dreams: the contemporary theory ernest hartmann, m.d. professor of psychiatry tufts university...

Dreams: The Contemporary Dreams: The Contemporary TheoryTheory

Ernest Hartmann, M.D.Ernest Hartmann, M.D.

Professor of PsychiatryProfessor of Psychiatry

Tufts University School of MedicineTufts University School of Medicine

Director, Sleep Disorders CenterDirector, Sleep Disorders Center

Newton Wellesley HospitalNewton Wellesley Hospital

I was walking along a beach somewhere. It wasn’t exactly like any of the beaches I know, I think my friend Jan was with me. Suddenly, a huge wave reared up out of the ocean and totally engulfed us. I’m not sure what happened after that. I struggled and struggled to get to the surface. There was no one else with me. I’m not sure whether I made it, and I awoke, terrified.

Fear, Terror

A huge tidal wave is coming at me.

A house is burning and no one can get out.

A gang of evil men, Nazis maybe, are chasing me.

Helplessness, Vulnerability

I dreamt about children, dolls — dolls and babies all drowning.

He skinned me and threw me in a heap with my sisters; I could feel the pain, I could feel everything.

There was a small hurt animal lying in the road.

Guilt

A shell heads for us (just the way it really did) and blows up, but I can’t tell whether it’s me or my buddy Jack who is blown up.

I let my children play by themselves and they get run over by a car.

I leave my children in a house somewhere and then I can’t find them.

Grief

A mountain has split. A large round hill or mountain has split in two pieces, and there are arrangements I have to make to take care of it.

A huge tree has fallen down.

I’m in this huge barren empty space. There are ashes strewn all about.

SCORING DREAMS FOR CONTEXTUALIZING IMAGES

Definition: A contextualizing image is a striking, arresting, or compelling image — not simply a story —but an image which stands out by virtue of being especially powerful, vivid, bizarre, or detailed.

EMOTION LIST

1. fear, terror 11. power, mastery supremacy2. helplessness, vulnerability, being trapped, being immobilized 12. awe, wonder, mystery3. anxiety, vigilance 13. happiness, joy, excitement4. guilt 14. hope5. grief, loss, sadness, abandonment, disappointment 15. peace, restfulness6. despair, hopelessness (giving up) 16. longing7. anger, frustration 17. relief, safety8. disturbing — cognitive dissonance, disorientation, weirdness 18. love (relationship)9. shame, inadequacy10. disgust, repulsion

If there is a second contextualizing image in a dream, score on a separate line.

Dream ID#

1. CI? (Y/N) 2. What is it?

3. Intensity (rate 1-3) 4. What emotion? 5. Second emotion?

Scoring for the CI (Central Image)

I was walking along a beach somewhere. It wasn’t exactly like any of the beaches I know, I think my friend Jan was with me. Suddenly, a huge wave reared up out of the ocean and totally engulfed us. I’m not sure what happened after that. I struggled and struggled to get to the surface. There was no one else with me. I’m not sure whether I made it, and I awoke, terrified.

Contextualizing Image (CI) Score

0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1

1.2

1.4

1.6

CI S

co

re

Most Recent Dream

Dream that Stands Out

Most Recent Daydream

Daydream that Stands Out

Contextualizing Image (CI) ScoresMean ± S.E.M.

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

CI S

co

re

Waking Sleep Onset NREM REM

CI Intensity

0.00

0.50

1.00

1.50

2.00

2.50

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Cases

CI I

nte

nsi

ty S

core

Mean of Student Group

CI Scores in the Trauma Group (N=10) Versus Matched Student Control Group (N=30)

(Mean ± S.E.M.)

00.20.40.60.8

11.21.41.6

Trauma Group Student ControlGroup

CI Scores in Students Reporting Abuse or No

Abuse

0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1

1.2

Abuse No Abuse

1.12 ± 1.2

0.65 ± 1.0

* t = 2.63, p = 0.01

Methods: Participants

• Complete data sets obtained from 44 persons, living in the US who have recorded their dreams every morning for years.

• 33 women, 11 men. Mean age about 50.

9/11 STUDY

Methods

• Each participant provided 20 dreams — the last ten recorded before 9/11 and the first ten after 9/11, without any selection or alteration.

