Video Gaming and Dreams

Researcher Jayne Gackenback at Grant MacEwan University has researched the effects of gaming on sleep mentation, or dreaming. She and her colleagues (2011) examined the dreams of soldiers who play video games, in particular, they were interested in nightmare. The previous literature has shown that high waking day emotion and distress are predictors of nightmare suffering. Interestingly, soldiers who were high in gaming exhibited less threat and war content in their military dreams than those who were low-end gamers. How would this help soldiers and could this possibly be tested with other groups who suffer nightmares?

The Continuity Hypothesis of Dreaming

There is much research evidence that dream images relate directly to waking day life circumstances. For example, students who study sports have more dreams about sports than students who study other disciplines. People who are ill have more dreams with doctors, needles, medications and other illness-related imagery than people who are not ill. One of the major researchers in the area is Dr. Michael Schredl from Germany who has found the continuity hypothesis to be stable and global for dreamers. Please google Dr. Schredl and blog about his work and how his work has influenced the field of dream science.

Dreams, Grief and Mourning

The psychological literature has noted 5 stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance (Kubler-Ross, 1969). Mourning is defined as the following four stages: Numbness, yearning, disorganization, and reorganization. Interestingly, when a person loses a loved one through death, in conjunction with the stages of grief and mourning are dreams of the deceased in various forms. For example, the deceased will appear as if they are alive and speak to the dreamer. The deceased can convey information such as forgiveness or advice. It appears that dreams of the deceased are a very important part of the human experience of grief and mourning. Joshua Black at Trent University is now examining the dreams of the bereaved to investigate further why these dreams occur and how they are important in the grief process. How might dreams of the deceased help people cope with their loss? How might these dreams help grief counselors deal with profound grief?