Quiz 4 - Dreaming Flashcards
When does dreaming happen?
Dreaming occurs in REM and Non-REM sleep
REM = Rapid Eye Movement - happens close to wakening - dreams happen more in REM and remembered - muscle Antonia - stillness - eye lids flutter
Non-REM = deep sleep - you do not remember dreams - you do not naturally wake up in non-REM sleep
Dream disorders
Muscle Antonia - caused by brain part called PONS - damage to PONS causes more movement instead of muscle atonia/relaxing of muscles during REM sleep
Non-REM sleep - sleepwalking
Dream Recall
We forget dreams
Correlates with visuospatial skill and individual differences in working memory
Animals & infants cannot report dreams
People report more in dreams than actually took place but can’t recall
Dreams and waking states
Some people have no dream imagery
Some have difficulty forming images in memory
How to record dreams
Ask people to recall
Ask people to keep dream diary
Ask people to report dreams every morning
Wake people up during sleep at many points through night and report - best method
What are dreams like
Scene shifts are common
Tend to be narrative
Tend to be experienced ‘first person’
Dream emotion tends to match content
Can be bizarre but not often
Scary dream - feels scared
Happy dream - feels happy
Animated
Movement
Strange seems normal
Bizarre dreams - talked about as is interesting - selection bias - remembered due to recited more - memory bias
What are dreams not like
Recent events rarely dreamed about
Interference from the world
Dream of needing to urinate
Dream teeth fall out (70%) caused by dental irritation
Loud sounds - alarm - can be in dream
How can you affect your dreams
Presleep - attention to specific concern
Called dream incubation
What is Threat Simulation Theory (TST)
Philosopher Antii Revonsuo
A major function of dreaming is to practice dealing with threats that were common in ancestral environment ie chased by animal
Support for TST - animal dreams highest in kids and decreases with age - negative emotions 2X more than positive emotion dreams - only recurring dreams are ones of being threatened by animals, people, monsters, disasters and response was watching, running, hiding - westerners dream of things rarely experienced - ancestral threats are over represented - people react appropriately to dream threats 94% of time
Play and Phobia
Ancestral threats
Ancient survival behaviours practised in play and in phobias
Animals play appropriately for what they need to do
Dreaming as preventing overfitting
Hoel’s theory
Only theory that explains weirdness of dreams
Ie two groups - differences - too much concentration leads to over learning-overfitting
Dreams help to prevent overfitting
The dreaming brain
Brain stem is very active - sends information forwarded
Dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) involved with executive function is deactivated
Explains our reduced reasoning ability during dreams
Not noticing what’s weird
Uninhibited behaviour
Reason for difficulty remembering dreams
AIM model of conscious state
Activation - basic level of activation
Information Flow - sensory input vs internal, fictive input
Mode of information processing - neuromodulation activation - synthesis hypothesis: dreams are the cortex trying to make sense of chaotic inputs from brain stem = dreams are interpretation of brain stem input
Support for AIM Theory - dream emotion shapes dream not the other way around ie anxiety dream often shifts one anxiety producing theme to another
Dream recall cessation caused by forebrain lesions
Lucid dreams
You know you are dreaming and you can control actions etc. in dream
You can only control your eyes in the real world
Could be a reactivation of DLPFC which allows you to see dream content for what it is and control yourself
Training - dream diaries, reality check, tech.
