Dream Sharing, Dream Recall, and Personality in Adolescents and Adults: The UK Library Study

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1 Article Dream Sharing, Dream Recall, and Personality in Adolescents and Adults: The UK Library Study Imagination, Cognition and Personality: Consciousness in Theory, Research, and Clinical Practice 2016, Vol. 36(1) 64 74! The Author(s) 2016 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.com/journalspermissions.nav DOI: / ica.sagepub.com Michael Schredl 1, Josie Henley-Einion 2, and Mark Blagrove 2 Abstract Although dreams are very private experiences, they are often shared with others. The findings of the present study (N ¼ 1,375) indicate that sharing dreams is indeed very common and that dream sharing frequency is related to gender (only in adolescents, with girls sharing dreams more often than boys), extraversion, dream recall frequency, and nightmare frequency. Future studies should study the dream sharing process in more detail with whom dreams are shared and possible beneficial effects of dream sharing. Keywords dream sharing, dream recall, personality Although dreams are very private experiences that are recalled upon awakening, they are often shared with others (Curci & Rime, 2008; Schredl, 2000). In a 2010 study, Schredl and Schawinski (2010) found that about 14.5% of the dreams were shared based on estimates of an overall dream recall frequency and the dream sharing frequency. Research has focused on the groups of factors that might be associated with dream sharing frequency; factors related to dreaming 1 Central Institute of Mental Health, Mannheim, Germany 2 University of Swansea, Swansea, UK Corresponding Author: Michael Schredl, Central Institute of Mental Health, J5, Mannheim 68259, Germany. Michael.Schredl@zi-mannheim.de

2 Schredl et al. 65 and factors related to the person (Schredl & Schawinski, 2010). The most obvious variable associated with a dream sharing frequency is, of course, the dream recall frequency; several studies (Georgi, Schredl, Henley-Einion, & Blagrove, 2012; Herman & Shows, 1984; Pagel & Vann, 1993) found moderate correlation coefficients (.40 < r <.60) between these two variables. In addition, nightmare frequency was also related to dream sharing frequency even if dream recall frequency was statistically controlled (Schredl & Schawinski, 2010) supporting the findings that emotional intensity of the dream increases the probability that the dream is shared (Curci & Rime, 2008). Stress relief might be one of the motives of dream sharing (Ijams & Miller, 2000). The first trait factor that was found to be related to dream sharing was gender: Women tend to share dreams more often than men (Curci & Rime, 2008; Keßels, 2004; Pagel & Vann, 1992; Schredl & Pallmer, 1998; Szmigielska & Holda, 2007). Since dream recall frequency and nightmare frequency have also showed stable gender differences with women reporting higher dream recall and more nightmares than men (Schredl & Reinhard, 2008, 2011), it was investigated whether the gender difference in dream sharing might be explained by the gender difference in dream recall. Two studies (Schredl, 2009; Schredl & Schawinski, 2010) found that gender was still significant if dream recall frequency and nightmare frequency were statistically controlled clearly indicating that non-dream related factors, for example, increased willingness to share personal experiences (Dindia & Allen, 1992) might be of importance. Up to now, only one study looked into personality factors and dream sharing frequency (Schredl & Schawinski, 2010). It was found that after controlling for dream recall frequency, nightmare frequency, and gender two personality dimensions (extraversion and boundary thinness) were still significantly associated with dream sharing frequency. That extraversion is related to dream sharing frequency is very plausible. The descriptions of persons with thin boundaries include the facts that they easily trust people and have intense relationships (Hartmann, 1991), that is, also a plausible candidate for explaining some part of the inter-individual variance in dream sharing frequency. As boundary thinness and related personality dimensions like openness to experience are also related to dream recall frequency (Beaulieu-Prevost & Zadra, 2007; Schredl, Wittmann, Ciric, & Go tz, 2003), it should kept in mind that is important to control the statistical analysis for dream recall frequency. The present study investigated the relationship between dream sharing, dream recall frequency, and personality in a sample of adolescents and adults. We expected that females would tend to share their dreams more often than men and that extraversion is positively correlated with dream sharing frequency even if controlled for dream recall frequency and nightmare frequency. In addition to investigating the frequency of telling one s own dreams to another person, the frequency of how often the person listened to another person s dream was also analyzed.

