The Dreams of The Bereaved

When a loved one passes away, a common experience is that the bereaved will have dreams of the person in specific patterns. For example, a person may dream that the loved one is not actually dead, or, has come back to life. Another common dream is that the lost loved one has a important message that is being conveyed in the dream. Though these dreams are often reported by the bereaved, little empirical research has yet examined the exact nature of them and how they affect the dreamer in waking life. Given that grief and bereavement is such an important and profound human process, this area of research and clinical study is especially warranted. A graduate student at Trent University, Josh Black, is now examining the dreams of the bereaved in relation to their grief process. What important elements should be included in his study and how can dream therapy help the bereaved with their loss?

The Continuity Hypothesis of Dreaming

Researchers have long since realized that dream images are produced from the dreamer's own life experiences and personality. Researchers have shown that images are often an extension of waking day thoughts, feelings and behaviours (Dale & DeCicco, 2012; Davidson & Lynch, 2012; Schredl, 2007; Steven et al., 2012). Furthermore, extensive studies with normative data have given researchers a pool of data specifying what specific groups dream about. For example, there is a data set for the dreams of university females, university males, community dwelling adults, people diagnosed with depression and people diagnosed with other disorders. Given what we know about the continuity hypothesis and normative data sets, how would the dream imagery of people with depression differ from the norms, and why?