Focus 580; The Mind at Night: The New Science of How and Why We Dream

It seems that for as long as human beings have been around certainly for as long as we have recorded history we know that people have been fascinated by dreams by their vividness by their strangeness and they have wrestled with the same questions I think across time and across culture the questions like What are dreams why do we dream. Where do they come from and what if anything do they mean. This morning in this part of the show we'll be talking about dreams and some of what we have learned about dreams over the last roughly 50 years of scientific research on the subject and our guest for the program is Andrea rock. She is a science writer. She's won a number of awards for her work and she is the author of a recently published book which is titled The mind at night. The new science of how and why we dream it's published by Basic Books and it is out now in bookstores if you want take a look at it and of course as we talk this morning questions are welcome. We always invite people to call in all we ask is that people try to be brief so that we can get in as many people as possible and keep the program going but of course

anyone is welcome to call. If you were in Champaign-Urbana where we are the number is 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We do also have a toll free line and I want to get anywhere that you can hear us if it would be a long distance call for you. You're on to Illinois and Indiana in fact if you would happen to be listening on the internet as long as you're in the United States you may use that. Toll free line that's eight hundred to 2 2 9 4 5 5 3 3 3 W while L and toll free 800 to 2 to WY MS rock. Hello good morning. Thanks very much for talking with us today. Thank you and we appreciate it. It seems that this is one of those subjects that I would imagine that for for a science writer for someone who writes about medical scientific issues this is a great opportunity because there's a lot of fascinating work to report on. And it's something that you can expect almost ever it will engage the interest of almost everyone. And it's something that everyone has some personal experience with. So it's an opportunity not only to to do some

journalism work but in gauge your personal curiosity. Oh exactly. I mean it from just a personal perspective that I've always been curious about why the brain doesn't simply you know take a rest at night along with the rest of the book. But instead creates this completely realistic artificial world that feels totally real while you're in it and you know both in terms of visual imagery and the emotions you experience in and spends plots that can somehow keep you on the edge of your seat even though you're the one who is creating them so it's kind of an unusual situation and a great way to look at how the brain works. I'm sure that everyone almost everyone will be able to relate some memory of a dream particularly vivid ones there are some that maybe you haven't stick with you for a long time. It is also the case and you talk in the book about people who are in the process of trying to understand what happens in the brain in dreaming. I have looked at people with various

kinds of brain injuries which in some cases actually mean people don't dream. But aside from that if someone whose brain is is quote unquote in normal shape everybody does dream that we dream probably a lot to much more than we would remember. Exactly. On average people remember only about one percent of their dreams. So if you feel like you don't have good recall you're in good company but that now the science suggests that we were never actually intended to recall our dreams in the in the first place by nature's design. It's just sort of. An accident that we have the capacity to do that but that even though we can't recall him and dreams to perform their function nonetheless. Well there are a lot of things we could talk about and already I have some callers but I guess one sort of bottom line thing we might talk about here a little bit at the beginning. Does that come under that heading of what sort of function do dreams have in and people report

all kinds of anecdotal kind of evidence about how it is they feel their daily experiences and getting into their dreams and relate and then how their dreams relate to their waking life. There does there's a lot of things that people who research dreams don't agree on. But generally it does seem there does seem to be some agreement that in fact dreams do perform an important function for us and that they do have something to do with integrating our experience what happens to us in our daily lives. Getting that somehow wired into our brains. Exactly. And it really only has been you know rapid eye movement sleep which is one of the most vivid and the majority of dreams occur. It was it was really only discovered actually hearing and Illinois at the University of Chicago in the mid-1950s and up until

then. That can scientifically census was that the brain did basically shut down at night and just sort of go into routine maintenance but in fact in the past decade or so we've been able to use brain imagery techniques to be able to actually look at what parts of the brain are most active during dreaming. And one of one of the theories now is that brand sleep itself may have evolved in animals as a means of processing and rehearse processing new information from the day that that was important for survival. You know how to escape that Tiger not to eat those red berries. The proportion of. When the brain is off line at night and and and to and to rehearse. That kind of behavior escape behavior that is related to survival. And in fact when you look at how the dreaming has evolved in humans it's

