Using the self-reports of 300 university students, we replicated and extended the results of a 1971 study of Hersen by demonstrating a significant relationship between both nightmare frequency and nightmare distress with two dimensions of anxiety. Our results are not consistent with the 1990 findings of Wood and Bootzin who concluded that both nightmare frequency and nightmare distress were not correlated with anxiety.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
BelickiK. (1985) The assessment and prevalence of nightmare distressSleep Research, 14, 145.
2.
BelickiK. (1992a) Nightmare frequency versus nightmare distress relations to psychopathology and cognitive style. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 101, 592–597.
3.
BelickiK. (1992b) The relationship of nightmare frequency to nightmare suffering with implications for treatment and research. Dreaming, 2, 143–148.
4.
BelickiK.ChambersE.OgilvieR. (1997) Nightmares and sleep quality. Sleep Research, 26, 637.
5.
BendigA. W. (1956) The development of a short form of the Manifest Anxiety Scale. Journal of Consulting Psychology, 20, 384.
6.
HaynesS.MooneyD. (1975) Nightmares: Etiological, theoretical and behavioral treatment considerations. The Psychological Record, 25, 225–236.
7.
HersenM. (1971) Personality characteristics of nightmare sufferers. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 153, 27–31.
8.
HicksR. A.OstleJ. R.PellegriniR. J. (1980) A unidimensional short form of the TMAS. Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society, 16, 447–448.
9.
SarasonL. G.GanzerV. J. (1962) Anxiety reinforcement and experimental instructions in a free verbal situation. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 65, 300–307.
10.
SpadaforaA.HuntH. T. (1990) The multiplicity of dreams: Cognitive-affective correlates of lucid, archetypal, and nightmare dreaming. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 81, 627–644.
11.
TanskanenA.TuomilehtoJ.ViinamaekiH.VartiainenE.LehtonenJ.PuskaP. (2001) Nightmares as predictors of suicide. Journal of Sleep & Sleep Disorders Research, 24, 844–847.
12.
TaylorJ. (1953) A personality scale of manifest anxiety. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 48, 285–290.
13.
WoodJ. M.BootzinR. R. (1990) The prevalence of nightmares and their independence from anxiety. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 99, 64–68.
14.
WoodJ. M.BootzinR. R.RosenhanD.Nolen-HoeksemaS.JourdenF. (1992) Effects of the 1989 San Francisco earthquake on frequency and content of nightmares. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 101, 219–224.
