REM sleep and dreams
REM, a dream or paradoxical sleep, is when the mind is at its most active sleep state. The forebrain is highly stimulated (Lewin & Glaubman, 1975), providing the basis for the belief that dreaming is simply thinking while sleeping. If deprived of REM, the body will compensate by increasing the frequency as well as the duration of REM in later sleep. REM is vital for mood stability and is related to cognitive dysfunction that results in bad dreams (McNamara, Auerbach, Johnson Harris, & Doros, 2010). Obviously, dreaming must be functionally important. While everyone has both dreams and nightmares, the frequency to which an individual has each depends on that individual’s psychological development.
Dreams are vital for this as implied by sleep not occurring in the absence of dreaming (Piotrowski & Biele, 1986). They allow the brain to take hold of physical information and consolidate it into mental and sensory outputs (Breger, 1975). They create an illogical, yet insightful picture into the mind of the individual. A nightmare is a psychological reaction to an experience (Kramer, 1986). It’s an over-reactive response to information that is too much for the body to make sense of in its conscious state. They are unconscious responses to overwhelming stress, major life events or perhaps high levels of psychopathology (Kales, Soldatos, Caldwell, Charney, Kales, Markel, & Cadieux, 1980). These severe reactions are what need to be addressed, treated and hopefully prevented