acquired more than just that kind of. Rerun of of important experience from the day. What. What additional layers are added. Is it that it does seem to be a process where new information from the day is integrated into their existing memory store. And so for those people who who say something and you will get people telling stories like there was some problem I needed to solve something I was thinking about a lot and I wasn't sure how to deal with that and I was maybe thinking about it before I went to sleep and when I woke up I had a solution. People tell stories like that so there is actually some reason to believe in fact that that kind of thing may indeed happen. Yes actually theres many scientists artists than in people just reporting every day kind of problem solving that comes to them during dreaming. And there is a scientific basis for that that has to do with the very

different physical operating conditions that prevailed during rapid eye movement sleep just when most dreams occur. And basically what that the difference is that the logical planning thinking part of the brain that prevails in waking consciousness is pretty much off line. That region of the brain during REM sleep and what is most active in our name the emotional center. And also the predominant neuro chemical brain chemicals circulating during REM sleep is is one that is step fosters free form association so that you make connections that you wouldn't make in waking consciousness. And so things that your logical mind might reject during waking hours. The brain doesn't question and that provides the basis for these kind of new

breakthroughs and in creativity that can come during dreaming. Well not surprisingly we have a number of phone calls so I will try to get again to some of the basic points as we continue the conversation but rather than make people wait let's go and see what's on their minds we have a couple of people who are calling on cell phones so we'll start with a line number one. Hello. I just wanted to make a comment. I don't work in the field covered but I've had a long process so much of the rain and I've just read the book unconscious. What I wanted to say is simply that I read your book 10 days ago and it is by far the best book that I have ever read on what goes on in Maine and I wanted to recommend that. Oh thank you for that. Thank you very much. Oh OK well thank you. And I think I guess I would I would want to second that particularly for people who might be interested in subject but would be concerned about

something that would be overly technical and I think it's not it's it is definitely written for the general reader so one shouldn't worry that if you're not a psychologist or haven't spent a lot actually but I'm not here at the end that was my goal was to make this information which I found fascinating myself extensible to people who don't have a science background where Let's talk next with another mobile phone person here right in line for Hello. Yes. I wanted to ask. How about a nuclear agreement that OK that I am sure you can. Well I when I was going to have a baby I had a dream that I was like in the fire and then I got this real cool hand grabbed me and I felt completely at peace. And I woke up I was in a lot of pain and I lost my baby and I wondered can you ever dream about things that are going on in your body.

I didn't I didn't do a lot about that in the book but there is there have been lots of reports about that and it may be that in the suggestion is that there may be you know portions of your brain that. Receptive to the two signals that are being passed. You know actual physical information that is overlooked during waking consciousness. As I said there may be you know some basis for that but there hasn't been a lot of research you know to document that phenomenon although it is. I have heard it reported often. Thank you. You know when you dream about them you never forget that dream and you know you were implemented Hans you well and and also there. There are consistent I guess the sort of leads in to another issue which is that the the other thing that we've discovered about dreaming is that it really is controlled by the emotional centers of the brain.

And so in humans it is during REM sleep. You know when when most of our dreams are happening. It is emotionally charged memory and particularly disturbing difficult emotions that are targeted for being processed and to those emotions. The dream plot and the characters and everything that's happening in the dream is basically a visit a visual metaphor to express and deal with whatever the predominant emotional concern is. You'll see consistent things pregnant women often dream have dream thoughts that revolve around anxiety about is the baby going to be OK. Am I going to be able to take care of the baby. Am I still attractive because my body is changing you know that sub dream plots that all kind of contextualize those emotions. So you'll see some consistencies and in that way but but when you're trying to interpret a dream really what you're looking at is

how does. What was happening visually express an emotion that you know may be on my front burner even though I am not aware of it. You know during the day when I really think Gramsci my question. All right well thank you for the call. Thank you. We have as our guest this morning this part of focus 580 Andrea rock she is a science writer. She's won a number of awards for her work including the National Magazine Award and also the award of the American Academy of Family Physicians. She has written a book about dreaming. And it takes a look at some of the scientific research that's been done roughly speaking over the last 50 years as we have learned more and more about dreams and what happens in the brain when people dream. Her book is titled The mind at night. The new science of how and why we dream it's published by Basic Books and it's really fascinating. So if you're interested in that subject you can go out and look for the book 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. Toll free 800 to

