Processing of Memories and Knowledge in REM and NREM Dreams

Abstract

Over 4 nights, 16 young-adult males each reported 2 REM and 2 nonREM dreams. They then identified possible sources of dream imagery in their waking memory and/or knowledge A judge, naive as to conditions of data collection, reliably judged the closeness of correspondence of dream event to identified source. Correspondence was lower for REM than for nonREM reports and for longer than for shorter reports from either stage.