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Hypnagogic images in normals and amnesiacs
... In addition, recent converging evidence from humans suggest that behavioral (Oudiette et al., 2011;Uguccioni et al., 2013) and neuronal replay occurs after new learning during subsequent sleep (Buzsaki, 1989;Skaggs and McNaughton, 1996;Louie and Wilson, 2001;Girardeau et al., 2009). This reactivation and replay of newly acquired memories is reflected in the content of our dreams ( Stickgold et al., 2000;Wamsley et al., 2010a,b;Kusse et al., 2012;Wamsley, 2014). Furthermore, sleep as compared to an equivalent period of wake, serves to support memory consolidation ( Walker, 2005), and the process of consolidation is reflected in non-REM hypnagogic reverie ( Wamsley et al., 2010a). ...
... However, several methodological hurdles have presented a challenge to the objective, scientific investigation of dreams. For example: (1) only certain types of experiences (e.g., engaging, emotional, and autobiographical) are robustly incorporated into dreams ( Stickgold et al., 2000;Malinowski and Horton, 2014a,b), (2) the type and timing of sleep when dream reports are collected is important for identifying learning-related incorporation (Nielsen et al., 2004;van Rijn et al., 2015), (3) the objective quantification of dream content, until very recently (Amini et al., 2011;Horikawa et al., 2013;Wong et al., 2016) has been limited to subjective assessment of verbal dream reports, and (4) the measurement of the semantic relationship between waking experiences and verbal dream reports (i.e., incorporation) has only been subjectively assessed by comparing behavior to dream reports, as opposed to comparing verbal reports of the learning experience to verbal reports of the subsequent dream experience ( Wamsley et al., 2010a,b). ...
... It was subsequently found that dream content could be more easily manipulated and detected with the use of novel, immersive, and impactful experiences (De Koninck and Koulack, 1975;Koulack et al., 1985;Corsi-Cabrera et al., 1986;De Koninck et al., 1988). An important milestone in understanding the phenomena of dream incorporation came from Stickgold et al. (2000) where participants played a variation of the highly engaging video game 'Tetris' before sleep. They found that both normal individuals and amnesiacs had similar dream reports, directly incorporating elements of the game into their dreams, even though the amnesiacs did not recall playing the game. ...
Can dreams reveal insight into our cognitive abilities and aptitudes (i.e., “human intelligence”)? The relationship between dream production and trait-like cognitive abilities is the foundation of several long-standing theories on the neurocognitive and cognitive-psychological basis of dreaming. However, direct experimental evidence is sparse and remains contentious. On the other hand, recent research has provided compelling evidence demonstrating a link between dream content and new learning, suggesting that dreams reflect memory processing during sleep. It remains to be investigated whether the extent of learning-related dream incorporation (i.e., the semantic similarity between waking experiences and dream content) is related to inter-individual differences in cognitive abilities. The relationship between pre–post sleep memory performance improvements and learning-related dream incorporation was investigated (N = 24) to determine if this relationship could be explained by inter-individual differences in intellectual abilities (e.g., reasoning, short term memory (STM), and verbal abilities). The extent of dream incorporation using a novel and objective method of dream content analysis, employed a computational linguistic approach to measure the semantic relatedness between verbal reports describing the experience on a spatial (e.g., maze navigation) or a motor memory task (e.g., tennis simulator) with subsequent hypnagogic reverie dream reports and waking “daydream” reports, obtained during a daytime nap opportunity. Consistent with previous studies, the extent to which something new was learned was related (r = 0.47) to how richly these novel experiences were incorporated into the content of dreams. This was significant for early (the first 4 dream reports) but not late dreams (the last 4 dream reports). Notably, here, we show for the first time that the extent of this incorporation for early dreams was related (r = 0.41) to inter-individual differences in reasoning abilities. On the other hand, late dream incorporation was related (r = 0.46) to inter-individual differences in verbal abilities. There was no relationship between performance improvements and intellectual abilities, and thus, inter-individual differences in cognitive abilities did not mediate the relationship between performance improvements and dream incorporation; suggesting a direct relationship between reasoning abilities and dream incorporation. This study provides the first evidence that learning-related dream production is related to inter-individual differences in cognitive abilities.
... A seminal study in the dream incubation literature provides a sense of the phenomenology that accompanies dream incorporation of waking learning tasks, and suggests that such incorporation might be related to sleep-dependent memory consolidation. Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, and O'Connor (2000) had 27 participants play the computer game Tetris for 5-7 h over 2-3 days and collected sleep onset dream reports from participants over the first hour of sleep each night. Awakenings were performed by the Nightcap sleep monitoring system (Ajilore, Stickgold, Rittenhouse, & Allan Hobson, 1995), and reports were collected as participants were attempting to fall asleep as well as after intervals of 15-180 s of Nightcap-defined sleep (Stickgold et al., 2000). ...
... Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, and O'Connor (2000) had 27 participants play the computer game Tetris for 5-7 h over 2-3 days and collected sleep onset dream reports from participants over the first hour of sleep each night. Awakenings were performed by the Nightcap sleep monitoring system (Ajilore, Stickgold, Rittenhouse, & Allan Hobson, 1995), and reports were collected as participants were attempting to fall asleep as well as after intervals of 15-180 s of Nightcap-defined sleep (Stickgold et al., 2000). Out of the 27 participants, including 5 amnesiac patients, 17 (63%) reported at least one Tetris-related dream. ...
Information processing during sleep is active, ongoing and accessible to engineering. Protocols such as targeted memory reactivation use sensory stimuli during sleep to reactivate memories and demonstrate subsequent, specific enhancement of their consolidation. These protocols rely on physiological, as opposed to phenomenological, evidence of their reactivation. While dream content can predict post-sleep memory enhancement, dreaming itself remains a black box. Here, we present a novel protocol using a new wearable electronic device, Dormio, to automatically generate serial auditory dream incubations at sleep onset, wherein targeted information is repeatedly presented during the hypnagogic period, enabling direct incorporation of this information into dream content, a process we call targeted dream incubation (TDI). Along with validation data, we discuss how Dormio and TDI protocols can serve as tools for controlled experimentation on dream content, shedding light on the role of dreams in the overnight transformation of experiences into memories.
... Psycho-dynamic such as Freud (1900), Jung (1967), and Solms (1997). 2. Evolutionary such as Revonsuo (2000), Franklin & Zyphur (2005) and Barrett (2007) 3. Neuro-cognitive such as Domhoff (2001), Hobson & McCarley (1977), Stickgold et al. (2001), Stickgold et al. (2000), Louie & Wilson (2001) and Maquet et al. (2002). ...
... After the neurological linkage between Rapid Eye Movement(REM) sleep and dreams (Snyder (1966)), many hypotheses are proposed focusing on REM or accompanied dreams. The major trend is the memory consolidation hypothesis (Stickgold et al. (2000), Louie & Wilson (2001), Maquet et al. (2002)). ...
Apart from being an audacious attempt and a masterpiece, Freud's Interpretation of Dreams has provoked controversy since its publication. After the neurological linkage between Rapid Eye Movement(REM) sleep and dreams, many hypotheses are proposed focusing on REM or its accompanied dreams. This paper reviews recent discoveries regarding the neuro-cognitive aspects of sleep, dreaming, and emotions as a dream ingredient. This paper assumes that a dream content is decomposable into a sequence of Timed Artificial Dream Actions (TADAs) and that dream interpretation resembles the ability of an expert system explaining HOW and WHY questions. Freud tried to answer WHY each dream ingredient is being incorporated. The inverse of this process is to answer HOW a TADA is formed, and it is the concern of this paper. Based on dream-contents, an operational model for dream ingredients is proposed. The proposed TADA generator, nicknamed Oneiros, is decomposed into three modules Morpheus, Phantasos and Phobetor. Morpheus is responsible for the lexical processing of memory contents, in order to perform tasks such as extracting objects, emotions associated with objects, and any object alterations. Phobetor is responsible for extracting viewer emotions , and phobetic-specific aspects. Phantasos is responsible for the actual generation of a TADA.
... Following early efforts in the'60s and'70s to influence dream content by manipulating sleepers' prior experience, recent studies explored the incorporation of a predefined/controlled task. Using as "control event" interactive video games such as Tetris (Stickgold et al. 2000;Kusse et al. 2012), a skiing arcade game (Alpine Racer II; Wamsley et al. 2010a), or a virtual navigation task (Wamsley et al. 2010b), these studies reported a robust influence of the task on subsequent dreams. For instance, Stickgold et al. (2000) showed that 63% (17/27) of the participants reported in their dreams stereotypical images of Tetris (e.g. ...