2 2 9 4 5 5. Those are the numbers to call. And we have someone up next here a listening in Indiana. And we'll go there. Line two. Hello. When you mention the 1 percent retrieval that sort of surprised me. But the long the question I have. I'm of those people at the party when people start talking about their dreams and most of the people I encounter every reason dreams you know like last night or a couple days ago. I have to go back months sometimes. Basically I end up coming up with generic dreams I had as a child and things that you know are more realistic than real and that sort of thing. And people I encounter and work and all that sort of thing just sort of what if I'm you know in a very small subset because I certainly don't have dream or at least I don't remember like other people do that's for sure. Yeah it definitely I mean and what actually there are

deals when they've done studies to try to to see if there are differences among people who have better recall Minutemen other people. About the only thing that they can come up with is that people who are have strongly developed visual spatial abilities and and who are involved in create creative pursuits as part of their line of work I mean there was a study done of people who do filmmaking at filmmakers who were at the Sundance Film Festival and they seem to have great recall and more vivid dreams but they work in that kind of visual medium and it may be that that their brain circuitry for creating that kind of thing is stronger than most people's. But when they do studies in sleep labs even people like you who claim that they they don't dream when they're awake and when they're in the midst of R.E.M. sleep they you know consistently are dreaming. And you know one of the

subjects I actually spend a night at in the lab and the guy as he was being wired for the experiment said you know I used to think I never dreamt it but every time I'm in the lab they wake they wake me and I'm having this vivid dream and I realized this must be happening every night. But I don't recall it. There are things you can do to improve your dream recall that which include really the most effective thing it is. Having the intent before you go to sleep thinking you know and I'm going to be dreaming of it and having the intent to remember and then when you first awaken in the morning before you change position even or allow thoughts of the day to intrude. If you can just allow yourself to to try to focus on what was in your mind right before you awaken. And if you begin keeping a dream journal of those that you do remember that seems to improve. Dream recall also a thank you. You know I think that doesn't really raise this interesting question about why it is that there. There seems to be such a poor in least and in most people such a poor or

maybe no hardly no connection at all between between the dream and memory and why it is and why is it that it doesn't become incorporated our memory like other things. Yeah and it's an interest. Situation because what the studies show what's happening is that dream particularly during REM sleep dream time is is a period when experience that is being transferred daily experience from short term memory into long term memory so the areas of the brain that are involved in long term memory processing and storage are very active during REM sleep. But the other can the other regions of the brain that are that are required for putting events in sequential order and storing short term memory actually storing the process of dreaming as it's occurring are you know almost off line you know that down to idling speed and some of the neuro chemicals that you need

for focusing attention and being able to to to store things in short term memory that are predominant during the day time are in short supply also so it really does have to do with the kind of the physiological condition of the brain. And we weren't really designed to you know the whole process we were designed to remember the dream itself. It's basically the. This can take place. The transfer of experience and into memory and the kind of emotional processing that affects our mood during the day all of that can occur whether we can recall the dream or not. It's really interesting that in connecting with this idea that somehow what dreaming is about is it's taking experience and programming that wiring that into our brains. It's interesting that when you look at how the amount of RAM sleep increases over the life course of humans will first of all if you look at what happens in the womb. Yeah apparently fetuses are in REM all the time