3 66 Imagination, Cognition and Personality 36(1) Method Participants The sample included 1,375 participants (927 females, 408 males, and gender was unknown in 40 cases) with a mean age of years (range: 8 90 years; N ¼ 24 missing values). For the analyses, the sample was divided into adolescents aged 8 to 17 years (N ¼ 776; 485 females, 269 males, and gender was unknown in 22 cases; mean age: years) and adults aged 18 years and older (N ¼ 575; 427 females, 133 males, and gender was unknown in 15 cases; mean age: years; range: years). Dream Questionnaire Two questionnaires entitled Dream Lab: The Big Library Experiment were devised by the Library Association (United Kingdom) and Mark Blagrove (Swansea University): a version for children and a version for adults. As personality assessments were only included in the Adult version, the present study is based on this sample (for details regarding the sample completing the Child version, see Georgi et al., 2012). The first section of the questionnaire included questions about book preferences and frequency of going to the library but this aspect of the study is not dealt with in the present report. The first question of the dream section covered dream recall frequency and used a 5-point format: How often do you wake up and recall a dream? 4 ¼ 4 7 times per week, 3¼ 1 3 times per week, 2¼ 1 4 times per month, 1¼ 1 11 times per year and 0 ¼ less than 1 time per year or never. A similar format was used for the following questions: How often do you tell someone about one of your dreams? How often do you listen to someone telling you about one of their dreams? and A nightmare is a vivid dream that is frightening and disturbing, the events of which you can remember clearly and in detail when you wake up. How often do you have such a nightmare? For assessing the big five personality factors, 40 adjectives based on a study by Saucier (1994) were presented. For neuroticism, the adjectives were anxious, irritable, moody, jealous, temperamental, envious, relaxed (reversed), and unenvious (reversed). For extraversion, the adjectives were talkative, bold, energetic, shy (reversed), extroverted, quiet (reversed), bashful (reversed), and timid (reversed). For openness to experience, the adjectives were creative, imaginative, philosophical, intellectual, complex, deep, uncreative (reversed), and unintellectual (reversed). For agreeableness, the adjectives were sympathetic, warm, kind, helpful, cold (reversed), unsympathetic (reversed), rude (reversed), and harsh (reversed). For conscientiousness, the adjectives were organized, efficient, practical, thorough, disorganized (reversed), sloppy (reversed), inefficient (reversed), and careless (reversed). The participants were presented with the following text: Put a tick next to any of the following words that you, or your friends and

4 Schredl et al. 67 family, would use to describe yourself. and the list of adjectives in alphabetical order. The sum scores for the total sample (N ¼ 1,369) showed the following indices of reliability (Cronbach s a): neuroticism (r ¼.577), extraversion (r ¼.560), openness to experience (r ¼.585), agreeableness (r ¼.470), and conscientiousness (r ¼.693). Procedure The Dream Lab Questionnaire was distributed in libraries all over the United Kingdom. The text explicitly stated that one did not have to remember dreams, go to a library, or read regularly to fill in the questionnaire: This was in order to minimize possible selection effects. The completed questionnaire could be returned to the library or sent to the Library Association anonymously. For the present analyses, the adult version questionnaires, completed by participants from 8 years to 90 years, were included. For testing the association of age, gender, dream recall frequency, dream sharing, and personality, logistic regressions were computed using the SAS 9.2 for Windows software package (SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC). Due to missing values, the sample sizes vary slightly. Results Means and standard deviations for dream recall frequency, dream sharing frequency, dream listening frequency, nightmare frequency, and sum scores of the five personality dimensions are depicted in Table 1. Most of the participants stated that they share and listen to dreams (see Table 2). Interestingly, the frequencies were not different in the adult sample (Sign Rank Test: S ¼ 586, p ¼.055) whereas, in the adolescent sample, dream listening frequency was higher when compared with dream telling frequency (Sign Rank Test: S ¼ , p <.0001). The logistic regression for dream recall frequency carried out for the adult and adolescent samples separately showed a somewhat similar pattern, gender and openness for experiences were related to the dream recall frequency with women and more open persons recall their dreams more often (Table 3). Age was negatively related to dream recall frequency in the adult sample but not in the adolescent sample with its limited age range. The other four personality factors (neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness) were not related to dream recall frequency, except for the small effect of agreeableness on the dream recall frequency in the adult sample. As dream sharing frequency was closely related to dream recall frequency (r ¼.502 (adolescents), r ¼.648 (adults), all p <.0001) and nightmare frequency (r ¼.230 (adolescents), r ¼.451 (adults), all p <.0001), these two variables were also entered (simultaneously) into the logistic regression analysis (see Table 4).

