Researchers report five main reasons for people’s fascination with lucid dreaming (LD): overall pleasure, reducing the frequency of nightmares, solving problems, developing creative abilities, and engaging in various sports. However, the strength and depth of awareness people experience in lucid dreams can vary widely.
Researchers from Spain (García-Campayo, Moyano, Modrego-Alarcón, Herrera-Mercadal, Puebla-Guedea, Campos, and Gascón) used lucidity and consciousness scale to analyze the dreams of 367 participants. The volunteers were asked to fill out a questionnaire developed back in 2013 by Voss, Schermelleh-Engel, Windt, Frenzel, and Hobson.
The questions were compiled by a team of philosophers, psychiatrists, and psychologists based on lucid dreamers’ reports as well as theoretical considerations. They investigated eight central aspects:
1. Insight (i.e. the sleeper was aware that the things around them were not real)
2. Control (the sleeper could control the plot of the dream or the surrounding space in a way that is impossible in reality)
3. Thought (the sleeper was thinking about their own actions)
4. Realism (for example, the emotions experienced in the dream were the same as if the situation had happened in reality)
5. Memory (the sleeper was able to recall their intention to perform certain actions in the dream)
6. Dissociation (the sleeper saw themself from the side)
7. Negative emotion
8. Positive emotion
Out of these, Control and Insight are considered defining characteristics, while Memory and Thought are usually interconnected. The answers were given on a six-point scale: from 0 (completely disagree) to 5 (totally agree).
The Spanish scientists compared participants’ scores based on their experience with meditation. The findings showed that meditators received higher scores on the items Insight and Dissociation. Volunteers with a lot of meditation experience also controlled sleep better. Another important point was mindfulness: people who actively engaged in developing this quality also showed a good level of Control.
How would your latest dream rank on the abovementioned scales?
The article was published in October 2021 in the journal Frontiers in Psychology.
