Vivid dreams are associated with a high percentage of REM sleep: a prospective study in veterans.

STUDY OBJECTIVES: Vivid dreams are dreams that feel real or are associated with dream enactment behavior. They are prevalent in veterans especially in those with psychiatric disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorders. Such psychiatric disorders have known association with abnormalities in rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Vivid dreams are also described in neurological conditions, such Lewy body dementias, which are also associated with REM sleep abnormality. Although vivid dreams occur in neuropsychiatric disorders that have REM sleep abnormalities, there are no studies that have directly investigated an association between vivid dreams and REM sleep. We sought to study vivid dreams and REM sleep in veterans.

METHODS: Veterans undergoing polysomnography at our hospital were invited to enroll. Participants completed a dream-related questionnaire the morning after their polysomnography.

RESULTS: We prospectively enrolled 505 veterans. After a night in the sleep laboratory, 196 of 504 (39%) reported experiencing a dream, and of those, 117 of 190 (62%) described their dream as vivid. Discrepancies in patient totals are secondary to missing questionnaire data. Our novel finding is that participants with a high percentage of REM sleep (above 25%) were more than twice likely to report a vivid dream than participants with a lower percentage of REM sleep ( p < 0.0001). Non-vivid dreams were not associated with a high percentage of REM sleep.

CONCLUSIONS: Vivid dreams are associated with a high percentage of REM sleep. Further research into the role of REM sleep abnormalities in vivid dreams may help to advance understanding of neuropsychiatric disorders.