and then newborns are in REM about I think about half of the time that they're asleep. So that very obviously that tends to try to say to support that idea that yes that's really what's about taking either preprogramed material and incorporating that maybe in the case of the fetus and then actually as soon as you're actually out there in the world and taking an experience like a newborn then it's it's taking stimulus experience stuff that happens to you while you're awake and again doing that same thing. Exactly and during. It appears that what's happening in the womb is that the DNA coded instructions that are important for survival are is literally the brain is being wired. And in infants you know that process is continuing. Which is why there's so much RAM and why you see things like you know when you see an infant smiling in its sleep before. And that usually occurs before the time when they can actually do that in

waking consciousness it's as if you know the instructions for how to do you know things that are important for survival or are actually being placed into the brain during REM. And in that case let's talk with some other people former city next caller. This is line three. Hello Yeah hello. Man of the this is having rooms really kind of gives you a different outlook on whether the tissue mass or a human being. My question was ordinarily dreams. You know my dreams had been the disjointed jumping from the usual. When I went on and I would be present about a year ago they started turning into this coherent here and plotted movie that I remember in great detail and everything that happens and then the whole what's going on.

That's interesting you bring that up. A researcher at Harvard has been just did a study in the past couple years documenting that exact phenomena and they don't understand yet why that's going on because he was looking at a similar time. Thing about antidepressants and the SSRI category at present there's a lot that was what he was studying and those. It's a strange situation because they tend to keep creases the amount of REM sleep people have by the way. But to increase the vividness of dreaming and dream recall so they're just starting to try to tease that apart and find out why why that might be the case. Well it's a great asset to creative career that a lot of plot ideas for that. Thank you. Thanks for the CO. Well then again it brings back to mind that we started talking at the beginning about how the sort of the modern age of scientific research and dreaming is

really only about 50 years old and it begins in the early 50s when it was discovered that human beings periodically throughout the night as they sleep have these periods of rapid eye movement and then if if when that's happening you wake the person up they will tell you that at that time they were dreaming. So there was this there was this idea that association between a realm the abbreviation REM and dreams and the thought was that well during that time the people are in rapid eye movement they're dreaming but. Would mean that the rest of the time that they're not. But one of the things that later was discovered is that there's there is not this absolute association between Rahm and dreaming and apparently there are dreams can occur at other times in the sleep cycle. And when they are when people are not having rapid I'm exactly and that that's an area that's still being explored that it could take years. And one of the researchers who's been leading that is

a man named Mark Solms who who've actually discovered that damage carried it to an area of the brain that is involved in what he calls it the I WANT IT system it's the same brain region that lights up when a drug drug addict just sees images of drug paraphernalia that source that it's involved in our most basic drives that if there's damage to that area dreaming ceases. And his contention is that REM sleep and dreaming are actually two separate processes with separate on and off switches and that most dreams occur during REM sleep because that's when the brain is most highly activated and there has to be a certain level of activation for dreaming to occur. But even in rem it won't occur if he thinks what the trigger is. Is the drug chemical nor chemical dopamine which

isn't involved in that whole section of the I wonder. The basic drives of the brain that's involved and is key to turning on the dreaming process. It's interesting that in the introductory in one of the first sections of the book you profile him the man you just mentioned and also another very famous brain and sleep researcher a guy named Jay Hobson who in fact has been here on that has been interviewed on this program I've talked to him it's been quite a long time but I actually talked to him and you know Hobson was one of the things that he characterizes his approach is he's very anti Freudian and. He was the guy that said well he has idea of dreaming was the fact that rather than being shut down when our body is resting the brain is continually active all there's all this activity going on there and and that what happens is that the kind of the higher regions of the brain look at all of this stuff that's going on in the brain and try to because it's

our nature to to make try to make sense of things to make up a story to fit this seemingly sort of random activity in the brain and so he then he looked at Freud who said that well what dreaming was about where there was messages from the unconscious and it was about those those drives and desires that in our waking life we tell ourselves we can't do and that what we're doing is in our dreams fulfilling those all those emotional drives and and interesting that this this other researcher this guy Mark Soames when he said well he thought in fact dreams come from this place that lights up with with desire he said Will in an interesting sort of way that that goes back to maybe support what Freud said that in fact that really is what what motivates dreams that comes from these this place in our brain where our desires are our hidden and that because our logical thinking parts of the brains are turned off it gives the emotional parts