... Using as "control event" interactive video games such as Tetris (Stickgold et al. 2000;Kusse et al. 2012), a skiing arcade game (Alpine Racer II; Wamsley et al. 2010a), or a virtual navigation task (Wamsley et al. 2010b), these studies reported a robust influence of the task on subsequent dreams. For instance, Stickgold et al. (2000) showed that 63% (17/27) of the participants reported in their dreams stereotypical images of Tetris (e.g. "[I'm] seeing in my mind how the game pieces kind of float down and fit into the other pieces, and am also rotating them."). ...
Memories constitute much of the source material for our dreams. Although waking life events are not faithfully replayed in dreams, dream content arises from recent daily experiences. Numerous empirical studies and theoretical accounts highlight the key function of sleep in the consolidation of newly learned memories, raising the question how reference to waking memories in dreams relates to ongoing memory-related processes that take place during sleep. This review attempts to present first the current knowledge of the incorporation of waking memories in dreams by highlighting three main features of this phenomenon i.e. (1) dreaming contains abundant references from recent dreamer’s own life, (2) the wake-dream relation can follow a surprising 7 day U-shaped timescale and (3) salient/intense waking events are more easily incorporated than indistinct/less-intense waking events. Second, this review attempts to discuss the relationship between this phenomenon and the memory-related processes that take place during sleep. The features of the incorporation of waking memories in dreams are in line with some characteristics of the memory processing hypothesized to take place during sleep, suggesting that dreaming might reflect this memory processing. However, substantial limitations and alternative hypotheses must be regarded and addressed in future studies to clarify the link between dream content and sleep-dependent memory consolidation.
... varied. Interestingly the 'Tetris effect' (Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenbury, & O'Connor, 2000) is a term given to the phenomenon whereby visual representations of Tetris persist in mind following extended periods of game play (for example, 1 hour of game play, twice a day). Further, it has been shown that Tetris-themed memory traces interacted with remote autobiographical memories that were not of Tetris (Stickgold et al., 2000). ...
... Interestingly the 'Tetris effect' (Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenbury, & O'Connor, 2000) is a term given to the phenomenon whereby visual representations of Tetris persist in mind following extended periods of game play (for example, 1 hour of game play, twice a day). Further, it has been shown that Tetris-themed memory traces interacted with remote autobiographical memories that were not of Tetris (Stickgold et al., 2000). Increasing the duration of pre-trauma Tetris game play to a level at which participants report experiencing the 'Tetris effect' (e.g. ...
Background and objectives:
Visuospatial working memory (WM) tasks performed concurrently or after an experimental trauma (traumatic film viewing) have been shown to reduce subsequent intrusive memories (concurrent or retroactive interference, respectively). This effect is thought to arise because, during the time window of memory consolidation, the film memory is labile and vulnerable to interference by the WM task. However, it is not known whether tasks before an experimental trauma (i.e. proactive interference) would also be effective. Therefore, we tested if a visuospatial WM task given before a traumatic film reduced intrusions. Findings are relevant to the development of preventative strategies to reduce intrusive memories of trauma for groups who are routinely exposed to trauma (e.g. emergency services personnel) and for whom tasks prior to trauma exposure might be beneficial.
Methods:
Participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 conditions. In the Tetris condition (n = 28), participants engaged in the computer game for 11 min immediately before viewing a 12-min traumatic film, whereas those in the Control condition (n = 28) had no task during this period. Intrusive memory frequency was assessed using an intrusion diary over 1-week and an Intrusion Provocation Task at 1-week follow-up. Recognition memory for the film was also assessed at 1-week.
Results:
Compared to the Control condition, participants in the Tetris condition did not report statistically significant difference in intrusive memories of the trauma film on either measure. There was also no statistically significant difference in recognition memory scores between conditions.
Limitations:
The study used an experimental trauma paradigm and findings may not be generalizable to a clinical population.
Conclusions:
Compared to control, playing Tetris before viewing a trauma film did not lead to a statistically significant reduction in the frequency of later intrusive memories of the film. It is unlikely that proactive interference, at least with this task, effectively influences intrusive memory development. WM tasks administered during or after trauma stimuli, rather than proactively, may be a better focus for intrusive memory amelioration.
... Engaging, interactive video game tasks have shown particularly powerful effects. For example, in one study, participants played the video game Tetris extensively prior to dream report collection [29]. Mentation reports were then repeatedly elicited during early non-REM (NREM) sleep at sleep onset-64% of participants reported unambiguous 2 Tetris images. ...
... The strength of this reactivation effect then tends to decay quickly across time [49,52]. Similarly, sleep mentation may be most strongly related to recent experience early in the sleep phase [29,31,53]. 3. Learning-related neural activity is not reactivated exactly in its original form. ...
Converging evidence suggests that dreaming is influenced by the consolidation of memory during sleep. Following encoding, recently formed memory traces are gradually stabilized and reorganized into a more permanent form of long-term storage. Sleep provides an optimal neurophysiological state to facilitate this process, allowing memory networks to be repeatedly reactivated in the absence of new sensory input. The process of memory reactivation and consolidation in the sleeping brain appears to influence conscious experience during sleep, contributing to dream content recalled on awakening. This article outlines several lines of evidence in support of this hypothesis, and responds to some common objections.
... Additionally, visualizations of video game images appearing at some point after playing a video game have been reported in other studies. Researchers interested in demonstrating continuity theory, a theory that supports the idea of continuity between awake activities and dreams, and in understanding the memory consolidation during sleep (Schredl, 2003)have explored visualizations of video game images in sleep onset considering this experience as hypnagogic replays of the game (Kusse, Shaffii-Le Bourdiec, Schrouff, Matarazzo, & Maquet, 2012;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000;Wamsley, Perry, Djonlagic, Reaven, & Stickgold, 2010) as well as kinaesthetic sensations similar to the symptoms of motion sickness where rocking sensations occur after a prolonged exposure to motion (Golding, 2006) and movements of fingers when playing the game have been reported (Kusse, et al., 2012;Wamsley, et al., 2010). Two of the three experimental studies used the tile-matching puzzle video game (i.e., Tetris, 1984) as the experimental game to induce hypnagogic experiences. ...
... B Ortiz de Gortari, et al., 2011) suggested that situations of arousal, anxiety, fatigue and stress can result in gamers seeing video game images projected as an escape or homeostatic mechanism when in social situations. Previous experimental studies have reported visualizations of video game images in sleep onset (Kusse, et al., 2012;Stickgold, et al., 2000;Wamsley, et al., 2010) and while doing daily activities (A. B Ortiz de Gortari, et al., 2011). ...
The aim of this study was to identify, classify, and explain gamers’ perceptual experiences referred to as Visual Game Transfer Phenomena (VGTP), to contribute to the understanding of the effects of post-video game playing, and encourage healthy and safe gaming. A total of 656 experiences from 483 gamers were collected from 54 online gaming forums. The findings suggest that intensive playing can result in misperceptions and visual distortions of real life objects and environments, stereotypical visual experiences that arise from mind visualization, and pseudo-hallucinatory experiences with video game content. Gamers' experiences can be explained by the interplay of physiological, perceptual, and cognitive mechanisms. Observation of video game features suggests that in most cases a relationship between the games’ structural characteristics, gamers’ VGTP experiences, and gamers’ playing habits appeared relevant. VGTP can occur while gaming, immediately after stopping play, or after some delay. Further VGTP characteristics and their psychosocial implications are discussed.
... REM and NREM sleep are the two phases of the sleep cycle. REM sleep has been reported mostly to be linked with memory and spatial learning by enhancing hippocampal consolidation 2,3 and can also cause hyperphagia and weight loss 4 Various neuropsychological studies and numerous behavioral studies on animals, such as the Morris water maze have been shown to cause cognition and memory deficits due to REM sleep deprivation 2 . With the increase in financial and social needs of the modern global 24/7 society, more people work outside their regular working time and ignore sleep. ...
Sleep plays a vital role to help in normal biological functions that are required for normal cognitive functioning. This study was done to determine the cognition-modulating effects of coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), ramipril, and vinpocetine on REM sleep-deprived acute insomniac rat models. A total of Forty-eight albino rats were divided into eight groups (Gr) (n=6).). Gr. 1 was REM control and Gr. 2 was REM sleep-deprived rats treated with water. Gr. 3 to Gr.8 - REM sleep-deprived rats were administered corn oil, donepezil, vinpocetine, coenzyme Q10+corn oil, ramipril, and (coenzyme Q10 + corn oil + ramipril) respectively. Except for the control Gr 1, REM sleep deprivation was induced in Gr. 2 and 8 daily for 7 days. All the rats were subjected to a Morris water maze (MWM) to test the navigation memory dysfunction after 7 days of acute insomnia. The rats were deprived of REM sleep by using a modified multiple platform method. The body weight of the animals was measured on day 1 and day 7. On day 1 and Day 2 acquisition trials, all groups of rats showed comparable latency time required to reach the hidden platform. However, on day 3 and Day 4, rats treated with coenzyme Q10, ramipril, and the combination (CoQ10+ Ramipril) showed a significant decrease in latency time (p<0.01). In the probe trial, sleep-deprived rats showed a significant decrease (p<0.001) in the percentage of time spent in the target quadrant as compared to the REM control. However, there was a significant increase in the percentage time spent in CoQ10, ramipril, the combination (CoQ10+ ramipril), donepezil, and vinpocetine as compared to sleep-deprived rats (p<0.05). At the end of day 7 of insomnia, when the body weight of rats was compared with day 1, there was a significant decrease in weight gain was seen with the sleep-deprived rats treated with corn oil, ramipril, vinpocetine, CoQ10, and (CoQ10+ramipril) (p<0.05). The present study shows that coenzyme Q10, ramipril, and their combination improve sleep deprivation induced cognition impairment.
