Psychophysiological Parallels in Dreams

To investigate relationships between dream content and physiological arousal, 15 volunteers slept for three nights each in the laboratory. Besides the usual EEG, EOG, and EMG measures to assess sleep stages, recordings were obtained for respiratory rate, heart rate, phasic vasoconstrictions, and skin potential fluctuations. Sleepers were awakened twice from REM and twice from NREM, to assess sleep mentation. This mentation was rated for emotionality, physical activity of the dreamer, and involvement of the sleeper in his dream. Besides a number of lesser relationships, highly significant associations (p < 0.005) were found during REM sleep between dream emotionality and heart rate variability; between dream emotionality and skin potential fluctuations; between dream involvement and mean heart rate; and between dream intensity and heart rate variability. During NREM sleep the intensity of sleep mentation also related to heart rate variability (p <0.03). These relationships indicate that some psychophysiological parallels do occur in dreams more often than chance

Arousal · Audiology · Blood pressure · Developmental psychology · Dream · Electroencephalography · Emotionality · Heart rate · Heart rate variability · Non-rapid eye movement sleep · Rapid eye movement sleep · Respiratory Rate · Sleep (system call) · EEG and Brain-Computer Interfaces · Internal Medicine · Medicine · Neuroscience · Psychology · Sleep and related disorders · Sleep and Wakefulness Research

• Are dream emotions fitting

  M Rosen, Marina Trakas•Philosophical Psychology•2025

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