free rein to do what what they will and this I guess lead to a long argument between these two. Guys which really hasn't been resolved to this time. To this day not not entirely but I think where it's kind of come out at this point is that there's sort of a middle ground that Freud was correct in saying that dreaming had a lot to do and was you know one of the driving factors than it was strong emotions and that also plots were being created by drawing from memory and in some cases memory going back to childhood. It may be memory that you don't bring up into your conscious recall during the day. And in fact with each successive REM period there's research that shows that older and older memory memory further and further removed from current experience is incorporated into the

dream. So there is evidence for that and Holmes evidence that you know about the brain region involved with desire being involved. On the other hand it also appears that Hobson's point it is true that you don't need to. There that one of Freud's other contentions was that everything in a dream is just you know code that has to be you know broken and there's symbols to you know everything's disguised and so on and meaning has to be extracted by using these you know dictionaries of symbols and determining meaning from that and in fact what it looks like is that no the meaning is there on the surface it's transparent it's the brain using metaphor as we do in in waking life it's not just a literary device it's an important part of how we think.

So when people have you know the very common dream of you know flying and it's associated with you know usually a feeling of happiness and elation I mean that is to some extent a visual expression of how we use phrases to express happening. You know high as a kite you know walking on air that sort of thing. And so you look at to try to interpret meaning from a dream you really have to look at it in terms of how does what the visual imagery or the metaphor sometimes they're even puns and the brain is very creative and cunning and dreams. How did how does that express what's maybe the driving emotion and how that would look and how does that relate to your own individual circumstances and what's going on in your daily life. Well the past mid-point here we have some of the calls I get right back to them and I just want to introduce Again our guest. We're talking with science writer Andrea rock and the book if you're interested is titled The mind at night the new science of how and why we dream published by Basic Books.

I have several callers here next is line one in Urbana. Hello. If you threw a term of the comments regarding people who meet in their dreams that actually come true. You know that actually you know transpire. I haven't because you know I did agree that it is. It's something that's reported often so it appears to be you know a phenomenon that's reported in many cultures and throughout time but there hasn't really been any research to kind of document what might be going on there or you know really looking in into that process but it certainly is something. That I've heard and that has been reported you know from the earliest times you have thought the phenomena. You know I don't I've stopped completely to looking at the science and what the

science can tell us that at this point but. It doesn't. It doesn't mean that that may not be a real thing that's happening it's just you know there's no way to to to really look at it at this point in terms of how to explain what that is. Further might there be people that were perhaps be interested in the understanding of what goes on by encountering a person or thing a person or whatever. Because I'm curious a family member can have that ability and you know it's quite uncanny and it's you know it's borne out many times. And he named there are in place to perhaps pursue pursue that. Well you might there's an organization called the Association for the Study of dreams and you can find it on the Internet. And there are people who you know within that group I know are interested in looking at those kinds of phenomena and so that yes I think you know if you have someone who seems to

be adept at that that would be a good place to start. Thank you thank you very much. Let's go to. Number two and this is also where Bella a little girl. My question was about dreaming about flying and I used to have those dreams and even in the middle of a dream I think oh my god this is disagreement and I'm thinking oh it's real. My I really you know right in the middle of a dream I thought I was really doing and it was like flooring above the turning buildings that you said it was happiness. But at the time I was having dreams I was under a lot of stress. I was wondering if you could explain that well and maybe sometimes what's happening can be an expression of you know what your wish is that that's the feeling you want to have versus the feeling that you're having in waking life. But you also mentioned that you became aware in the dream you know that that it was a dream and

