Do Dreams Have Any Meaning in Our Lives
Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung were both early researchers in the field of neuro psychology and the study of dream patterns associated with sleep. Although not all of Freud and Jung's theories have withstood the test of time, without their groundbreaking research our conscious and unconscious might never have been explored. With the aid of Freud and Jung, these sleep stages can be interpreted to further the human understanding of dreams. A dream consists of three parts: latent content, the dreamwork and the manifest content (Adams & Victor 332). A dream has no meaning independent of the dreamer. Dreams are the part of id, which have been excluded from the consciousness and are part of normal psychic functioning (Brenner 215). Sigmund Freud prized dreams as the highest source of useful information in analysis. He said interpretations of dreams were the most direct access to a patient's unconscious mental life (Brenner 180). His greatest theory was that "wish-fulfillment is the meaning of each and every dream, and based upon a childhood wish" (http://psych.ucsc.edu). Freud felt that bizarre dreams stemmed from sexual and aggressive content derived from childhood...(http://encarta.msn.com).
Subjects are easily aroused from REM sleep and recall their dreams. The most complex visual dreaming occurs in the REM period. REM sleep happens cyclically throughout the night at periods of approximately 90 minutes in all age groups (Epstein 90). Full-term newborn infants spend approximately 50% of their sleep in the REM stage. The sleep cycle of a newborn infant lasts around sixty minutes averaging about 50% REM and 50% NREM. Young adults average 20 to 25% of sleep time in REM (Adams & Victor 332). Narcoleptics have an instantaneous onset of REM sleep. The sleep attack of narcolepsy is a REM episode (Epstein 99). REM sleep has been validated throughout the animal kingdom (Epstein 108). A good indicator of the occurrences of dreams is the sleep stages. The stages of sleep are called non-rapid eye movement (NREM), and rapid eye movement (REM). REM is a mentally active period during which dreams occur. Many times during the night you enter REM sleep. Individuals in REM sleep stage seem to be more awake than asleep. The body is immobilized except for the eye muscles. Even though rapid eye movement transpires it does not necessarily mean someone is dreaming (Adams & Victor). Sigmund Freud analyzed his own dreams and wrote about them in his work, The Interpretation of Dreams. He found that he could manipulate himself into having the same dream repeatedly, by eating highly salted foods at night, before going to bed. This experiment would make him dream about water, even if he had drank a whole glass of water befo
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Approximate Word count = 1039
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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