Methods: Scoring

• All dreams were scored on a blind basis for CI intensity, emotion pictured by the CI, dreamlikeness, and vividness.

• Dreams were also scored on three ad-hoc scales of content: 1) attacks 2) buildings like WTC or pentagon 3) airplanes, and on a scale of nightmare-likeness

SUBJECT

434037343128252219161310741

Mea

n A

FT

MIN

BE

1.5

1.0

.5

0.0

-.5

-1.0

Results: After vs. Before 9/11

Bef Aft Dif t p

CI 1.10 1.28 .18 3.29 .001 one-tailed

Length 12.93 11.88 -1.04 1.3 NS

D-like 4.50 4.54 .04 .47 NS

Viv 4.22 4.24 .02 .17 NS

Results, continued

Bef Aft Dif t p

Attacks .034 .098 .064 2.74 <.01

Bldgs. .059 .104 .045 1.70 NS

Planes .045 .061 -.016 .85 NS

NM-like .213 .307 .094 2.28 <.05

Conclusions:

If we can generalize from these 44 dream journalers, our dream imagery overall was more intense after 9/11/01 than before.

Conclusions (continued):

However, dreams after 9/11/01 were not significantly longer, more dreamlike or more vivid. They did not contain more references to buildings or airplanes. They did contain slightly more references to attacks and they were scored as slightly more nightmare-like.

Conclusions (continued)

• Consistent with previous studies the intensity of the dream’s central image (CI) appears to be a measure of emotional arousal or emotional power.

• Scoring of “Emotions pictured” showed a shift towards more fear/terror and helplessness/vulnerability after 9/11.

• However this was not as clear as the change in “Central Image Instensity.”

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming

• 1. Dreaming is a form of mental functioning ( a “neurocognitive state”). It is one end of a continuum of mental functioning that runs from focused waking thought, at one end, through reverie and daydreaming, to dreaming at the other end.

• ( Mental functioning involves varying patterns of activation of the cerebral cortex.)

• 2. Dreaming is hyperconnective. At the dreaming end of the continuum, connections are made more easily, more broadly, and more loosely than in waking. Dreaming avoids tightly structured, overlearned processes such as reading, writing, typing, calculating.

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming

• 3. The connections are not made randomly. They are guided by the emotions, and emotional concerns, of the dreamer.

• 4. The dream, and especially the Central Image (CI) of the dream, pictures or expresses the dreamer’s emotion. The intensity of the imagery is a measure of the power of the emotion.

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming

• 1. Dreaming is a form of mental functioning ( a “neurocognitive state”). It is one end of a continuum of mental functioning that runs from focused waking thought, at one end, through reverie and daydreaming, to dreaming at the other end.

• ( Mental functioning involves varying patterns of activation of the cerebral cortex.)

A Continuum of Mental Functioning

FocusedWakingThought

LooserWaking

Thought,Reverie

Day-dreaming Dreaming

Figure 1. A CONTINUUM

Focused Looser, Reverie Dreaming

Waking thought Less-structured free association Waking thought daydreaming

What perceptual input, fewer words, signs, almost pure dealt with? math symbols more visual-spatial imagery signs, words imagery How? logical relationship — less logic, more noting or almost pure if A then B picturing of similarities, picture- more metaphor metaphor Self- highly self-reflective — less self-reflective, in “typical reflection: “I know I am sitting here more “caught up” in the dreams” reading.” process, the imagery total thereness, no self reflection Boundaries: solid divisions, less rigid categorization, merging categorizations, thinner boundaries condensation thick boundaries loosening of categories, thin boundaries

A CONTINUUM

Focused Looser, Reverie DreamingWaking thought Less-structured free association

Waking thought daydreaming

C C B Sequence of ideas or A B C D A B A B A C images: D D D Processing: relatively serial; net functions chiefly net functions more as an auto-associative net as a feed-forward net. Subsystems: activity chiefly within structured activity less within, more across or outside of subsystems structured subsystems

A Continuum of Mental Functioning

FocusedWakingThought

LooserWaking

Thought,Reverie

Day-dreaming Dreaming

Directed waking activityMath problem. Catch fly ball.