... By one estimate, >50% of dreams are strongly similar to at least one element of a waking life episode 6 . Meanwhile, a substantial portion of dreams collected following engaging in experimentally introduced learning tasks are directly related to those presleep learning experiences (≈5-30%) [7][8][9][10] . While dreams are a universal human experience, ...
The frequent appearance of newly learned information in dreams suggests that dream content is influenced by memory consolidation. Many studies have tested this hypothesis by asking whether dreaming about a learning task is associated with improved memory, but results have been inconsistent. We conducted a meta-analysis to determine the strength of the association between learning-related dreams and post-sleep memory improvement. We searched the literature for studies that 1) trained participants on a pre-sleep learning task and then tested their memory after sleep and 2) associated post-sleep memory improvement with the extent to which dreams incorporated learning task content. Sixteen studies qualified for inclusion, which together reported 45 effects. Integrating across effects, we report a strong and statistically significant association between task-related dreaming and memory performance (SMD = 0.51 [95% CI 0.28 0.74], p < 0.001). Among studies using polysomnography, this relationship was statistically significant for dreams collected from NREM sleep (n = 10) but not for dreams collected from REM sleep (n = 12). There was a significant association between dreaming and memory for all types of learning tasks studied. This meta-analysis provides further evidence that dreaming about a learning task is associated with improved memory performance, suggesting that dream content may be an indication of memory consolidation. Furthermore, we report preliminary evidence that the relationship between dreaming and memory may be stronger in NREM sleep compared to REM.
... To give just one example of that diversity, consider benign hypnogogic imagery experienced in half-awake or drowsy states. In that state, one often becomes prone to what is described as the Tetris Effect, where visual imagery is manifest as a quasi-hallucination, which is usually brought about by engaging in repetitive activities beforehand (Stickgold et al. 2000). That diversity is further underlined by the fact that modern neuroscience has found that even the world, as perceived veridically, is a kind of visual image referred to as a controlled hallucination, as I mention in my paper. ...
Pareidolia (seeing meaningful things in patterns) is regarded as a concept that can
help identify and interpret rock art. However, its usefulness is deceptive and, consequently, can give rise to significant problems with interpretation because it is such a fundamental attribute of the human visual system. In this paper, I show that the heuristics that underpin pareidolia can mislead researchers into accepting natural rock marks as examples of rock art. Nevertheless, the concept can, to some extent, be leveraged to provide a useful means to identify and interpret rock art by considering the tendency in the context of other types of imagery. By utilising the concept of ‘hyperdolia’, where the human visual system is primed by a range of evolutionary, psychological and socio-cultural factors, I demonstrate how that concept can provide a more reliable means than pareidolia that rock art researchers can exploit when assessing, for example, Upper Palaeolithic depictions of animals. By drawing attention to the similarities and differences between pareidolia and hyperdolia within the broader context of projective mental imagery, this paper shows how the differences can be valuable in furnishing a more nuanced understanding of the subtle characteristics that underpin the experience of imagery in different circumstances and psychological states that can be useful
to rock art researchers.
... It is unknown how this cortical state is related to LSD-induced hallucinations. However, hypnagogic imagery does occur often in WST in humans (Stickgold et al., 2000), and a recent study shows that slow oscillatory events in the retrosplenial cortex are involved in the effect of dissociative drugs such as ketamine (Vesuna et al., 2020). In addition, the forward propagation of alpha waves, a potential signature of HVSs in humans, is enhanced by the hallucinogen N-Dimethyltryptamine or DMT (Alamia et al., 2020). ...
Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) produces hallucinations, which are perceptions uncoupled from the external environment. How LSD alters neuronal activities in vivo that underlie abnormal perceptions is unknown. Here, we show that when rats run along a familiar track, hippocampal place cells under LSD reduce their firing rates, their directionality, and their interaction with visual cortical neurons. However, both hippocampal and visual cortical neurons temporarily increase firing rates during head-twitching, a behavioral signature of a hallucination-like state in rodents. When rats are immobile on the track, LSD enhances cortical firing synchrony in a state similar to the wakefulness-to-sleep transition, during which the hippocampal-cortical interaction remains dampened while hippocampal awake reactivation is maintained. Our results suggest that LSD suppresses hippocampal-cortical interactions during active behavior and during immobility, leading to internal hippocampal representations that are degraded and isolated from external sensory input. These effects may contribute to LSD-produced abnormal perceptions.
... 79 Moreover, dreams triggered by such repetitive games appear even in patients completely lacking all memory, those with clinically diagnosed amnesia. 80 It can take several days for repetitive tasks to show up in dreams, a form of ''dream lag,'' and almost always these tasks appear in partial forms that are, again, only loosely similar. 81 Overall, the behavioral evidence suggests that dreams are not replays of memories or waking events. ...
Understanding of the evolved biological function of sleep has advanced considerably in the past decade. However, no equivalent understanding of dreams has emerged. Contemporary neuroscientific theories often view dreams as epiphenomena, and many of the proposals for their biological function are contradicted by the phenomenology of dreams themselves. Now, the recent advent of deep neural networks (DNNs) has finally provided the novel conceptual framework within which to understand the evolved function of dreams. Notably, all DNNs face the issue of overfitting as they learn, which is when performance on one dataset increases but the network's performance fails to generalize (often measured by the divergence of performance on training versus testing datasets). This ubiquitous problem in DNNs is often solved by modelers via “noise injections” in the form of noisy or corrupted inputs. The goal of this paper is to argue that the brain faces a similar challenge of overfitting and that nightly dreams evolved to combat the brain's overfitting during its daily learning. That is, dreams are a biological mechanism for increasing generalizability via the creation of corrupted sensory inputs from stochastic activity across the hierarchy of neural structures. Sleep loss, specifically dream loss, leads to an overfitted brain that can still memorize and learn but fails to generalize appropriately. Herein this ”overfitted brain hypothesis” is explicitly developed and then compared and contrasted with existing contemporary neuroscientific theories of dreams. Existing evidence for the hypothesis is surveyed within both neuroscience and deep learning, and a set of testable predictions is put forward that can be pursued both in vivo and in silico.
... Come per un lampo improvviso mi risvegliai e passai il resto della notte a elaborare la mia ipotesi" (Morrison & Boyd, 2002, p. 319). Ѐ da rimarcare come dopo esperienze prolungate con attenzione focalizzata in videogiochi alcune parti dell'attività percettivo-motoria eseguita ricompaiano sotto forma di immagini più o meno brevi sia in addormentamento (Stickgold et al, 2000) che in sonno REM nella stessa notte (Wamsley et al., 2010). Inoltre, anche informazioni di tipo verbale trasmesse prima del sonno all'interno di un compito di memoria da completare dopo il risveglio vengono elaborate (cioè, scomposte nelle loro componenti semantiche e ricombinate con altre informazioni cui sono collegate da ben definite relazioni semantiche o episodiche, nonostante l'apparente bizzarria dei contenuti delle attività mentali: Cipolli et al., 1993) sia in stadio II NREM che in sonno REM (Cipolli et al., 1983(Cipolli et al., , 1987. ...
