothesis that primary consciousness is an important building block on which secondary consciousness is constructed.
Mark Blagrove is a British research psychologist who specializes in the study of sleep and dreams.
A dream character, sometimes abbreviated as DC, is an interactable human-like entity in the person's dream, especially while the person is REM-sleeping. The topic has been profoundly addressed in the lucid dreaming community, since while experiencing a lucid dream, the person can consciously interact with dream characters.
The term "lucid dreaming" to describe the technique of controlling dreams and following them to a desired conclusion was coined by the 19th-century Dutch psychiatrist Frederik van Eeden.
Dr. Van Eeden was an author and physician who sat with the English medium Mrs. R. Thompson and was also ... 431) in which he used the term "lucid dream" to indicate those conditions in which the dreamer is aware that they are dreaming.
The lucid dream, a term coined by van Eeden himself, had already been noted by Aristotle who wrote that 'often when...
The person most widely credited with coining the term "lucid dream" is Frederick Van Eeden, a Dutch psychiatrist who from 1898 to 1912 gathered reports of lucid dreams and performed experiments on his own abilities to have lucid dreams ...
The occurrence of lucid dreaming (dreaming while being conscious that one is dreaming) has been verified for four selected subjects who signaled that they knew they were dreaming. The signals consisted of particular dream actions having observable concomitants and were performed in accordance with a pre-sleep agreement.
Conclusions: LDT seems effective in reducing nightmare frequency, although the primary therapeutic component (i.e. exposure, mastery, or lucidity) remains unclear.
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: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to explore, and demonstrate, a potential long-term risk following the use of LD induction techniques.