A Continuum of Mental Functioning

FocusedWakingThought

LooserWaking

Thought,Reverie

Day-dreaming Dreaming

Psychoanalysis: free association

A Continuum of Mental Functioning

FocusedWakingThought

LooserWaking

Thought,Reverie

Day-dreaming Dreaming

Inspiration. Discovery. New work of art.

Creating a “dream” in the laboratory

• If a dream involves the picturing of emotion (“contextualizing emotion”), could one create a dream or something very dream-like by allowing waking imagery (daydream) to develop under the influence of strong emotion?

Dreamlikeness Scale (Mean ± S.E.M.)

3.84

4.24.44.64.8

5

RecentDaydream

LabDaydream

LabDaydream

w/ Emotion

RecentDream

Bizarreness Scale (Mean ± S.E.M.)

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

RecentDaydream

LabDaydream

LabDaydream

w/ Emotion

RecentDream

• Dreams and Daydreams

• The daydreams of students with thin boundaries are as “dreamlike” and as “bizarre” as the dreams of students with thick boundaries.

• STUDIES NEEDED

Views of the Mind

thoughts

memories

emotions

Id

Ego

Super Ego

LinguisticProcessing

Modules

SemanticProcessing

Modules

OtherModules

Boundaries in the Mind

• Between different sensory inputs

• Between thought and feeling

• Around thoughts and feelings ( “spread”)

• Between sleep and waking

• Between dreaming and waking

• Between past, present, future

• Around oneself ( body boundaries)

Boundaries, continued

• Ego boundaries• Interpersonal boundaries in family, etc.• Between male and female• Between old and young• Group boundaries – ethnic, race, nation..• Boundaries in organizing one’s life• B’s in philosophy– the true, the beautiful,

the good …

THICK THIN

• Keep things separate• Distinct categories• Absolutes. Definite.• Black-or-white• Solid member of one

group• Persevering• Reliable

• Together• Merging• Flexible, “it depends”• Shades of grey• Many groups

• Imaginative• Creative

A person with very thick Bs

• I am awake or I’m asleep. That’s it. No in-between states.

• I don’t let my emotions interfere with my thinking. They get in the way.

• I’m a man, you’re a woman. Vive la difference!• The accused is guilty, or he’s innocent! A person is

sane, or insane! No in-betweens.• A good relationship ( or organization) is one where

everything is clearly defined.• My group is this way. Other groups are totally

different. Groups should remain separate.

A person with very thin boundaries

• Sometimes I’m not sure whether I’m awake, or still asleep and dreaming.

• There’s no such thing as thought without emotion. My emotions are always involved

• I’m a man, but there’s a lot of feminine in me too.• We’re all a little bit crazy. There are no sharp

dividing lines.• I’m a member of group A, but also sometimes

groups B and C. Groups should mix more.

Measuring Boundaries: the BQ

• The Boundary Questionnaire ( BQ) is a 138-item questionnaire, covering many different categories of boundaries.

• The BQ has been taken by at least 10,000 people by now.

Boundaries and Dreams

• Overall there is a positive correlation between Sumound ( thinness of Bs) and dream recall frequency. Many studies.

• Overall people with thin Bs have longer, more vivid, more “dream-like,” more emotional, more bizarre dreams, and dreams with more intense Central Images. (CI score).

Boundaries and Dreams

• Sumbound ( thinness of Bs) is significantly correlated with dream recall frequency, but the r’s are modest ( r = .2 to .5).

• Correlation is more definite, r’s are higher, when less “ noise.” Thus r = .58 in members of IASD ( N = 42).

• Or, when well-defined groups of Ss are compared, rather than individual Ss.

Boundaries and Dreams

• Frequent dream recallers ( 7/wk) have much thinner boundaries (in all 12 categories) than non-recallers (+/- none).

• Dreams reported by people with thin Bs are longer, more vivid, dreamlike, emotional than those in people with thick Bs (Three studies)

• Dreams reported by people with thin Bs have more powerful Central Images (Two studies).