Marcello Cesa-Bianchi ha svolto un ruolo importante nel favorire gli studi sperimentali degli psicologi italiani sulla funzione delle immagini visive all'interno del processo di pensiero creativo durante i diversi stati di vigilanza (veglia vigile, veglia rilassata, rêverie, addormentamento e sonno REM). Egli era partitodalla constatazione che la ricerca di soluzioni innovative per nuovi problemi artistici, scientifici o di vita quotidiana richiede una ricombinazione flessibile e creativa di alcune conoscenze pregresse. Questo articolo riporta le prove sperimentali a sostegno sia dell'assunto che le immagini mentali generate e trasformate intenzionalmente possono facilitare la soluzione dei problemi, sia delle successive ipotesisu come le strategie innovative e intuitive di manipolazione delle immagini mentali possano operare durante la veglia e altri stati di vigilanza. Dopo aver delineato sinteticamente i risultati degli studi in condizioni di veglia a sostegno di una stretta relazione tra la capacità di manipolare mentalmente le immagini in modo olistico e il pensiero creativo, vengono riportati i risultati di vari studi recenti i quali mostrano che l'intuizione (insight) che preannuncia la soluzione può avvenire durante il sonno così come nell'addormentamento, nella veglia rilassata e nella rêverie (mind wandering). Tutti questi stati di vigilanza favoriscono sia la diffusione dell'attivazione di nuclei di conoscenza episodica e semantica nelle reti associative (coinvolte anche nella produzione di sogni durante il sonno), sia la ristrutturazione della rappresentazione del problema attraverso il trasferimento di relazioni tra diversi tipi di informazioni. Soprattutto il sonno REM può funzionare come un periodo di incubazione in grado di aumentare i tassi di soluzione di compiti come la scoperta di regole matematiche nascoste e la risoluzione di anagrammi.Quasi tutti i risultati sperimentali confermano l'idea che un periodo di sonno – così come di veglia rilassata, rêverie o addormentamento – facilita la soluzione di problemi indipendentemente dalle loro caratteristiche artistiche, scientifiche o di vita quotidiana.
... Hypnagogic experiences "can occur in all the sensory modalities, sometimes different sensory modalities can be engaged in the same event" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14). They are considered as "hallucinatory and quasi-hallucinatory events that [occur] in the intermediated state between wakefulness and sleep" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14) that do not appear to be related with memory systems (Mavromatis, 1987;Stickgold et al., 2000). Suggestibility seems to be one of the most prevalent features of hypnagogia (Mavromatis, 1987). ...
Video game playing is a popular activity and its enjoyment among frequent players has been associated with absorption and immersion experiences. This paper examines how immersion in the video game environment can influence the player during the game and afterwards (including fantasies, thoughts, and actions). This is what is described as Game Transfer Phenomena (GTP). GTP occurs when video game elements are associated with real life elements triggering subsequent thoughts, sensations and/or player actions. To investigate this further, a total of 42 frequent video game players aged between 15 and 21 years old were interviewed. Thematic analysis showed that many players experienced GTP, where players appeared to integrate elements of video game playing into their real lives. These GTP were then classified as either intentional or automatic experiences. Results also showed that players used video games for interacting with others as a form of amusement, modeling or mimicking video game content, and daydreaming about video games. Furthermore, the findings demonstrate how video games triggered intrusive thoughts, sensations, impulses, reflexes, optical illusions, and dissociations.
... Control and capture of dream content has been an object of fascination in popular culture and brain and behavioral sciences for decades (Brill and Freud 1934). To this end, sleep laboratory techniques have been developed with the goal of manipulating dream content across sleep onset, NREM and REM sleep: These range from influencing dream content with pleasant or unpleasant smells, inflating a pressure cuff, playing a video game prior to sleep, or inducing lucid dreams with light stimulation (Baekeland, Koulack, and Lasky 1968; R. Stickgold et al. 2000;Sauvageau, Nielsen, andMontplaisir 1998, LaBerge 1988). Our renewed interest in dream engineering aims to expand on and improve protocols that enable the direction of dream content. ...
... Control and capture of dream content has been an object of fascination in popular culture and brain and behavioral sciences for decades. To this end, sleep laboratory techniques have been developed with the goal of manipulating dream content across sleep onset, NREM and REM sleep: These range from influencing dream content with pleasant or unpleasant smells, inflating a pressure cuff on a sleeper's leg, playing a video game prior to sleep, or inducing lucid dreams with light stimulation (Goodenough et al., 1975;LaBerge & Levitan, 1995;Sauvageau, Nielsen, & Montplaisir 1998;Stickgold et al., 2000). Our renewed interest in dream engineering aims to expand on and improve protocols that enable the direction of dream content. ...
... This transitional phase is characterized by a loss of EEG alpha activity and prominent theta activity (3-7 Hz; Berry et al., 2012). Recent experiences and even experimental tasks are frequently incorporated into N1 imagery (e.g., Tetris, Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000;alpine racer game, Wamsley, Tucker, Payne, Benavides, & Stickgold, 2010) and incorporation of a learning task into N1 imagery has been correlated with improved performance (Wamsley, Perry, Djonlagic, Reaven, & Stickgold, 2010). N1 images are also described as surreal and have been associated with creativity and insight (McKellar, 1995). ...
We explore the application of a wide range of sensory stimulation technologies to the area of sleep and dream engineering. We begin by emphasizing the causal role of the body in dream generation, and describe a circuitry between the sleeping body and the dreaming mind. We suggest that nearly any sensory stimuli has potential for modulating experience in sleep. Considering other areas that might afford tools for engineering sensory content in simulated worlds, we turn to Virtual Reality (VR). We outline a collection of relevant VR technologies, including devices engineered to stimulate haptic, temperature, vestibular, olfactory, and auditory sensations. We believe these technologies, which have been developed for high mobility and low cost, can be translated to the field of dream engineering. We close by discussing possible future directions in this field and the ethics of a world in which targeted dream direction and sleep manipulation are feasible.
... Frequently, our dreams are laden with aspects of our waking lives. For example, people who suffer from trauma report experiencing nightmares (Levin & Nielsen, 2007), people playing video games very often report seeing elements of these video games in their dreams (Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000), and musicians experience more dreams about music than non-musicians (Myers, 2010;Uga, Lemut, Zampi, Zilli, & Salzarulo, 2006). Moreover, blind people report dreams in which they use their non-visual senses, e.g. ...
While modern psychology considers dreams to be the royal road inwards into one’s preoccupations, intrapsychic conflicts, and unconscious, Muslims have additionally viewed dreams to be a royal road outward into the realm of spiritual inspiration and prophecy. Despite the significance attributed to dreams in both worldviews, dreams have been an endangered species in the mainstream practice of psychiatry and clinical psychology. In an attempt to address this gap in clinical practice, the authors provide a foundational account on the study of dreams in Islamic the literature and intellectual heritage. The authors will also shed light on the profound tradition of dream interpretation (ʿilm al-taʿbīr) established by Muslim scholars. Following this theoretical foundation, the authors will discuss clinical applications of dreamwork within an Islamically integrated model of psychotherapy. The clinical tools provided for clinicians in this chapter include a toolkit for dream interpretation, utilization of ‘healing dreams’ in practice, navigating through nightmares, understanding the connection between dreams and istikhārah, providing psychoeducation about dreams, and understanding the connection between dreams, psychopathology, and psychopharmacology.
... The personality of the sensitive soul, with so-called thin boundaries, may render a parody of dreams, the experience becoming more "dream-like, emotional and bizarre" (Hartmann & Kunzendorf, 2006). Previous work has established that daytime subjective experience is frequently represented in dream content (Freud, 1913;Solms, 1997;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000;Wamsley & Stickgold, 2009), often events from the preceding day (Freud, 1913) and influences the waking affective state (Komasi, Soroush, Khazaie, Zakiei, & Saeidi, 2018). Many dreams are highly visual, comprising content such as people, faces, places, objects, and animals (Hobson, 1988). ...
Dreams and daydreams are as beguiling as they are intangible. Both share many features, from neurobiology to the sensed experience. Nevertheless, the specific narrative relationship between both, if any, remains uncertain. Theories of dream origins are many: from the psychodynamic royal road, to biological theories including Hebbian-based memory consolidation and a unified quantum brain theory that extends to waking and dreaming alike. Both the ephemeral nature of dreams, and an inability to simultaneously study their content and biology, renders them difficult to research from a conventional biomedical perspective. This leaves agreement on the fundamental properties of dreams as ambiguous, and even the state of consciousness enjoyed during sleep is contested. What is known is that the qualia and neurophysiological signature of dreams and daydreaming share many features. We propose further, from a subjective experientialist position, that dream content is specifically derived from daydreaming or mindful wandering (subserved by the default mode network). If substantiated, this concept offers a new insight into the origin of dreams.
... Kusse, Shaffii-Le Bourdiec, Schrouff, Matarazzo, & Maquet, 2012;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000;Wamsley, Perry, Djonlagic, Reaven, & Stickgold, 2010). ...
Game Transfer Phenomena (GTP) is a multimodal and holistic research approach for understanding the effects of playing video games on cognition, sensory perceptions and behaviors, considering the interplay of video game contents, in-game phenomena (e.g. immersion, trance state, embodiment), in-game activities, and the manipulation of hardware and peripherals. Research with over 6,000 gamers from different samples has demonstrated that playing video games can lead to at least temporarily seeing images, hearing music, sounds, voices, tactile sensations, involuntary movements of limbs, sensations of unreality, illogical thoughts, verbal outbursts, etc., with video game contents. This chapter encompasses an overview of the research on GTP conducted to date, including contributions to the video game research field and future research directions. The chapter is divided into three main sections: i) the phenomena comprises characteristics and the prevalence of GTP; ii) the gamer covers the underlying factors associated with GTP, appraisal and consequences of GTP, and iii) the game includes structural characteristics associated with GTP.
