The threats we face today are very different than what early humans faced. Those children, too, simulated threats in their dreams and were more prepared to fight them. Revonsuo theorized that the ancient humans that did “practice” facing these threats could fight them off and have children. We simulate threats in our dreams so that we may be more prepared for them if we actually face them. But what about nightmares? Why do we dream that we’re fired from our job, dumped by our partner, or taking a test without any pants on? Threat-simulation theory has a guess.įinnish neuroscientist Antti Revonsuo suggested that nightmares are actually a biological defense mechanism. Threat-Simulation and Social-Simulation TheoryĪ lot of dream theories explain why we might have nonsensical, yet pleasant, dreams. While this model does not address the content of dreams itself, it looks at how dreams are formed. To illustrate this, psychologists developed the Self-Organization Model. Our dreams, which often contain elements from what we experienced that day, are a byproduct of that process. Information-processing theory suggests that we organize our memories as we sleep. And our minds don’t shove all long-term memories into one big storage container. Memory storage is key to this study and why we dream.ĭreaming could just be a key part of how we convert our short-term memories into long-term memory. Cognitive psychology looks at how the brain makes decisions, solves problems, and stores memories. Similarly, information-processing theory suggests dreams are just a part of our cognitive development. Information-Processing Theory and the Self-Organization Model Just as we daydream to make sense of our social interactions, we dream to make sense of all the neurons firing in our brains during sleep. These dreams aren’t meaningless, necessarily, but they do not come from unconscious wishes or messages from the beyond. The Activation-Synthesis Theory suggests that dreams are the result of our brains attempting to make meaning from the brain activity that takes place during sleep. In 1977, they created the Activation-Synthesis Theory. Allan Hobson and Robert McCarley took that into consideration. Remember when I said that humans are “meaning-making creatures?” Well, J. Knowing this, let’s dive into why modern psychologists think we dream. REM sleep is crucial for the mind to recuperate, while other stages of sleep are vital for the body to do the same. The heart rate and breathing increase.īrain activity is also especially high during REM sleep. Although the rest of the body is close to paralyzation, our eyes rapidly move back and forth. This name suggests exactly what happens during this stage. Dreaming takes place in the REM stage of sleep, or “rapid eye movement” stage. When Do We Dream?īefore diving into more modern theories about why we dream, you should know when we dream. They have since been replaced by a variety of other theories about why we dream and how it benefits the dreamer. For example, he suggests interactions with sticks, trees, and other phallic-shaped items suggest…you can probably guess.įreud’s theories of dream interpretation and wish fulfillment are not accepted anymore. In Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams, he interprets these unique elements. We added unique elements so we could still fulfill our wish but in a more palatable way. (Freud has some interesting theories.) That’s why, Freud believed, our dreams were so bizarre. We wish to kill our father or have sex with our mother, for example. After dreaming about a patient whom he felt he had failed, Freud created the wish-fulfillment theory.įreud’s wish-fulfillment theory suggests that we dream to fulfill repressed wishes. Sigmund Freud, like many people, asked himself, “Why do we dream?” He believed he discovered the answer after, you guessed it, a dream. Medieval Europeans also wrote down how to interpret certain dreams.Īncient cultures laid the foundation of this work, but one name is synonymous with dream interpretation: Sigmund Freud. Ancient Egyptians wrote dream interpretations and what specific dreams meant for the dreamer. Mesopotamian kings took advice from their dreams. In the Bible, for example, dreams are often portrayed as messages from God. Humans are meaning-making creatures, so it’s natural for us to have a dream and ask “what does this mean?” In the earliest days of the study or contemplation of dreams, dreams had serious meaning. “Why do we dream?” is a question that people have been asking since the dawn of time. Why Do We Remember Our Dreams? Ancient and Freudian Theories of Dreaming
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