Boundaries and Dreams

• People with thin boundaries have been called “dreamers” as opposed to people with thick boundaries (“thinkers”). Of course this is only relative. Everyone thinks and probably everyone dreams, but those with thin Bs do – or at least remember -- more dreaming and probably daydreaming, and are more comfortable with those forms of mental functioning.

A Continuum of Mental Functioning

FocusedWakingThought

LooserWaking

Thought,Reverie

Day-dreaming Dreaming

People with thick boundaries spend more time at the left end of the continuum(focused waking). Those with thin boundaries spend more time in and are moreComfortable with the right end (daydreaming and dreaming).

A Continuum of Mental Functioning

FocusedWakingThought

LooserWaking

Thought,Reverie

Day-dreaming Dreaming

Thick boundary functioning…………….Thin boundary functioning

Emotion and the Continuum

FocusedWakingThought

LooserWaking

Thought,Reverie

Day-dreaming Dreaming

•EMOTION

The Continuum at the Cerebral Cortex

The focused-waking-activity-to-dreaming continuum refers to patterns of activation in the cortex.

1. Regions of Activation

Focused thought

Looser thought

Daydreaming Dreaming

2. Spread of Activation Within a Region

Focused thought

Looser thought

Daydreaming Dreaming

3. Single Units as a Network

Focused thought

Looser thought

Daydreaming Dreaming

• 2. Dreaming is hyperconnective. At the dreaming end of the continuum, connections are made more easily, more broadly, and more loosely than in waking. Dreaming avoids tightly structured, overlearned processes such as reading, writing, typing, calculating.

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming

• Results from 250 good dream recallers

We do not dream of “reading, writing and arithmetic”

RESULTS:

Question A (Frequency of the “3 R’s” in dreams)

READING

48% of subjects said “never,” and an additional 36% said “hardly ever,” although the group spent 150 ± 94 minutes per day reading.

WRITING

56% of S’s said “never” and an additional 36% said “hardly ever,” although this group spent 106 ± 87 minutes per day writing.

TYPING

75% of S’s said “never” and an additional 19% said “hardly ever,” although this group spent 98 ± 97 minutes per day typing.

CALCULATING

73% of S’s said “never” and an additional 22% said “hardly ever,” although this group spent 23 ± 29 minutes per day calculating.

Relative Prominence Scores Relative Prominence Scores for Six Activities: X ± S.E.Mfor Six Activities: X ± S.E.M..

6

5

4

3

2

1 Walking Writing Talking Reading Sexual Typing

with Friends Activity

Questionnaire study in 250 frequent dreamers. The scale on the left runs from 1: “The activity is far more prominent in my waking life; it hardly occurs in my dreams,” to 7: “The activity is far more prominent in my

dreams; it hardly occurs in my waking life.”

• 3. The connections are not made randomly. They are guided by the emotions, and emotional concerns, of the dreamer.

• 4. The dream, and especially the Central Image (CI) of the dream, pictures or expresses the dreamer’s emotion. The intensity of the imagery is a measure of the power of the emotion.

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming

• 5. The making of connections, making new connections guided by emotion probably has an adaptive function. It “weaves in” or integrates new material. In other words new experiences, especially if they are traumatic, stressful, emotional, are integrated, interconnected into existing memory stores ( in the cortex). STUDIES NEEDED

• And making new connections can be adaptive in self-knowledge, discovery, creation.

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming: Functions

Is Dreaming Psychotherapy?

• “Making connections in a safe place.”

• 6. In addition to this specific function of dreaming, the entire focused waking-to-dreaming continuum has an adaptive function. It is obviously useful and adaptive for us to be able to think in a focused, serial-processing manner at certain times, and at other times to associate more broadly, loosely, creatively –in other words to daydream and dream.

The Contemporary Theory of Dreaming (Functions)

MAJOR PROPOSITIONS ABOUT DREAMING

PROPOSITION FREUD BIOLOGISTS THIS VIEW (and often Jung) (Crick, Mitchison, (Hartmann)

Gazzaniga, Hobson, etc.)