... Dans le milieu clinique, les jeux vidéo sont de plus en plus utilisés comme stimuli dans le cadre du sommeil comme celle de la fonction de mémorisation des rêves, notamment lorsque les individus sont en état hypnagogique, autrement dit dans l'état de conscience entre la phase d'endormissement et celle du sommeil (Stickgold et al. 2000). ...
Bien que le jeu vidéo soit une technologie connue pour se divertir et largement adoptée, la question des émotions, de l'immersion et du sommeil en lien avec le jeu vidéo reste discrète. La quasi-totalité des joueurs ont un jour ressenti une émotion soit positive (joie), soit négative (colère) en jouant. Et si ces émotions pouvaient être utilisées comme source de gameplay (manière de jouer) ? Pour répondre à cette question, un des chercheurs de cette publication s'est auto-évalué pendant 3 mois actuellement en renseignant un questionnaire traitant des émotions et de l'immersion après chaque temps de jeux. Afin de voir si le jeu vidéo et le sommeil sont liés, un second questionnaire a été rempli après chaque nuit. Grâce à des statistiques descriptives, des premiers résultats montrent certaines tendances en vue de statistiques inférentielles qui seront réalisées dans une autre étude. Grâce à une analyse quantitative effectuée sur les premières données et une analyse qualitative flottante, le chercheur a tenté d'interpréter ses expériences vécues ainsi que ses rêves afin de voir comment ceux-ci sont récités. Les apports de cette étude paraissent avant tout pratiques. En effet, des sociétés s'intéressent au moyen d'exploiter les émotions ressenties par les joueurs comme variable de gameplay dans les jeux vidéo. De cette manière, de nouveaux périphériques de jeux peuvent être développés. Dans un autre registre, le milieu médical peut approfondir des thérapies déjà existantes chez les enfants par utilisation des émotions ressenties dans le jeu vidéo. Plus généralement, les entreprises pourraient s'équiper de certains jeux qui permettraient aux employés de se former ou de pouvoir extérioriser leurs émotions dans un univers virtuels plutôt que dans leur contexte professionnel et ainsi éviter des situations délicates. Enfin, les managers peuvent via cette recherche avoir des éléments de réponse pour mieux comprendre les joueurs de jeu vidéo de la génération Y. Ces éléments constitueraient ainsi une autre manière de considérer le jeu qui pourrait s'appeler le "serious play".
... Tetris has been found useful in helping patients with retrograde amnesia (Stickgold et al., 2000). It has also been proven to reduce cravings in addicts, as it (hypothetically) uses up the visuospatial part of the working memory and creates a load on it, such that at the time the brain cannot produce images of the addictive substance, thus decreasing cravings (Skorka-Brown, Andrade & May, 2014). ...
This study was intended to test the effect of Tetris as an intervention for severe but sub-clinical life stress in young adults. Tetris has been indicated to be useful in many clinical populations, particularly having potential in reducing the occurrence of intrusive recollections in PTSD; and the mechanism it has been hypothesised to work on has cognitive and neurological connections to the experience of stress. Method: Tetris was administered as an intervention on a young adult population (30 males, 30 females between 18-20 years) in India, who had a minimum score of 16 as measured by the Perceived Stress Scale. The design used was a single group pre-test post-test method, where PSS scores were compared. Results: There was a significant reduction in the mean perceived stress levels of the group post-intervention, and a significantly greater reduction in perceived stress among women as compared to men, respectively. The effect size score computed (0.759) for reduction in stress levels indicated that the use of Tetris has a high practical significance. Conclusion: Tetris was found useful in controlling perceived stress; and can be a highly relevant intervention for the tech-savvy generation of young adults who spend a considerable amount of their time on their smart-gadgets. Its implications are that any comparable visuo-spatially oriented task could potentially be useful in controlling stress, and that technology can potentially be the next step in administering clinical interventions.
... For example, it has been shown that sport students dream much more often about sports than psychology students (Erlacher and Schredl 2004;Schredl and Erlacher 2008). Playing computer games also shows up in sleep onset mentation and REM dreams (Gackenbach et al. 2011;Kusse et al. 2012;Stickgold et al. 2000). I.e., the findings support the notion that learning new tasks in waking life is reflected in dreams. ...
As testing the functions of dreams directly is not possible, empirical dream research has focused on three areas providing indirect support for a relationship between dreaming and sleep-dependent memory consolidation: (1) Correlation between the activity of the sleeping brain and dreaming, (2) Effects of waking-life on dream content (continuity hypothesis), and (3) Effects of dreams on subsequent daytime behavior and performance. Findings indicate that dream content might be related to reactivation processes, with dream content reflecting learning in waking life, and a dream training effect on waking performance provided some support for the claim that dreaming is influenced by brain processes related to sleep dependent memory consolidation. The research in this area is, however, just at its beginning.
... Nevertheless there is a wealth of evidence showing the continuity of AM across sleep and wake in terms of content (e.g., Stickgold et al., 2000;Schredl and Hofmann, 2003;Schredl et al., 2006), and consciousness and cognition (e.g., Graveline and Wamsley, 2015;LaBerge, 1996, 2011;Kahan et al., 1997). As such the sleeping brain can reflect one's personal life history to a similar extent as waking life processes and behaviors can. ...
... Studying the effect of practicing the Tetris game on NREM dreams, Stickgold et al found that it appeared in about 60 % of the subjects' dreams during the next two nights. Sleep helped the consolidation of the memory traces of the Tetris game [20][21][22]. The phenomenon demonstrated in our study is similar to the Tetris phenomenon game at a phenomenological level. ...
... Studying the effect of practicing the Tetris game on NREM dreams, Stickgold et al found that it appeared in about 60 % of the subjects' dreams during the next two nights. Sleep helped the consolidation of the memory traces of the Tetris game [20][21][22]. The phenomenon demonstrated in our study is similar to the Tetris phenomenon game at a phenomenological level. ...
BACKGROUND:
Images evoked immediately before the induction of anesthesia by means of suggestions may influence dreaming during anesthesia. This study is a retrospective re-evaluation of the original prospective randomized trial.
METHODS:
Dream reports were studied in two groups. In group 1. dreams of patients who received suggestions, and in group 2, those of the control group of patients who did not. The incidence of dream reports and the characteristics and the theme of the reported dreams were compared among the groups.
RESULTS:
In general, the control and the psychological intervention groups were different in terms of dreaming frequency, and non-recall dreaming. The incidence of dream reports was significantly higher in the suggestion group (82/190 at 10 min and 71/190 at 60 min respectively) than in the control group (16/80 at 10 min and 13/80 at 60 min, respectively; p10 = 0.001 and p60 = 0.002). There were no differences in the nature (thought- like or cinematic), quality (color or B&W) and the mood (positive vs. negative) of the recalled dreams. In general, the contents of the imaginary favorite place and the reported dream were identical in 73.2 %. Among the topics most successfully applied in the operating theater were loved ones (83.8 %), holiday (77.8 %) and sport (63.6 %).
CONCLUSION:
The results of the present study suggest that dreams during anesthesia are influenced by suggestions administered immediately preceding anesthesia.
TRIAL REGISTRATION:
The study was registered in ClinicalTrials.gov. Identifier: Q1 NCT01839201 , Date: 12 Apr. 2013.
KEYWORDS:
Anesthesia; Dreaming; Imagination; Suggestion
... Moreover, items of recent episodic information can be activated and processed not only over the following night (day residue effect 51 ), but also up to 5-7 nights later (dream-lag effect 51 ). Indeed, subsequent dreams reported after multiple awakenings of the same night show both repeated incorporations of presleep stimuli [52][53][54][55][56] or suggestions and high frequencies of semantically equivalent or similar (socalled "interrelated" 57,58 ) contents, regardless of the number of awakenings 59 , sleep stage 60 or delay between awakenings. Both types of findings indicate that the activation of memories is not random, but oriented by some concerns 61,62 and/or relationships with previously accessed information 63 . ...