5 68 Imagination, Cognition and Personality 36(1) Table 1. Dream Sharing, Dream Recall Frequency, Nightmare Frequency, and Personality (Means Standard Deviations). Variable Adolescents Adults Dream recall frequency (768) (569) Dream sharing frequency (773) (571) Dream listening frequency (769) (573) Nightmare frequency (775) (567) Neuroticism (773) (572) Extraversion (773) (572) Openness for experiences (773) (573) Agreeableness (773) (572) Conscientiousness (773) (572) Note. Figures in parentheses designate the number of participants. Table 2. Frequencies for Dream Sharing Frequency and Dream Listening Frequency. Adolescents Adults Category Telling (%) Listening (%) Telling (%) Listening (%) 4 7 times per week times per week times per month times per year Less than 1 time per year or never In the adolescent sample, dream sharing frequency is related to gender with females sharing dreams more often than males and to extraversion as expected. For the adult sample, more extraverted persons also shared dreams more often but gender did not have an effect on dream sharing frequency if dream recall frequency and nightmare frequency are statistically controlled. Dream sharing frequency decreased with age in the adult sample. Interestingly, the influence of nightmare frequency was significant even though the effect of overall dream recall was partialled out (Table 4). In the adolescent sample, the logistic regression analysis showed that dream listening frequency increases with age and is higher in females than in males (see Table 5). In addition, extraversion is positively correlated with dream sharing frequency. The pattern is different for the adult sample (see Table 4): There was a significant decrease with age and significant correlation between dream

6 Schredl et al. 69 Table 3. Logistic Regression for Dream Recall Frequency. Adolescents (N ¼ 745) Adults (N ¼ 551) Variable SE 2 p SE 2 p Age <.0001 Gender a a Neuroticism Extraversion Openness for experiences a <.0001 a Agreeableness Conscientiousness Note. SE ¼ Standardized estimate. a One-tailed test. Table 4. Logistic Regression for Dream Sharing Frequency. Adolescents (N ¼ 745) Adults (N ¼ 542) Variable SE 2 p SE 2 p Age <.0001 Gender <.0001 a a Neuroticism Extraversion a a Openness for experiences Agreeableness Conscientiousness Dream recall frequency <.0001 a <.0001 a Nightmare frequency <.0001 a a Note. SE ¼ Standardized estimate. a One-tailed test. listening frequency and openness to experience. The relationship between dream listening and extraversion was only marginally significant. In both samples, dream sharing frequency and dream listening frequency are highly correlated (r ¼.586 [adolescents], r ¼.626 [adults], all p <.0001). The effect sizes of the three variables such as dream recall frequency, dream sharing frequency, and dream listening frequency are depicted in Table 6. Whereas all gender differences in the adolescent sample were significant (see Tables 2 4), for adults only the gender difference in dream recall frequency

7 70 Imagination, Cognition and Personality 36(1) Table 5. Logistic Regression for Dream Listening Frequency. Adolescents (N ¼ 746) Adults (N ¼ 555) Variable SE 2 p SE 2 p Age < <.0001 Gender < Neuroticism Extraversion Openness for experiences Agreeableness Conscientiousness Note. SE ¼ Standardized estimate. Table 6. Gender Difference in Dream Sharing, Dream Recall Frequency, and Nightmare Frequency (Means Standard Deviations). Variable Males Females Effect size Adolescents Dream recall frequency (264) (482) Dream sharing frequency (266) (485) Dream listening frequency (264) (483) Adults Dream recall frequency (131) (423) Dream sharing frequency (132) (425) Dream listening frequency (133) (425) Note. Figures in parentheses designate the number of participants. was significant. The gender difference regarding dream sharing frequency was not significant if dream recall frequency was statistically controlled. Discussion Overall, the findings of the present study indicate that sharing dreams is very common and that dream sharing frequency is related to gender (only in adolescents with girls sharing dreams more often than boys), extraversion, dream recall frequency, and nightmare frequency. Listening to dreams is also very common but other personality factors (openness to experience) are related to the frequency of dream listening, at least in adults.