that's really the beginning of another interesting process for which there has been some substantial scientific research documenting that. It does occur and it does occur while you are in the midst of ren's sleep and that's something called lucid dreaming and I think most people have had the experience of just momentarily having that realization while the dream is still going on. Hope I'm dreaming and that I or so are on or I'm dreaming and then I'd saying OMG this is really real I'm really doing that. Well in a sense it is because that's that was one of the other interesting things. Because of the conditions in your brain during that period of sleep your muscles are paralyzed other than than your eye muscles. But when your brain is sending commands and creating you know this sort of realistic world you're in for the purposes of the motor area in your the cortex of your brain and so on. It

doesn't know that the commands that have been given have not been carried out. So in a sense what you experience in a dream is real from the brain's perspective. It is not just like you've done it. It is from its perspective the same as having done it so that is that the fact that it felt real to you. You know there is this a good physiological reason for it feeling so real. OK well thank you. That's good. And number three this is also IRB line 3. An interesting sort of reaction is that the relationship between dreaming and brainstorming because in brain room what you do is you actually suspend. I've been involved in those processes and know the words and sort of with rope and it would be interesting to see whether the parallel between the two. Yes. And actually you know that's one of the some areas of research they've

been trying to to do and they're hoping to do more with brain imaging looking at the brain regions that are activated during dreaming versus during during waking consciousness in those kinds of mental mental states you know people involved in a creative process in the midst of you know writing something or painting or doing theoretical math. Or someone in a state of meditation How how does that compare. Because you know when it gets down to it it's our particular state of consciousness at any given point in time is based on what the physiological conditions are in the brain and making the fine distinction between well there's waking and there's you know dreaming up to the line may not you know so finely drawn and there may be more subtle shades. Self-consciousness in various states of Love waking vs. dreaming and lucid dreaming which is

yet another category where you've got conscious awareness at the same time that you're dreaming. You know work in groups where you work in terms of building brainstorming with a group of three or four people and it's amazing the connections that come up and there's you know there's different techniques for brainstorming so that the only comment. All right well thanks and go right away I'll go on again to color in southeastern Illinois this is line number for toll free line. A little before my question I have a comment on earlier it wouldn't be exactly the same in the brain as though you were doing it in the sense that that your brain would be sending messages to your muscles or your arms to move your legs to you know to move in the same way that the brain would be transmitting messages to the masses in real live with it. Well then. The commands are transmitted and the outcome of those demands or commands are computed by the brain. So from the researchers I talked to they said that actually from the

perspective of you know the motor areas and the cortex it is as if you have carried out those activities even though the muscles haven't completed the action which is why musicians you know will report for instance that you know when they're learning a new piece of music and then but they're having difficulty with it or are a gymnast learning a new routine and so on that that after two or three nights sleep they'll suddenly have an improvement in performance even though they haven't practiced in the meantime. And you know it's because there is this mental or her soul that goes on that actually is more effective. You know when it occurs during REM sleep then it would be for people who you know say athletes who just do this kind of visualisation process and in waking consciousness which is also against seem to be effective. But that's that's very interesting.

My question I don't know whether you would know this or not but is there any indication that if the waist level in the blood is increased that that triggers increase during me and I'm thinking for example of some people who need kidney dialysis and they who are approaching the time when they haven't had dialysis for a while and and or maybe they have missed dialysis those that increased waist level in the blood to cause trigger increase dream that I have and I haven't heard anything about I know you know certain medications can affect it. But but just as for that specific condition I'm not sure. OK well thank you. Isn't that a very good other calls are welcome we have about 15 minutes left in this part of focus 580 talking with Andrea rock about her book The mind at night the new science of how and why. Dream 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 here in Champaign Urbana toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5.

One of the things that that you write about is researchers who have collected catalogs essentially of subjects of dreams they've gone out and they've asked people lots as many people as they can just to tell what it is that they dream about and then try to make comparisons say across culture and. And also they've looked at how it is that the the content of dreams change as we get older. It's interesting that one of the things that apparently researchers have found that if you look at what it is people dream about and look cross-culturally that we are more alike than we are different and that people seem to dream a lot about of this. A lot of the same sort of things. Exactly. Across all cultures the dream of being chased pursued is the most common dream theme you know and that has to do with or were talking about earlier about you know sort of the biological origins of dreaming and survival personal survival skills rehearsal and that sort of thing.