... In previous qualitative studies concerning GTP, gamers reported that images arose recurrently, sometimes moving, and either preserved the color from the game (positive afterimages) or appeared in an opposite color (negative afterimages) (Ortiz de Gortari et al., 2011;Ortiz de Gortari & Griffiths, 2014a). Experimental studies have successfully induced seeing images at sleep onset (Kusse, Shaffii-Le Bourdiec, Schrouff, Matarazzo, & Maquet, 2012;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000;Wamsley, Perry, Djonlagic, Reaven, & Stickgold, 2010). Also, visual hallucinations during and after exposure to a virtual reality (VR) system were reported in an experiment conducted with Parkinson's disease patients, which suggests the importance in understanding individual susceptibility and distinguishing between GTP and symptoms of other underlying conditions (Albani et al., 2015). ...
Previous qualitative studies suggest that gamers experience Game Transfer Phenomena (GTP), a variety of non-volitional phenomena related to playing videogames including thoughts, urges, images, sounds when not playing. To investigate (i) which types of GTP were more common and (ii) their general characteristics, the present study surveyed a total of 2,362 gamers via an online survey. The majority of the participants were male, students, aged between 18 and 27 years, and ‘hard-core’ gamers. Most participants reported having experienced at least one type of GTP at some point (96.6%), the majority having experienced GTP more than once with many reporting 6 to 10 different types of GTP. Results demonstrated that videogame players experienced (i) altered visual perceptions (ii) altered auditory perceptions (iii) altered body perceptions (iv) automated mental processes, and (v) behaviors. In most cases, GTP could not be explained by being under the influence of a psychoactive substance. The GTP experiences were usually short-lived, tended to occur after videogame playing rather than during play, occurred recurrently, and usually occurred while doing day-to-day activities. One in five gamers had experienced some type of distress or dysfunction due to GTP. Many experienced GTP as pleasant and some wanted GTP to happen again.
... However, the possibility that these heterogeneities could be linked to the known intra- (14) and interindividual (7,8) local variations in cortical EEG power during sleep and in preceding local brain activities during waking periods (37-39) cannot be ignored. In addition to this challenge, our results reveal that extensive cortical territories remain activated for several minutes after the thalamic deactivation at sleep onset, a situation that may be propitious to the development of hypnagogic experiences so common during the wake-sleep transition (40,41). In addition, the errors in self-reported sleep latency which commonly is overestimated by several minutes with respect to the objective (polysomnographic) sleep onset (42,43), might result from these persistent and topographically heterogeneous cortical activities. ...
... Two studies (Fosse, Fosse, Hobson, & Stickgold 2003;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000) suggest that episodic memories are not reactivated during dreaming as dream construction occurs without activation of hippocampus-mediated episodic memories; instead they show abstracted images of key elements of the waking events. Such an absence of episodic memory replay is supported by Maquet (2000) showing that the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, normally involved in memory recall, is deactivated during sleep, especially REM sleep, which is also supported by animal studies suggesting that the hippocampus-to-cortex connection is blocked during REM sleep (Buzsáki, 1996). ...
The present review gives an overview on common theories of dreaming with a specific emphasis on how
they are able to explain lucid dreaming. The theories are grouped either to such that describe structural or biological processes of dreams or to such that describe evolutionary and adaptive functions of dreams. This overview shows that none of the theories outlined is fully capable of explaining neither non-lucid dreaming nor lucid dreaming. With respect to the first group, the concept of “protoconsciousness” is the theory that at best explains lucid dreaming. With respect to theories with an evolutionary and adaptive function of dreams, those theories, that stress the problem solving or simulation functions of dreams are more suited to explain lucid dreaming. Further, aspects that induce or amplify lucidity and the neural mechanisms that may be involved in lucid dreaming are described.
... Two studies (Fosse, Fosse, Hobson, & Stickgold 2003;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000) suggest that episodic memories are not reactivated during dreaming as dream construction occurs without activation of hippocampus-mediated episodic memories; instead they show abstracted images of key elements of the waking events. Such an absence of episodic memory replay is supported by Maquet (2000) showing that the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, normally involved in memory recall, is deactivated during sleep, especially REM sleep, which is also supported by animal studies suggesting that the hippocampus-to-cortex connection is blocked during REM sleep (Buzsáki, 1996). ...
The present review gives an overview on common theories of dreaming with a specific emphasis on how they are able to explain lucid dreaming. The theories are grouped either to such that describe structural or biological processes of dreams or to such that describe evolutionary and adaptive functions of dreams. This overview shows that
none of the theories outlined is fully capable of explaining neither non-lucid dreaming nor lucid dreaming. With respect to
the first group, the concept of “protoconsciousness” is the theory that at best explains lucid dreaming. With respect to theories with an evolutionary and adaptive function of dreams, those theories, that stress the problem solving or simulation functions of dreams are more suited to explain lucid dreaming. Further, aspects that induce or amplify lucidity and the neural mechanisms that may be involved in lucid dreaming are described.
... Based on the standard Willshaw network, the system allows massive storage and flexible retrieval of natural images in a neural architecture, the storage capacity scaling with network size. The relevance of a memory system already in primary visual cortex becomes clear if one accepts both a hierarchical view of visual processing, meaning that low-level visual features are present exclusively in the early visual cortex, and the notion that such features can be recalled at all, e.g. in dreams (Felleman and Van Essen, 1991;Stickgold et al., 2000). In addition, there is direct evidence that filling-in processes do exist and take place in early visual cortex (Meng et al., 2005). ...
... Third, day-residue incorporations into NREM sleep mentation that followed a complex visuomotor task (Alpine Racer arcade game) were found in 30% of reports, with the nature of incorporations changing across the night, from relatively direct, concrete incorporations to more abstract representations of the task (Wamsley et al., 2010a). Fourth, day-residue incorporations of the video game Tetris into sleep onset mentation were so robust that both healthy controls and anterograde amnesiacs displayed them (Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'connor, 2000). Finally, Tetris video game incorporations were also found in 10% of sleep onset reports, often mixed in with other memory sources (Kussé, Shaffii-Le Bourdiec, Schrouff, Matarazzo, & Maquet, 2012). ...
Previous work demonstrates that memories about a target experience are incorporated into dream content according to a U-shaped temporal pattern with a peak of incorporations around 1-2 days following the experience (day-residue effect), a diminution on days 3-4, and a recurrence of incorporations on days 5-7 (dream-lag effect). This temporal pattern has been observed for many types of experiences, but no study has yet investigated either whether the pattern occurs differentially for qualitatively distinct, yet temporally proximal, experiences or whether the pattern also manifests by generic changes not specifically related to the target memory. The current study traced memory source incorporation patterns of two qualitatively distinct but temporally overlapping events: a laboratory overnight stay (LAB), considered to be an interpersonal and passive experience; and a virtual reality maze task (VR), considered to be a solitary and active experience. Hypotheses were that: 1) elements of LAB and VR experiences would be incorporated independently and exhibit different temporal patterns of incorporation into dream content; and 2) these incorporation patterns would be associated with different generic changes in dream content, i.e., a primarily external dreamed Locus of Control (Dream LoC) for dreams incorporating LAB experiences and a primarily internal Dream LoC for dreams incorporating VR experiences.
Twenty-six participants each spent 1 night in the sleep laboratory, underwent a VR maze task in the morning, and then kept a home dream log for 10 days. Judges rated dreams for evidence of incorporation of LAB and VR experiences. Results were consistent with expectations: 1) LAB and VR experiences showed independent and opposite temporal incorporation patterns; LAB incorporations showed both day-residue and dream-lag effects whereas VR incorporations revealed a peak only on day 4; 2) Dream LoC scores were more external for Day 1 (peak of LAB incorporations), and more internal for Day 4 (peak of VR incorporations).
Different incorporation patterns for these two experiences may reflect separate underlying processes of memory consolidation responding to different types of stimulus events. Further, temporal patterning of both specific dream incorporations and general dream content changes (LoC) may reflect qualitatively different aspects of episodic memory consolidation.
... Hypnagogic experiences "can occur in all the sensory modalities, sometimes different sensory modalities can be engaged in the same event" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14). They are considered as "hallucinatory and quasi-hallucinatory events that [occur] in the intermediated state between wakefulness and sleep" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14) that do not appear to be related with memory systems (Mavromatis, 1987;Stickgold et al., 2000). Suggestibility seems to be one of the most prevalent features of hypnagogia (Mavromatis, 1987). ...
Video game playing is a popular activity and its enjoyment among frequent players has been associated with absorption and immersion experiences. This paper examines how immersion in the video game environment can influence the player during the game and afterwards (including fantasies, thoughts, and actions). This is what is described as Game Transfer Phenomena (GTP). GTP occurs when video game elements are associated with real life elements triggering subsequent thoughts, sensations and/or player actions. To investigate this further, a total of 42 frequent video game players aged between 15 and 21 years old were interviewed. Thematic analysis showed that many players experienced GTP, where players appeared to integrate elements of video game playing into their real lives. These GTP were then classified as either intentional or automatic experiences. Results also showed that players used video games for interacting with others as a form of amusement, modeling or mimicking video game content, and daydreaming about video games. Furthermore, the findings demonstrate how video games triggered intrusive thoughts, sensations, impulses, reflexes, visual illusions, and dissociations.
