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Could your dreams help you solve problems?

Dreams have fascinated humans for millennia. Why do we dream? Can we find meaning in the content of our nocturnal imaginings? Can our dreams help us solve problems, give us new ideas, or help us write a symphony?

In The Infinite Monkey Cage, Brian Cox and Robin Ince are joined by comedian Bridget Christie, neuroscientist Prof Penny Lewis and psychologist Richard Wiseman to have a sleepy look at the science of dreaming.

We only dream in REM sleep, right? Wrong

When we sleep, our brain works its way through four very different, very precise states roughly every 90 minutes: Stages 1 to 3 of Non-REM sleep, and REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep. We talk about REM as being dream sleep – but we actually dream in all four of the sleep states.

When people are woken from REM sleep, their dreams tend to be more emotional, bizarre and fragmented.

Stage 1, as you fall asleep and your brain activity slows down, is quite brief. You then move into stage 2 of Non-REM in which your brain slows down even more but you also have bursts of high-frequency activity that are localised over different areas of the cortex called sleep spindles. Slow-wave or very deep sleep comes next and this is characterised by really high amplitude oscillations where millions of neurons in the brain all fire at the same time, pause, and then fire again – just a bit slower than once per second. Next comes REM, characterised by the eyes moving quickly under closed lids and brain waves that look very similar to when we are awake.

It’s true that dreams are more prevalent during REM sleep. When people are woken from this state 80% will report a dream. These dreams also tend to be more emotional, bizarre and fragmented. However, studies show that 50% of people still report dreams when woken from slow-wave sleep.

How often do we dream?

Although we don’t remember it all, pretty much everyone will dream about five times a night. In terms of REM, those dreams start off very short and grow longer as the night progresses – in the second half of the night we have a lot more REM sleep than the first.

Dreams are thought to be the brains attempt to solve life鈥檚 problems. The phrase 鈥渂etter to sleep on it鈥� has a strong grounding in science.

Why can’t we always remember our dreams?

To remember a dream you need to be woken up very soon after it or during it, which is why many of our dreams get forgotten. If you’re a very light sleeper you might find you can recall more dreams, simply because you’re more likely to wake up during one of them. And the opposite applies to the deeper sleepers amongst us. It also depends how emotional your dreams are: a very emotional dream or a nightmare is more likely to wake you up, and be remembered as a result.

Why do we dream?

In short, we don’t really know. But scientists believe that there probably isn’t just one purpose to dreaming, but many:

Memory consolidation
Dreaming is partly to do with making memories. We know that when we learn something, the brain activity associated with that memory spontaneously occurs again during sleep – known as replay. This is associated with strengthening memories, integrating them, and protecting them against interference. The theory is that sometimes these reactivations, which we’re having all the time when we’re asleep, come to consciousness and manifest as dreams.

Processing trauma
Another theory is that dreams are a way of reliving events that are to some extent traumatic in order to knock off their emotional edges. By going over the event in a safe space, we learning to separate the incident from the emotion attached to it.

Problem solving
Dreams are also thought to be the brains attempt to solve life’s problems. (The phrase “better to sleep on it” has a strong grounding in science.) There is research that shows that we come up with very creative solutions immediately after we’ve been dreaming. Paul McCartney famously dreamt the melody to Yesterday, the plot to Misery came to Stephen King in a dream, and The Periodic Table was also famously the result of a dream.

Do our dreams mean anything?

Over the ages people have attached great importance to dreams. Some thought dreams were the gods communicating with them, or that a bad dream foretold real peril in a person’s life. Famous psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud believed that we repressed various thoughts from our consciousness that in sleep would then bubble forth in the form of dreams, telling us an awful lot about our sexual urges and deepest desires. In terms of the Freudian approach, modern day psychology suggests there might be something in it. Dreams are certainly not meaningless.

Why do we dream?

Dreaming usually occurs in REM sleep (Rapid Eye Movement).

The bedtime stories that are hypnotic

If you can't get your kids off to sleep, this might just do the trick.

What else do we know about dreams?

Dreams can be dangerous places

Most dreams are fairly banal: when scientists wake up the participants in sleep studies, they are often dreaming about mundane events like processing an invoice in the office or walking the dog. Dreams are also often negative, reflecting concerns and worries. And they can also be quite threatening in places. Did you know that the murder rate in dreams is higher than any city in the world?

Some people’s dreams stretch over more than one night

Some of us will actually return to the same dream narrative over a number of different nights. One study, where sleepers were asked to report their dreams night on night, evidenced very long, elaborate, soap-opera style recurring dreams. Researchers found they started to look forward to the next instalment!

Most dreams are actually quite dull.

Some of us can control our dreams

A lucid dream is when you have some sense of control over your dreams, but these are fairly rare. It seems to be more about genetics: some people are just naturally good at it and if you’re not born with the knack, it’s just very difficult. Fascinatingly, studies show that if a person practices a physical skill in a lucid dream, like skateboarding for example, they actually improve on that skill in real life.

Fascinatingly, studies show that if a person practices a physical skill in a dream, they actually improve on that skill in real life.

We can help our dreams to have happier endings

If you have a recurring bad dream, try Imagery Rehearsal Therapy. During the day you just remember the dream, but with a happier ending. If you have a child who is having a recurring nightmare that they are being chased by a dragon for example, encourage them to think about it as a friendly creature. By doing that a few times during the day it can actually affect the outcome of the dream at night.

Smell might affect your dreams

Studies show that people who smell pleasant scents at night will have positive dreams, and those that smell bad odours will have negative dreams. So try wafting a pleasant scent using essential oils through your bedroom for a more enjoyable night’s sleep!

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