Social contents in dreams: Dreams were found to contain more social interactions than corresponding waking life; prosocial social simulations were not specifically aimed at familiar persons

Social contents in dreams: An empirical test of the Social Simulation Theory. Jarno Tuominen et al. Consciousness and Cognition, Volume 69, March 2019, Pages 133-145. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2019.01.017

Highlights
•    Hypotheses from the Social Simulation Theory of dreaming were tested.
•    A novel content analysis method, the Social Content Scale, was developed.
•    Dreams were found to contain more social interactions than corresponding waking life.
•    Prosocial social simulations were not specifically aimed at familiar persons.
•    REM and NREM reports did not differ in prosocial or aggressive interactions.

Abstract: Social Simulation Theory (SST) considers the function of dreaming to be the simulation of social events. The Sociality Bias and the Strengthening hypotheses of SST were tested. Social Content Scale (SCS) was developed to quantify social events. Additionally, we attempted to replicate a previous finding (McNamara et al., 2005, Psychological Science) of REM dreams as predisposed to aggressive, and NREM dreams to prosocial interactions.

Further, we investigated the frequency and quality of interactions in late vs early REM and NREM dreams. Data consisted of wake, REM and NREM home dream reports (N = 232, 116, 116, respectively) from 15 students. Dreams overrepresented social events compared to wake reports, supporting the Sociality Bias hypothesis. However, the Strengthening Hypothesis was not supported. We weren’t able to replicate the McNamara et al. finding, and no time of night effect was found. While SST gained partial support, further research on social contents in dreams is required.