... There are indeed indications to assume that unconscious perseverative cognition continues during sleep. Several recent studies measuring brain activity have suggested that daytime neuronal activity is repeated during sleep (Skaggs & McNaughton, 1996;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000), presumably to enhance memory. In addition, extensive data show that negative emotional information encountered during waking is re-processed during sleep (Walker & Stickgold, 2004). ...
Perseverative cognition, such as worry and rumination, is a common reaction to stressful events. In this review, we present a self-regulation perspective on perseverative cognition and propose that it forms part of the default response to threat, novelty and ambiguity. This default response is enhanced in chronic worriers who show difficulties in recognizing signals of safety, due to excessive goal commitment and the use of perseverative cognition as a strategy to cope with perceived threats to goal attainment. It is proposed that worrying about stressful events increases the total amount of time that stress has a 'wear and tear' effect on the human body. Studies supporting this perseverative cognition hypothesis are reviewed. Moreover, we provide preliminary evidence that unconscious forms of perseverative cognition have substantial somatic health effects as well. In conclusion, a focus on perseverative cognition is warranted when investigating links between stressful events and somatic health.
... external perception). For example, it has been shown that waking perception in the hours before sleep has a significant effect on dream content [27]. Antti Revonsuo describes the continuity of perception and dreaming: "We are dreaming all the time, its just that our dreams are shaped by our perceptions when awake, and therefore constrained" [29]. ...
It has been suggested that creativity can be functionally segregated into two processes: spontaneous and deliberate. In this paper, we propose that the spontaneous aspect of creativity is enabled by the same neural simulation mechanisms that have been implicated in visual mentation (e.g. visual perception, mental imagery, mind-wandering and dreaming). This proposal is developed into an Integrative Theory that serves as the foundation for a computational model of dreaming and site-specific artwork: A Machine that Dreams.
... During sleep people obviously do not worry consciously, but the hypervigilance that is evoked by stressful events might be prolonged into the night. Although a lot has to be discovered on what exactly happens cognitively during sleep, studies with rats and humans have shown that daytime neuronal activity seems to be repeated or "replayed" just before or during sleep (Skaggs & McNaughton, 1996;Stickgold, Malia, Maguire, Roddenberry, & O'Connor, 2000). Furthermore, sleep promotes the consolidation of memories, especially negative ones (Walker & Stickgold, 2004). ...
... Generally, the sleep stages defined by the AASM sleep staging criteria are associated with different behavioral and cognitive changes, as well as with different types of subjective conscious content reports obtained after sudden awakenings. Early sleep (N1 stage) is characterized by recollections of vivid hypnagogic hallucinations and lucid dreams (Domhoff, 2002;Kusse et al., 2011), cognitive operations similar to those performed during wakefulness (Stickgold et al., 2000;Wamsley et al., 2010) and in some cases a failure to recognize a prior state of sleep (Tononi, 2009). It is known that the cortex can remain in a state similar to wakefulness for minutes after the thalamic deactivation occurring during sleep onset (Magnin et al., 2010), which could be behind the conscious content present during early sleep. ...
Human deep sleep is characterized by reduced sensory activity, responsiveness to stimuli, and conscious awareness. Given its ubiquity and reversible nature, it represents an attractive paradigm to study the neural changes which accompany the loss of consciousness in humans. In particular, the deepest stages of sleep can serve as an empirical test for the predictions of theoretical models relating the phenomenology of consciousness with underlying neural activity. A relatively recent shift of attention from the analysis of evoked responses toward spontaneous (or "resting state") activity has taken place in the neuroimaging community, together with the development of tools suitable to study distributed functional interactions. In this review we focus on recent functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) studies of spontaneous activity during sleep and their relationship with theoretical models for human consciousness generation, considering the global workspace theory, the information integration theory, and the dynamical core hypothesis. We discuss the venues of research opened by these results, emphasizing the need to extend the analytic methodology in order to obtain a dynamical picture of how functional interactions change over time and how their evolution is modulated during different conscious states. Finally, we discuss the need to experimentally establish absent or reduced conscious content, even when studying the deepest sleep stages.
... Hypnagogic experiences "can occur in all the sensory modalities, sometimes different sensory modalities can be engaged in the same event" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14). They are considered as "hallucinatory and quasi-hallucinatory events that [occur] in the intermediated state between wakefulness and sleep" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14) that do not appear to be related with memory systems (Mavromatis, 1987;Stickgold et al., 2000). Suggestibility seems to be one of the most prevalent features of hypnagogia (Mavromatis, 1987). ...
Video game playing is a popular activity and its enjoyment among frequent players has been associated with absorption and immersion experiences. This paper examines how immersion in the video game environment can influence the player during the game and afterwards (including fantasies, thoughts, and actions). This is what is described as Game Transfer Phenomena (GTP). GTP occurs when video game elements are associated
with real life elements triggering subsequent thoughts, sensations and/or player actions. To investigate
this further, a total of 42 frequent video game players aged between 15 and 21 years old were interviewed.
Thematic analysis showed that many players experienced GTP, where players appeared to integrate elements of video game playing into their real lives. These GTP were then classified as either intentional or automatic experiences. Results also showed that players used video games for interacting with others as a form of amusement, modeling or mimicking video game content, and daydreaming about video games. Furthermore,
the findings demonstrate how video games triggered intrusive thoughts, sensations, impulses, reflexes, visual illusions, and dissociations.
... Hypnagogic experiences "can occur in all the sensory modalities, sometimes different sensory modalities can be engaged in the same event" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14). They are considered as "hallucinatory and quasi-hallucinatory events that [occur] in the intermediated state between wakefulness and sleep" (Mavromatis, 1987, p. 14) that do not appear to be related with memory systems (Mavromatis, 1987;Stickgold et al., 2000). Suggestibility seems to be one of the most prevalent features of hypnagogia (Mavromatis, 1987). ...
Video game playing is a popular activity and its enjoyment among frequent players has been associated with absorption and immersion experiences. This paper examines how immersion in the video game environment can influence the player during the game and afterwards (including fantasies, thoughts, and actions). This is what is described as Game Transfer Phenomena (GTP). GTP occurs when video game elements are associated with real life elements triggering subsequent thoughts, sensations and/or player actions. To investigate this further, a total of 42 frequent video game players aged between 15 and 21 years old were interviewed. Thematic analysis showed that many players experienced GTP, where players appeared to integrate elements of video game playing into their real lives. These GTP were then classified as either intentional or automatic experiences. Results also showed that players used video games for interacting with others as a form of amusement, modeling or mimicking video game content, and daydreaming about video games. Furthermore, the findings demonstrate how video games triggered intrusive thoughts, sensations, impulses, reflexes, optical illusions, and dissociations.
Each night, we cross a bridge that connects the waking and sleeping worlds. We know very little about this bridge (symbolizing the sleep-onset period), as our passage is brief and leaves only a few fragmented memories behind. Moreover, sleep researchers have largely overlooked this twilight period, certainly owing to its ‘in-between’ and fleeting nature. However, upon closer examination, the sleep-onset period appears as a rich and dynamic time during which our body and mind undergo significant changes. Brain activity slows, muscles relax, and reality gradually distorts: dreamlike images begin to dance before the eyelids. In contrast to the research community, many scientists and artists, such as Thomas Edison and Salvador Dali, were fascinated by this rich period, seeing in it great potential, particularly for increasing their creativity. They even devised methods for capturing creative inspirations from this ‘genius gap’ before they vanished into the limbo of sleep. They would take naps while holding an object that dropped noisily as they dozed off, awakening them just in time to record some of their discoveries/ideas. Is there any truth in this seductive story? In other words, is the sleep-onset period conducive to creativity? This question will serve as the central theme of this thesis. Our main hypothesis was that hybrid states, at the borderland between wakefulness and sleep, would promote creativity. We tested this hypothesis by examining both a physiological state in which sleep and wakefulness coexist (the sleep-onset period, specifically the first sleep stage, named N1) and a sleep disorder, narcolepsy, in which the line between the two vigilance states is even finer than usual. We first demonstrated an increased creative potential in patients with narcolepsy, suggesting an (indirect) link between a privileged access to the sleep-onset period (caused by excessive daytime sleepiness) and the gradual development of creativity over time. Second, we found a direct link between the N1 stage and creativity, given that a single minute of N1 was sufficient to triple the probability of discovering a hidden shortcut to solve a task compared to a period of wakefulness. Additionally, this beneficial effect of the N1 stage disappeared when the subjects reached a deeper sleep (N2). We substantiated these results using spectral analyses and discovered an optimal cocktail for creativity (above and beyond sleep stages), consisting of an intermediate level of alpha (a marker of the wake-to-sleep transition) and a low level of delta (which signs sleep depth). We thus unraveled the existence of a ‘creative sweet spot’ within the sleep-onset period. Hitting this zone requires striking a balance between falling asleep easily and sleeping too deeply. Finally, we investigated the relationship between memory and creativity during sleep onset, using a newly-designed task that allowed us to evaluate these two cognitive functions within a single experimental design. Regrettably, the creative task was too difficult (not enough solvers) to assess the link between memory and creative problem-solving. However, we found that subjects who slept exclusively in N1 exhibited a 10% forgetting of previously encoded individual memory traces, whereas subjects who transitioned to the N2 stage showed less forgetting. Intriguingly, these last two studies both show distinct behavioral effects between two seemingly close sleep stages (N1 and N2). These parallel findings may suggest a link between memory processing (and possibly the pruning of irrelevant information) and the N1-induced boost in creativity. But more importantly, they emphasize the importance of distinguishing the N1 and N2 stages in future research, as they appear to have distinct effects on cognition. Overall, our findings indicate that critical cognitive processes occur during sleep onset. Notably, we found that this period constitutes a doorway into creativity, which neuroscientists [...]
