Beds in dreams

Abstract

According to the continuity hypothesis, one would expect that the sleep surroundings (bed, bedroom, etc.) occur within dreams. In the present study, 1612 dreams of 425 participants, mostly psychology students, were analyzed. Beds are quite prominent in dreams (7.20%) but it was often not the dreamer’s bedroom and an activity not related to sleep. Up to now it is an open question as to what waking life experiences bed dreams are based, e.g., only emotionally salient experiences (although erotic activity in the bed was also relatively rare in this study). Future diary studies could elicit the factual bed and bedroom in which the dreamer sleeps and also measure attitudes towards sleep as some persons are fond of sleeping whereas, for others, sleep is loss of time.