• Dream control makes the leap from science fiction to science fact Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Reddit Flipboard Email Researchers have shown they can achieve some control over what people are dreaming, bringing a theme that has been frequently explored in sci-fi and horror genres off the page and into the lab. • Unlike more fanciful imaginings of dream control, however, researchers at Northwestern University (NU) were particularly interested in finding out if they could harness dreams to work with the idea that sleeping on a problem can help people solve it. • So they recruited 20 people who were experienced in lucid dreaming, the ability to recognize that you’re dreaming from within a dream and sometimes control what happens. • Another dream-related study released this month showed that lucid dreams might be able tohelp withmental health therapyfor conditions like PTSD and Parkinson’s disease, and previous work with researchers from NU and other institutes showeda simple type of communication was possiblebetween lucid dreamers and test administrators. • For this study, which has been published in the journal,Neuroscience of Consciousness, the test subjects arrived about two hours before bedtime and were given a series of brain-teaser puzzles to solve, which they worked on for three minutes at a time. • During every puzzle that was presented, the participants heard a unique soundtrack that looped along with the name of the puzzle.

Article Summaries:

  • Researchers at Northwestern University demonstrated that auditory cues played during REM sleep can influence lucid dreamers’ content and improve problem‑solving. Twenty experienced lucid dreamers were given brain‑teaser puzzles before bed; during REM, soundtracks linked to two unsolved puzzles were replayed. Seventy‑five percent reported dreaming about a cued puzzle, and 42% of those puzzles were solved later, compared with a 17% solve rate for uncued puzzles. The study also noted other dream alterations, such as dream characters assisting with tasks. Authors caution that some solutions may arise post‑wake and call for immediate post‑REM testing in future work.

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