Some of the other consistencies are that women no matter what the cultured women streams tend to contain an equal number of male and female characters been men in men's dreams almost 70 percent of the characters are other men and they're men generally also have more physical aggression in their dreams than women do. The highest proportion of physical aggression and dreams of the places studied were people in a small tribal society is an aberrant Aboriginal society. But among industrialized countries studied Americans actually ranked highest for aggression and dreams. I mean they were 50 percent of American males dream content involved physical aggression. And one thing I thought was interesting again this makes one think about Freud and his argument there would dreams were about things that we desires that we

suppress as people perhaps might have this idea that a lot of dreaming is about. Sex and in fact if you ask people about how much dreaming about sex it's really not all that much. Yeah that when they looked at that range between 10 and 30 percent. So it tended to be higher for college students. So you know I'm a neighbor select a little bit more of a current life experience and stage of life. So it could be a lot of unfulfilled desire. Let's talk with some other people listening in here is someone back in Champaign-Urbana line one. Hello. Yes hi. I actually have many many things to ask but I'll try to limit it to just that you requested. But before I started I just wanted to tell you that you think that in terms of coming in during that point dating somebody older and I had this dream at night that I was getting married and that my but my fiance was over the hill I had to

keep I mean I didn't think of that morning that's already a mystery and I thought you were over the hill and he said I didn't. Contouring I understand that. Did he find that amusing. He found that very. He did OK I get that. But then I actually had some requests. But the first is in terms of Korean comparison and the symbol that people now have in common. I have always dreamt about houses and it's clear to me that when I dream about houses that I'm dreaming about some part of myself that sort of represents me and going into different rooms I know that it's me I'm looking at. But when my current boyfriend also talks about his dreams and houses he says that's not what it means that you find that to be true that people it's an individual thing or do you find that some symbols are actually go through many people's dreams. Well I think when they do these studies of content in there they're not really trying to interpret they're really just looking at what what is it that people dream about what appears

most often. And certainly houses you know are you know among the most common settings and generally it's houses that aren't the combination of many different houses. You know it's not you know an exact replication of where you live now or even where you lived as a kid or whatever. And you know that half has to do partly with that kind of hyper associate of state that your brain's enduring dreaming pulling a piece of this and a piece of that and putting it together with something else. As far as interpret ng what it means. You know again it really you know. If for you you can look at it and and say this is this is a metaphor that my my brain is doing just the same as your brain created that pun. You know that happens to be how the image that your brain uses to express to express something that you're feeling and so that's perfectly valid. You know for you but the but the main thing is that to derive meaning from it is

it really the key has to come from you. You know it can't come from looking at a book and saying oh if I dreamt that it means you know. Right. Yeah I've noticed that. And my last question and I. After is that you talk about the function of dreaming and talking about basically how you learn different things at night how you resolve the problems and I was wondering if you had heard about the study I might get to then either late you might have already mentioned it but there's nothing about the my in the mazes of the reader that I've noticed that night they were actually going through the maze and yes it's actually which wraps but it's talk to the guy who did that study and it's a wonderful one because what it what it does is really demonstrate that there is that mental replay of ease of experience going on and what they were doing as they were able to record the firing patterns of individual brain cells in rats who were during the waking hours. Learning to run a maze and then when they were sleeping they were also recording you know from those brain cells and they were

completely startled to discover that when the rats went into the room sleep they were seeing the exact same firing pattern that they'd seen when the rat was in the maze during the day and in fact that the match was so precise that they could actually pinpoint which part of the maze the rat was in its mental replay of experience during sleep right. Do you happen to know the name of the researchers. Yeah. Matthew Wilson he's an MIT a wonderful Will thank you very much. Sure. Thank you. On to number two this is in Urbana listener Hello hello. Yes I have a question about the possible effects of the possible research on all timers disease to diagnosis and treatment and possible effect of effects of medication that's used such things as there are septum and pin on dreams and all timers and I don't know

