We all have our fears, which often manifest themselves through nightmares. In fact, according to the Freudian view of dreams, some of these are messages from the unconscious to make us aware of aspects that have not yet come to our consciousness, perhaps because we are not yet prepared to face them assertively and without causing harm to ourselves.
We like to think that our dreams are unique but the truth is that you would be surprised to discover that most people have the same nightmares. After all, we are not so different. Or at least that is what a curious study carried out by researchers at the University of Montreal indicates.
In this research, 253 nightmares and 431 bad dreams reported by 331 people were analyzed. It is worth clarifying that the main difference between nightmares and bad dreams is that the latter do not wake us up or cause the intense feeling of restlessness that nightmares generate.
What was interesting about this research was that, while most previous studies asked people to classify their dreams based on an existing list of categories, these researchers allowed them to keep a dream diary, so that dreams flowed with greater freedom and only in a second moment were they categorized based on the content.
What were the most common contents of nightmares?
– Physical aggression: 31.5%
– Interpersonal conflicts: 29.5%
– Failure and helplessness: 17%
– Health problems and death: 12.2%
– Apprehension about the future: 11.4%
– Being chased: 7.6%
– Presence of an evil force: 7%
– Accidents: 6.3%
– Disasters and calamities: 5.4%
– Insects: 5.3%
– Anomalous environments: 4.4%
Do people from different cultures have different nightmares?
In the past, when the contents of dreams began to be investigated, it was thought that each culture would produce its own contents. However, after much research it has been seen that cultural differences are not as great as expected. That is to say, basically we all have the same nightmares, what can change is the frequency since some cultures worry more about some issues than others.
Obviously, the way in which these concerns are presented and, above all, the explanation given to them also changes. A good example was a study done a few years ago on sleep paralysis. In this research it was noted that both Canadians and Japanese, from a statistical point of view, suffered equally from episodes of sleep paralysis. However, the way they lived them was very different. While the Canadians believed that it was a kind of dream and did not give much importance to it, the Japanese had less calming experiences, which is due to the deep-rooted myth of a spirit called “kanashibari” that paralyzes the person during sleep.
References:
Robert G. Zadra A. (2014) Thematic and content analysis of idiopathic nightmares and bad dreams. Sleep ; 37(2): 409-417.
Domhoff, W. & Shneider, A. (2008) Similarities and differences in dream content at the cross-cultural, gender, and individual levels. Conscious Cognition 17(4):1257-1265.
Fukuda, K. et. Al. (2003) The Prevalence of Sleep Paralysis Among Canadian and Japanese College Students. Dreaming 8(2): 59-66.