8 Schredl et al. 71 Before discussing the findings in detail, two important methodological issues will be addressed. First, the sample consisted of library users willing to participate in a brief dream study without any incentives. In a way similar to the findings obtained in samples of psychology students (Curci & Rime, 2008; Schredl & Schawinski, 2010), this probably results in an overestimation of dream telling and dream listening frequency. That is, representative studies are needed to study the frequency of dream sharing in the general population. With respect to the effect of sociodemographic variables on dream sharing, the only representative study (Schredl, 2009) did not find an age effect (dream recall frequency was also statistically controlled) which was present in this sample indicating possible selection biases. The selection issues, however, have only an indirect and very likely minor effect on the relationship between personality and dream variables by reducing variance because low dream recallers are underrepresented in this sample. Keeping the sampling issue in mind, we did not perform a statistical comparison between adolescents and adults but rather analyzed the pattern of the influencing factors within each group. The second issue concerns the personality assessment. As the questionnaire should be filled in within a reasonable amount of time in order to minimize dropouts, the assessment of the Big Five personality dimensions was very brief, presenting eight adjectives for each factor with simple Yes/No answers. The internal consistencies of these scales are moderate but much lower compared with the Neuroticism-Extraversion-Openness Five-Factor Inventory (Borkenau & Ostendorf, 1993) or the Neuroticism-Extraversion-Openness Personality Inventory Revised with 240 five-point scales (Ostendorf & Angleitner, 1994). Nevertheless, the findings regarding dream recall frequency (openness to experience) and dream telling (extraversion) are in line with the hypotheses and, thus, support the notion that the measurement quality was satisfactory. Almost 80% to 90% of the sample comparable to the frequency in psychology students (Schredl & Schawinski, 2010) reported some dream sharing. As noted above, exact frequency data for representative samples are still lacking. An interesting finding which needs further clarification is the higher dream listening frequency in adolescents compared with the dream telling frequency an effect which was not present in the adult sample. One might speculate that adolescents might listen to dreams told by their parents (Bachner, Raffetseder, Walz, & Schredl, 2012) even if they don t share their own dreams. But this hypothesis has to be tested by studying dream sharing within the family. The finding that women reported dreams more often than men is in line with the meta-analysis of Schredl and Reinhard (2008) and, thus, supports the validity of the present findings. Also, the correlation found between openness to experience and dream recall has been reported before (Schredl et al., 2003) whereas, for the four other dimensions of the Big five personality model, correlations to dream recall frequency as in the present sample were not found (Schredl, 2007).

9 72 Imagination, Cognition and Personality 36(1) As expected, dream telling frequency was related to dream recall frequency a relationship that is very plausible and has been reported in the literature (Herman & Shows, 1984). In addition to overall dream recall frequency, nightmare frequency also has an effect on dream telling frequency, indicating that nightmares might be told for reasons like stress relief or for being comforted (cf. Ijams & Miller, 2000). It would be very interesting to study whether telling nightmares to another person has a positive effect on nightmare occurrence, that is, decreasing nightmare frequency. The only personality dimension that correlated with dream telling while controlling for the effects of dream recall frequency and nightmare frequency was as expected extraversion. This relationship, which was also found in a student sample (Schredl & Schawinski, 2010), seems very plausible as extraverted persons talk more about everything with other people. It would be very interesting within this context to study the frequency of sharing personal matters with other persons and dream sharing frequency because Bachner et al. (2012) obtained moderate correlations between dream sharing and overall relationship closeness. As this is the first study that has looked into the relationship between personality and dream listening frequency, the results should be viewed with caution. Extraversion plays a role for the adolescents, that is, extraverted people do have more social contacts and, thus, hear about dreams more often but this relationship was much less pronounced in the adult sample. That openness to experiences is related to dream listening frequency also makes sense due to the likelihood that a dream will be told if the person knows that the listener is interested in hearing the dream. Taking a closer look at the gender differences in the dream variables, it is very remarkable that the effect sizes for dream telling frequency and dream listening frequency in adolescents are much larger than the same gender differences in adults and even the gender difference in dream recall frequency. The larger effect sizes of the gender difference regarding dream sharing compared with effect sizes of the gender difference in dream recall have been reported previously (Georgi et al., 2012; Schredl & Schawinski, 2010). This lends support to the hypothesis that there is a gender-specific dream socialization (how children/adolescents learn their attitudes about dreaming) a hypothesis put forward by Schredl and Reinhard (2008). To summarize, personality dimensions, especially extraversion, are related to dream sharing frequency. The next step would be to study the interaction between personality dimensions and dream sharing more closely, eliciting who the dreams were shared with and the intimacy of these relationships. It would also be very interesting to study the effects of dream sharing, for example, on nightmare frequency. Whereas Funkhouser, Cornu, Hirsbrunner, and Bahro (2000) reported no beneficial effect of telling dream once a week to an unknown experimenter over 6 months, it was found that regular dream sharing increases