much research is being done in that area that I haven't heard much about. But there is it's not all Somers but the only other sort of link in that kind of disease of aging that I've seen to sleep is that there. Is something called REM sleep disorder that tends to occur in men starting around age 50 and sometimes get more severe. You know as they get into their 60s. But in that the brain set up where the muscles are paralyzed is disrupted and they actually act out their dreams begin to physically act out dreams and sometimes violently. And what they have discovered is that people who have that disorder that it also tends to be a precursor of Parkinson's disease. And one of the studies I think two thirds of the the men who had REM disorder

went on to develop Parkinson's so that it may have to do with that damage to a particular type of cell brain cell the brain network that some fault in Parkinson's as well. Thank you. Another bad person swine three Hello. Hi I'm in Urbana and I have a question. I noticed something quite interesting throughout my life and it happened maybe on a couple of occasions. But I have. How did your name and then years later. Like maybe 10 years later during the day that dream will come back to me very very clear. And it didn't at the time you didn't recall it the meaning at the time that you first dreamed it I mean you had recall of it that the next day and then I don't. I'm not sure that's one thing but what really startled me was that. That I remembered that I had this dream and so I was just curious what that

something common that you can have or and then maybe you can remember that dream again in the future. Like maybe five years later or that will just come back to you. Have you heard anything about something like that. No but you know it would. It would tend to make sense in a way. One of the there's a great phrase I think that I'm a researcher here in Chicago is that Rush dispensary and Roslyn Cartwright uses to describe the way that the brain is making associations during dreaming is you know what it's not like the linear thought process we have during the day but it's more like Scotch plaid that that one. Thing gets associated with another that based on emotion. If there was a similar feeling around to the so you know it can be that you know you had better earlier dream and then something in waking life. You know five years later it's associated with the same emotion. You know

that's connected with that dream and so you know it's activating those memory circuits and it comes back right even subconsciously because there was no rhyme or reason why I would remember that. 3 right. Well I mean that's the other startling thing and doing the research I mean the proportion of our mental activity that actually occurs outside of our conscious awareness is immense I mean it's more than 90 percent so that kind of activation of memory that may not even be conscious memory or may not even be you know directed by you you're not consciously recalling occurs all the time. Yeah. Well thank you. Thank you. And we'll try to be real quick here one more caller in Urbana. Well I'll assume you it too and when you think of that sort of stress reduction you think in terms of dreaming exactly and then the other point was that the earlier caller that you had about the house and all I can. It's almost like a Rorschach test. Other words people see different things

and in the same object that is except that that's a perfect way to fight it. And much more personal than a horse because you're creating right and you know a lot yourself. When and where exactly. Supposedly norms that if you go off the norms are crazy or whatever. But in this case. So anyway that was just some comments I keep with your bro thing and I'm the one that talked about the brainstorming so I keep it stimulated in terms of views of the things. Anyway when you're right about the therapeutic value we have time to go into it but there's a lot of evidence showing that people who do go through trauma that dreaming play some role in helping them resolve the trauma and can get back on keel. Well we certainly know what happens with people who are sleep deprived. There's all sorts of physical symptoms of exhaustion is there also a problem with being dream deprived. There's conflicting evidence about that and that question actually hasn't been resolved yet. But when you look at the evidence about

what's happening during that process I'd be surprised if there weren't some some negative effect in terms of at least mood regulation. And in fact there is evidence showing that people who suffer from clinical depression have a much different pattern of dreaming than people who say well we'll have to stop I'm sorry to say I'm sure we could go on I'm sure whenever people meet you and they say what have you written about lately you say I've written this book about dreams that's it I have a dream. Exactly I had this dream what does it mean. There's a lot of fascinating stuff in the book it's titled The mind at night. The new science of how and why we dream. It's published by Basic Books by our guest and Iraq and we want to thank you very much for talking with us to make sure it's fun.