1. Dreams are YES YES NOIrrational or psycho-tic mental products

2. Every dream is aFulfillment of a wish YES NO NO

3. Dreams are “the YES NO YESroyal road” or at leasta good road to theunconscious

4. Dreams are YES NO NOdisguised — theproduct of “censorship”

MAJOR PROPOSITIONS ABOUT DREAMING

PROPOSITION FREUD BIOLOGISTS THIS VIEW (and often Jung) (Crick, Mitchison, (Hartmann)

Gazzaniga, Hobson, etc.)

5. Dreams are NO YES NOessentially a randompattern of activity.

6. The dream (manifest NO NO YESdream) is often importantwithout interpretation ortranslation

7. Dreams are useful NO NO YES(functional) even ifforgotten

8. Dreaming is on a NO NO YESContinuum with waking,Reverie, daydreaming

9. In dreams begin NO NO YESresponsibilities

Collaborators, Co-workers

Cole, JonathanCooper, StevenCravens, JamesCutler, J.Dawani, HannahDucey, CharlesEddins, M.Edelberg, R.Elkin, RachelFalke, RobertaForgione, AlbertGarg, MithleshGlaubman, HananyahGrant, WilliamGrace, NancyGreenwald, David

.

Hengst,William Holevas, AdeleHouran, JamesHurwitz, IrwinKeller-Teschke, M.Kleman, Gerold\Knudson, RogerKramer, MiltonKrippner, StanleyKrueger, CharlesKunzendorf, RobertLaBrie, RichardLatraverse, T.Lindsley, GilaMacFarlane, J.Mattle, L.McNamara, Patrick

Adelman, S.Adinolfi, SherryAngel, CorrineBaddour, A.Banar, M.Barrett, DeirdreBasile, RobertBeresen, LCohen, R Bernstein, JackBevis, JudithBlitz, RobertBrezler, TylerBrune, PatriciaBulkeley, KellyBurr, A.Carpenter, JohnCartright, RosalindChapwick, M.

Harrison, Robert Hauri, Peter

Clark, J.

Collaborators, Co-workers

Moulton, H.Murphy, M.Myers, B.Newsom, M.Oldfield, MollyPavia, HollyRand, WilliamRegestein, QuentinRosen, RachelRuss, DianeShannon, R.Sherry, SallySivan, IlanaSkoff, BarryLatraverse, T.Lindsley, GilaMacFarlane, J.

Sivan, IlanaSkoff, BarrySpinweber, CherylStickgold, RobertTeschke, M.Thalbourne, M.Thomas, L.Treger, F.Vaillant, GeorgeVan der Kolk, BesselWare, CatesbyWatson, RobertZborowski, Michael

Marsden, HerbertMehta, N.Milosfsky, EvaMitchell, WilliamMoldofsky, Harvey

CAR IN MOTION

TRUCK

RELATIONSHIP

Engine Wheels

Metal

Gasoline

Highways

A Journey Motion

Beginnings, ends

Goal Brakes Speed

Start-stop Obstacles

In control, out of control Crash?

Exhilaration, danger

Dreams and poems

• Is the Objective Correlative of the poem the same as the Central Image of the dream?

• “I should have been a pair of ragged claws Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.”

• “Let us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky,

Like a patient etherized upon a table.”

• And What rough beast, its hour come

round at last,

Slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?

Coleridge

• In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

• A stately pleasure dome decree:

• Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

• Through caverns measureless to man

• Down to a sunless sea.

Ezra Pound:

• Melopoieia

• Phanopoieia

• Logopoieia

Shakespeare:

• The poet’s eye, in a fine frenzy rolling……..

• Such tricks has strong imagination,• That, if it would but apprehend some joy,• It comprehends some bringer of that joy:• Or in the night, imagining some fear,• How easy is a bush supposed a bear.

The Emotion-Imagery Bridge

Poet’sEmotion

Poem’s Image

Reader’s (audience’s)Emotion

Art ( from the Encyclopedia Brittanica)

• “The creation of a work of art is the bringing together of a new combinations of elements in the medium (tones in music, words in literature paints in painting , and so on.). Creation is the re-combination of pre-existing materials.”

• …. “guided by the artist’s emotion.”

“ I suggest that creation of a work of art relies on the same basic mechanism we have identified in dreaming – making new connections guided by emotion.”