Offline reactivation of task-related neural activity has been demonstrated in animals but is difficult to directly observe in humans. We sought to identify potential electroencephalographic (EEG) markers of offline memory processing in human subjects by identifying a set of characteristic EEG topographies (“microstates”) that occurred as subjects learned to navigate a virtual maze. We hypothesized that these task-related microstates would appear during post-task periods of rest and sleep. In agreement with this hypothesis, we found that one task-related microstate was increased in post-training rest and sleep compared to baseline rest, selectively for subjects who actively learned the maze, and not in subjects performing a non-learning control task. Source modeling showed that this microstate was produced by activity in temporal and parietal networks, which are known to be involved in spatial navigation. For subjects who napped after training, the increase in this task-related microstate predicted the magnitude of subsequent change in performance. Our findings demonstrate that task-related EEG patterns re-emerge during post-training rest and sleep.
Selon la théorie du replay, le sommeil améliore la consolidation mnésique des apprentissages récents à travers leur réactivation. Pour tester cette hypothèse, nous avons utilisé le modèle de la somniloquie : les paroles nocturnes reflétant le contenu mental du dormeur et les informations qu’il est en train de traiter. La somniloquie survient fréquemment dans le cadre de parasomnies de sommeil lent (somnambulisme) ou de sommeil paradoxal (TCSP). Nous avons d’abord montré comment ces deux parasomnies correspondaient à la mise en gestes et en paroles du contenu mental du dormeur, avec une prédominance en sommeil lent de rêves de catastrophes que les somnambules fuyaient et en sommeil paradoxal, de rêves d’agressions d’animaux ou de personnes que les patients contre-attaquaient. Ceci soutient le concept de la fonction évolutionniste des rêves comme un entraînement virtuel à « fuir ou combattre » les menaces. Ensuite, nous avons utilisé les somniloquies pour tester si un apprentissage verbal récent était consolidé pendant le sommeil mais aussi si certains mots étaient répétés en dormant. Nous avons d’abord montré que la consolidation mnésique verbale liée au sommeil était bien conservée chez les somnambules comme chez les patients atteints de TCSP, même déments, comparée aux sujets normaux. Ensuite, nous n’avons pas identifié de réexécution de phrases apprises la veille lors des somniloquies de sommeil lent, mais avons identifié chez un patient avec TCSP, un élément sémantique évoquant une réutilisation du contexte de l’histoire. Enfin, nous avons collecté 883 verbatim nocturnes et décrit les aspects acoustico-phonétiques, prosodiques et sémantiques du langage nocturne.
Recent studies have provided evidence that information processing occurs during sleep as well as in the daytime. This paper reviews the literature on information processing during sleep from the viewpoints of 1) input : response to external stimuli during sleep, 2) processing : consolidation and improvement of learned memory during sleep, and 3) output : temporal features of dream occurrence and characteristics of dream content. Although during sleep the ability to respond to external stimuli decreases, psychological functions, such as attention and motivation, are maintained. Sleep is required after training in order to improve certain types of procedural and declarative memory. Dreaming occurs frequently in the morning, and altered association of semantic memories is related to the unique quality of dream contents. Progress in the study of information processing during sleep will provide further understandings of human cognitive function and mental activity. (Japanese Journal of Physiological Psychology and Psychophysiology, 25 (1) : 17-34, 2007.)
Sleep offers a unique opportunity to relate changes in brain activity to changes in consciousness. Indeed, if it were not for sleep, when consciousness fades in and out on a regular basis, it might be hard to imagine that consciousness is not a given but depends somehow on the way our brain is functioning. At the same time as changes in consciousness occur, brain activity undergoes major changes through an orderly progression of sleep stages, which can be identified by recording the electroencephalogram (EEG), eye movements (EOG), and muscle tone (EMG). Within each sleep stage, there are frequent, short-lasting electrophysiological phenomena, such as slow oscillations and spindles representing moments at which brain activity undergoes important fluctuations. There are also orderly spatial changes in the activation of many brain regions, as indicated by imaging studies. Importantly, similar brain activities occur in animals, and this has spearheaded detailed studies of the underlying neural mechanisms.
Visual mentation is the experience of visual images in the mind and includes visual aspects of perception, mental imagery, mind wandering and dream-ing. We propose an Integrative Theory of visual mentation (VM) that unifies biopsychological theories perception, dreaming and mental imagery. Un-der the theory, we make three major hypotheses where VM (1) involves the activation of perceptual representations in the temporal lobe, (2) is expe-rienced phenomenologically due to the activation of these representations, and (3) depends on shared mechanisms of simulation — dependent on a subset of the Default Network — that exploit these perceptual representa-tions. The resulting Integrative Theory informs the development of a com-putational model — and generative site-specific artwork — that generates visual images from perceptual, mind wandering and dreaming processes. These images are composed of shared perceptual representations learned during waking. Perception, mind wandering and dreaming are contiguous simulations of sensory reality modulated by varying degrees of exogenous and endogenous activation impacting a predictive model.
What is a dream? What is the relationship between dreaming, mind wandering and external perception? These questions are at the core of this artistic enquiry. In this art-as-research practice, both arts and sciences are defined as practices that construct culturally relevant representations that
function as tools exploited in our attempt to make sense of the world and ourselves. Through this research, novel contributions are made to both artistic practices and cognitive science where both are manifest in a computational system that serves as both a generative and site-specific artwork and as a computational model of dreaming — the Dreaming Machine.
Visual mentation is the experience of visual images in the mind and includes visual aspects of perception, mental imagery, mind wandering and dreaming. The Integrative Theory of visual mentation unifies biopsychological theories of perception, dreaming and mental imagery and makes three major hypotheses: Visual mentation (1) involves the activation of perceptual representations, (2) is experienced phenomenologically due to the activation of these representations, and (3) depends on shared mechanisms of simulation that exploit these representations. The Integrative Theory is the theoretical foundation of the model and artwork that generates dream imagery.
The Dreaming Machine is an image-making agent that uses clustering and machine learning methods to make sense of live images captured in the context of installation. Visual images are generated during external perception, mind wandering and dreaming, and are constructed from shared perceptual representations learned during waking. The difference between these processes of visual mentation are varying degrees of activation from external stimuli (exogenous) and feedback
in a predictive model of the world (endogenous). As an artwork, the generative methods manifesting biopsychological processes create a rich diversity of imagery that ranges from abstract collage to photo-realism. The artwork is meant to facilitate the viewer’s sense of his/her own fabricated perceptions and consider the relationships between computation, cognitive models and scientific conceptions of mind and dreaming.
The present study investigated the effect of a high-impact waking stimulus on adults' dreams. Sixty-seven participants recorded dreams following viewing of a traumatic digital video disc (DVD; September 11 media coverage) and an education DVD (a Psychology 1 lecture). There was significantly more intense central imagery (Hartmann, 1998, 2011) and negative emotion in the dreams following viewing of the stressful DVD. Scales were developed to assess imagery related to the content of the DVDs. A set of scales loosely based on Garfield's (2001) common dream themes measured thematic content. Significantly higher ratings were obtained for six out of the nine themes identified as relevant (e.g., chased, attacked, or threatened) in dreams following viewing the September 11 DVD, as compared with those following the education DVD. As predicted there was significantly more September 11-related literal, closely, and distantly associated imagery following viewing of the September 11 DVD. The results provide experimental support for connectionist processes in dream production as postulated in Hartmann's (1998, 2011) theory, and other theories predicting metaphoric dream imagery related to waking concerns.
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