Beena Kuruvilla’s research while affiliated with Idaho State University and other places

Two studies examined the relationship between measures of video game play, dream bizarreness and dream type, with a conceptual emphasis on dream lucidity. The varimax rotated factor analyses with some variables of each type replicated across studies, showing no association between gaming, dream bizarreness and dream lucidity. Of additional interest is that the oft claimed association between dream bizarreness with lucidity was also not supported with one analysis showing a negative association. This may call into question methods of lucid dream induction that recommend attention to oddities while awake as practice to notice oddities in dreams as a way to get lucid in sleep.

In a follow-up from Gackenbach and Kuruvilla (2008a), data analysis was undertaken examining the metacognitive qualities of video game players dreams associated with lucidity. Kahan and LaBerge’s (1994) Metacognitive, Affective, Cognitive Experience Questionnaire (MACE) responses were examined in a principle component factor analysis. Several factors loaded dream type and gaming variables along with items from the MACE. It was concluded that gaming may be associated with dream lucidity because of the enhanced problem-solving quality of gamer’s dreams. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved)

Hard-core video game players have developed a culture of their own, which has become large and potentially influential in today's society. While much of the research and media attention into the effects of gaming have focused on the negative consequences, there are also numerous positive effects, including those on various aspects of consciousness. The focus of this chapter is an exploration of various states of consciousness, including dreams, through interviews of 27 hard-core college student gamers. Video game play is found indeed to affect dreams, though there are still more similarities to than differences from the dream norms. The differences may be significant in their implications for the relationship between waking conscious experience of video game play and dreams.

In a series of studies Gackenbach and colleagues have been investigating the relationship between video game play and dreams. Three lines of inquiry have been pursued, cognitive factors, emotional content and bizarreness in dreams associated with video game play. The question across studies being does hard core video game play change these fundamental qualities of dreams in the player? It has been found that gamers report more lucid/control type dreams, higher dream bizarreness and unusual reactions to nightmares. These findings are summarized in this chapter.

In a series of studies, J. Gackenbach has been mapping the effects of heavy video game play on consciousness, including dreaming. The reason that gamers are being investigated is that they represent a group of people who are engaging in the most immersive media experience widely available today. With its audio and visual interactive nature as well as the long hours often required to master a game, they are an opportune group to study media effects upon consciousness. In this study, the focus was on dream bizarreness. Dream bizarreness has been variously thought to be the differentiator between waking and dreaming thought, an indication of creativity, and most recently, as a model for solving the binding problem in consciousness. Using A. Revonsuo’s and C. Salmivalli’s scale for dream content analysis, it was found that high-end gamers evidenced more bizarre dreams than did low-end gamers in two of three types of bizarreness categories. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

Revonsuo proposes an evolutionary theory of dreaming in which dreams allow an individual to prepare for real world threats in the safety of the virtual setting of the dream world. Based upon previous work examining the dreams of video game players, it was hypothesized that high-end gamers would experience fewer threat simulation dreams because of frequent threat resolution rehearsal during game play. Subjects were asked to report a night before dream and fill out surveys regarding their gaming history, media use, and dream experiences. Using a factor analysis, support for the main hypothesis was found. Individuals with a history of game play experienced fewer threat severity variables in their dreams. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

Recent dreams were collected over a year’s period from college undergraduates. In addition to providing self-evaluations of the dreams, participants were also asked to answer a variety of media use questions. These were both in terms of their media use the day before the dream and in terms of their historical media use with the most interactive and absorbing media available today, video games. High-end gamers’ dreams were content-analyzed using the Hall and Van de Castle system. These were compared to dreams from a similar population that were collected by interview but were not necessarily recent. There was some replication and some differences in these two different dream samples from individuals with the same gamer history. The second analysis examined day before electronic media use more specifically by loading all the gamer history and media use information with two types of dream variables: sum scores from the Hall and Van de Castle scale and self-evaluations of the dream. Seven of nine factors loaded some combination of media and dream content. This study further supports the idea that general electronic media use and game play in particular are affecting how we process and store information by demonstrating changes at the source of such processes, in dreams.