The vast majority of people dream of their everyday problems
A new theory about the property and purpose of dreams was put forward by Californian scientists. There are tons of theories about what our dreams show us. Some, for example, say that dreams are random images reproduced by the brain in the process of processing previously received information.
Others suggest that in this way our consciousness learns to adapt to the dangers of the outside world, writes neboley.com.ua. The compilers of dream books and predictors insist that a dream is a secret signal, which can be deciphered to know your future.
And the most famous and popular theories belong to Freud and Jung and are associated with the manifestation of our sexual and other secret desires. Adherents of such ideas believe that a dream is a way of the human subconscious to break through and show what we lack, what worries us, what we forgot to do, etc.
But, in general, if we forget about all the variety of "sleepy" theories, researchers of this topic can be divided into two camps - those who are trying to determine the purpose of dreams, and those who believe that there is simply no such purpose.
The latter include the authors of one of the latest works in this area - employees of the University of California. According to their theory, dreams are an elementary reflection of what we saw or experienced the day before, which means that you should not attach any special importance to dreams.
- The fact that we remember our dreams very vaguely speaks in favor of the fact that they have no function. After all, if they were so important, why do we forget them? - reports Times Online the words of Dr. Bill Domhoff, who participated in the study at the University of California. - In general, thought processes to one degree or another are a way of adapting a person to life, but this does not mean that any manifestation of consciousness has its own purpose. Our research shows that sleep is something like a residual product of the brain, a set of arbitrary images that can be reproduced so that during rest the mind is at least occupied with something.
Another stereotype, broken by the scientific writings of Californians, is the most common themes of dreams, which until now have been considered sex and religion. Having studied the dreams of 22 thousand people of various ages and professions, American doctors came to the following conclusion: much more often we dream of the most ordinary everyday images and situations - shopping, meeting with parents and friends, driving a car, sports, traveling, playing, eating, and so on. Further.
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At the same time, dreams associated with sex make up a negligible part of the total - 2% for men and 0.4% for women. In 54% of cases, people interviewed by researchers saw friends, in 24% - parents, 24.5% of dreams were devoted to driving a car, in 17% people saw themselves walking on the street, in 13.7% - eating, in 6.1% - went in for sports.
It turns out that our dreams are not at all a world of fairy tales, not predictions of the future and not a connection with the dead. The vast majority of people dream of their everyday problems, that is, they stay at night in the same routine that they are in during the day. This is confirmed by other studies in this area. For example, French sociologists have found that musicians dream of music twice as often as people of other professions. And their American colleagues proved that the percentage of women who dream about work increased in proportion to the increase in the number of working women.
The secret of good dreams
The most common and popularly known ways to manage sleep are prayer, meditation, and drugs. But if neither the first, nor the second, nor the third attracts you, try to use the latest developments of overseas scientists.
If you follow the logic of their theory, you have to live well in order to have good dreams. But, according to scientists, there is an easier way. The fact is that quite often the brain reproduces exactly those impressions that were the brightest or most recent before you fell asleep. Therefore, anything can provoke nightmares - scary books, horror movies, crime news in the newspaper and even a news release. So before going to bed, it is better not to scare yourself in vain and read some love story, a collection of jokes, or just think about good things. If you are going to go to bed with a “heavy heart” and a busy head, try first to unwind a little - to distract yourself with a walk, for example, or talking on an abstract topic. Cooking, cleaning, pet and flower care is good for soothing and distracting.
It is interesting
According to the World Sleep Association, nightmares of a wide variety of people follow the same pattern. The main themes of nightmares are stalking, public nudity, drowning, falling, and meeting the dead.
There is a definite connection between the character of the sleeper and what he sees, say researchers from the University of St. Clara (USA). For example, people of a conservative mind often dream that they are being chased or that they are falling from a great height. In a dream, they more often than others experience feelings of discontent and unhappiness, but they see sex scenes much less often.
Major events on an international scale are reflected in human dreams as well as in the press. For example, over the past 20 years, the number of dreams devoted to the problems of global warming has increased dramatically. And after September 11, 2001, many people, who until then had not suffered from nightmares, began to see them regularly.
Dreams in numbers
Every 90 minutes during the night we have dreams. The dream continues for 5 to 30 minutes. In 33% of dreams, a person sees his own failures. 25% of dreams occur in a familiar area. 50% of those who dream of us are aggressive towards us in their dreams. We forget 95 to 99% of our dreams.