10 Schredl et al. 73 relationship intimacy and satisfaction in couples (Duffey, Wooten, Lamadue, & Comstock, 2004). Whether dream sharing within the family or among peers has any beneficial effects should be studied in the future. Declaration of Conflicting Interests The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. Funding The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. References Bachner, J., Raffetseder, P., Walz, B., & Schredl, M. (2012). The effects of dream socialization in childhood on dream recall frequency and the attitude towards dreams in adulthood: A retrospective study. International Journal of Dream Research, 5, doi: /ijodr Beaulieu-Prevost, D., & Zadra, A. (2007). Absorption, psychological boundaries and attitude towards dreams as correlates of dream recall: Two decades of research seen through a meta-analysis. Journal of Sleep Research, 16, doi: /j x Borkenau, P., & Ostendorf, F. (1993). NEO-Fu nf-faktoren-inventar (NEO-FFI). Go ttingen, Germany: Hogrefe. Curci, A., & Rime, B. (2008). Dreams, emotions, and social sharing of dreams. Cognition and Emotion, 22, doi: / Dindia, K., & Allen, M. (1992). Sex differences in self-disclosure: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 112(1), doi: / Duffey, T. H., Wooten, H. R., Lamadue, C. A., & Comstock, D. C. (2004). The effects of dream sharing on marital intimacy and satisfaction. Journal of Couple and Relationship Therapy, 3, doi: /j398v03n01_04 Funkhouser, A. T., Cornu, C. M., Hirsbrunner, H.-P., & Bahro, M. (2000). A preliminary study of dream-telling among mentally healthy elderly: No adverse effects on life or sleep quality. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 15, doi: / (200010)15:10%3c917::aid-gps218%3e3.0.co;2-8 Georgi, M., Schredl, M., Henley-Einion, J., & Blagrove, M. (2012). Gender differences in dreaming in childhood and adolescence: The UK library study. International Journal of Dream Research, 5, doi: /ijodr Hartmann, E. (1991). Boundaries in the mind. New York, NY: Basic Books. Herman, S., & Shows, W. D. (1984). How often do adults recall their dreams? International Journal of Aging and Human Development, 18, doi: / A3R8-C69H-13X5-P5V0 Ijams, K., & Miller, L. D. (2000). Perceptions of dream-disclosure: An exploratory study. Communication Studies, 51, doi: / Keßels, T. (2004). Angsttra ume bei neun-bis elfja hrigen kindern. Praxis der Kinderpsychologie und Kinderpsychiatrie, 53,

11 74 Imagination, Cognition and Personality 36(1) Ostendorf, F., & Angleitner, A. (1994). A comparison of different instruments proposed to measure the big five. European Review of Applied Psychology, 44, Pagel, J. F., & Vann, B. H. (1992). The effects of dreaming on awake behavior. Dreaming, 2, doi: /h Pagel, J. F., & Vann, B. H. (1993). Cross-cultural dream use in Hawaii. Hawaii Medical Journal, 52, Saucier, G. (1994). Mini-markers: A brief version of Goldberg s unipolar big-five markers. Journal of Personality Assessment, 63, doi: /s jpa6303_8 Schredl, M. (2000). The effect of dreams on waking life. Sleep and Hypnosis, 2, Schredl, M. (2007). Dream recall: Models and empirical data. In D. Barrett & P. McNamara (Eds.), The new science of dreaming - volume 2: Content, recall, and personality correlates (pp ). Westport, CT: Praeger. Schredl, M. (2009). Sharing dreams: Sex and other sociodemographic variables. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 109, doi: /pms Schredl, M., & Pallmer, R. (1998). Geschlechtsunterschiede in angsttra umen von schu lerinnen. Praxis der Kinderpsychologie und Kinderpsychiatrie, 47, Schredl, M., & Reinhard, I. (2008). Gender differences in dream recall: A meta-analysis. Journal of Sleep Research, 17, doi: /j.smrv Schredl, M., & Reinhard, I. (2011). Gender differences in nightmare frequency: A metaanalysis. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 15, Schredl, M., & Schawinski, J. A. (2010). Frequency of dream sharing: The effects of gender and personality. American Journal of Psychology, 123, Schredl, M., Wittmann, L., Ciric, P., & Go tz, S. (2003). Factors of home dream recall: A structural equation model. Journal of Sleep Research, 12, doi: /j x Szmigielska, B., & Holda, M. (2007). Students views on the role of dreams in human life. Dreaming, 17, doi: / Author Biographies Michael Schredl has been a dream researcher since 1990 and head of research of the sleep laboratory of the Central Institute of Mental Health, Mannheim, Germany. He teaches at the University of Mannheim and is also the editor of the online journal International Journal of Dream Research. Josie Henley-Einion has received her PhD in psychology from the University of Swansea, Wales, UK and is also a writer. Her novel Silence was published by Legend Press. Mark Blagrove is full professor in psychology and Head of Department College of Human and Health Sciences, Swansea University, Wales, UK. He is doing research on the relationship between sleep and cognition, including effects of sleep loss; memory consolidation functions of sleep; causes and possible functions of dreaming; nightmares; and lucid dreams.