Some people think that dreams can predict the future. Maybe, but there is no evidence to support it. So just like Duke Zhou, let's take a look at these. Please don't be too serious. We must explain our dreams from a scientific point of view.
First, the occurrence of dreams.
What is the dream? Dream is an imaginary activity that appears in sleep, and it is a special form of unconscious imagination. During sleep, the cerebral cortex is in an unbalanced state of inhibition, so the excitement of a few nerve cells will activate some appearances. Through unconscious control and adjustment, the activated images form a strange combination, which makes dreams very different from real life.
Dreams happen in sleep, but they are not spent in sleep. Dreams often appear in active sleep, and the waves during REM sleep may be the expression of the excitement of a cell in the cerebral cortex, but the concept is very strong, and dreams closely related to reality will also appear in inactive sleep.
Many dreams, sleepwalking, and dream fright mostly occur in non-rapid eye movement sleep, which is considered as a sleep disorder reaction in physiology. When people wake up in this state, it is easy to forget the contents of their dreams. However, we often remember what dreams Rem had when he woke up from sleep. Therefore, rem sleep is considered as the activity sign of dreams.
Second, the theory of dreams
1. Psychoanalytic point of view
The most representative interpretation of dreams is Freud's psychoanalytic theory, which systematically expresses the interpretation of dreams through the analysis of dreams. Freud believed that dreams are repressed subconscious impulses or desires, which appear in the form of changes in consciousness. These impulses and desires are mainly the reflection of human sexual instinct and aggressive instinct.
In a calm state, these impulses and desires cannot be accepted by social ethics, so they are suppressed and controlled and will not appear in consciousness. Then the vigilance of consciousness is relaxed in sleep, and these impulses and wishes appear in the form of dream changes.
Freud believed that dreams are actually personal symbolic meanings, which can be divided into explicit dreams and implicit dreams. Explicit dream is the content of dream that can be said when recalling, and implicit dream is the meaning of dream contained in explicit dream.
Freud suggested using psychoanalytic techniques to explore people's dreams. For example, free association technology and symbolic knowledge of dreams can be used to explore the subconscious motivation of dreamers.
2. Physiological viewpoint
Psychologist Hobson believes that the essence of dreams is our subjective experience of random neural activities in the brain. A certain amount of stimulation is necessary to maintain the normal function of the brain and nervous system. Stimulation decreases during sleep, so the nervous system has random activity. Dreams are our cognitive system. Explain these random activities and give them meaning. The occurrence of dreams is related to personal past memories and experiences, so we can know personal feelings, feelings and events of concern from the contents of dreams.
3. Cognitive point of view
In cognitive psychology, dream is a cognitive structure, which undertakes the cognitive function of recording and integrating human perception and action experience, and combines old and new memories to promote the association of memories and the transfer of attention.
During sleep, the cognitive system will also search, organize, merge and consolidate the accumulated knowledge, and some of these activities will enter consciousness and become dreams. This integration can link new memories with old ones.
Cognitive perspective provides a framework for studying the function of dreams. Related research shows that REM sleep deprivation will lead to the decline of event memory, especially emotional events.