Dreaming during COVID-19: the effects of a world trauma

Marogna, Cristina; Montanari, Emanuele; Contiero, Silvio; Lleshi, Klodjana

doi:10.4081/ripppo.2021.541

Cited by 13 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 52 publications

(41 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Looking at the data on these themes, university students saw that either they or their relatives got corona in their dreams. In a study conducted with a nonclinical sample, it was emphasized that after the events considered traumatic, the situations reflected in the dream content effectively infiltrated the subconscious (Marogna et al, 2021). Similarly, the effect of threat experiences the day before dreaming was found to be associated with the presence of threats in the dream content (Lafrenière et al, 2018).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pandemic dreams: A thematic analysis of university students’ dreams during the COVID-19 outbreak.

AVCI¹

2022

Dreaming

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The aim of this study is to investigate how the COVID-19 pandemic affects the dream content of university students. This research, which is based on a qualitative design, is based on a phenomenological approach. The group of the study was determined by purposive sampling, and 221 dreams that 115 university students had recently and that were not repetitive (it was emphasized that dreams were not seen before the pandemic and at the same time were not recurring) were recorded in written form by online survey method. Thematic analysis method was used in the analysis of the data. The six main themes that emerged as a result of the thematic analysis of dreams obtained from the participants are “Corona,” “Chaos,” “Death and Loss,” “Illness,” “Fear, Threat, and Anxiety,” and finally “Crowd and Loneliness.” It was found that the contents reflected in the dreams of the participants during the pandemic process affected the life negatively and traumatized the individual. It was also found that the participants and their relatives were infected with COVID-19, extraordinary events (traumatic experiences, e.g., the apocalypse, the outbreak of wars, natural disasters) were experienced during this disease, as well as deaths and losses due to the disease, and these were fearful in the dreamer, and increased the perception of threat and anxiety. On the other hand, it can also be argued that the widespread exposure of people to social distance and social isolation during the pandemic was reflected in the contents of dreams in the form of being alone and seeing crowded environments. As a result, since concerns and fears about the pandemic are common and many individuals are affected both while awake and asleep, talking about and analyzing the dreams of individuals who apply for counseling or therapy can be considered a useful approach in terms of relieving stress and anxiety related to COVID-19. Similarly, the dreamer’s psychic sufferings can be effectively uncovered and processed through dream contents.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pandemic dreams: A thematic analysis of university students’ dreams during the COVID-19 outbreak.

AVCI¹

2022

Dreaming

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…This theory identifies the reproduction and simulation of potentially dangerous and threatening events in dreams as a specialized and evolutionarily selected function. When an individual faces a threatening event during waking life, the system should activate and produce a threat simulation, thereby increasing the frequency and severity of threatening events in dreams (Marogna et al, 2021; Valli et al, 2005; see Valli & Revonsuo, 2009 for a review).…”

Section: Dreams During the Covid-19 Pandemicmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lockdown dreams: Dream content and emotions during the COVID-19 pandemic in an italian sample.

Giovanardi¹,

Bincoletto²,

Baiocco³

et al. 2022

Psychoanalytic Psychology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Beginning in March 2020, the Italian population was subjected to a lockdown lasting approximately 3 months due to the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) emergency. Drawing on a quantitative and qualitative analysis of dream data, the present study aimed at exploring the effects of social isolation and the lockdown on Italian people's dreams, focusing on content and dominating emotions. An online survey was administered to 598 participants who aged 18-70 years (M = 30.9, SD = 10.9). In the survey, participants were asked to: (a) write down two dreams they had during the lockdown and (b) provide data on demographic and socioeconomic factors; sleep quality before and after lockdown; and levels of anxiety, depression, and rumination. Questions also explored participants' perceived fear of contagion, dream recall frequency (DRF), and dream vividness. Participants' dream transcripts revealed a majority of negative emotions-particularly fear/fright/terror and anxiety/anguish/preoccupation. Moreover, several themes emerged from the content analysis, including relationships, the human and natural environment, and COVID-19. The results deepen our understanding of the dominant dream emotions of people experiencing a collective stressful event, such as the social isolation necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Further, the findings support the continuity hypothesis, which holds that dreams tend to reflect the emotional concerns of the dreamer and help to integrate intense or disruptive emotions experienced during waking life.

show abstract

“…An Italian study proves the negative impact of the restriction measures on oneiric life regardless the age, underlying that both adults and adolescents reported dreams related to the home confinement marked by negative emotions (Sommantico et al, 2021). The huge presence of COVID-19 elements inside dreams can be seen as the presence of unmetabolized daytime elements, showing a traumatic experience (Marogna et al, 2021). Finally, in the pandemic experience, dreams content and specific traumatic pattern can be predictor of depression and resilience, demonstrating how dreams can be a valid tool to understand the experience of the collectivity (Borghi et al, 2021).…”

Section: Fitting the New Realitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“Dreams drawer”: Analysis of dreams during lockdown in the Italian population.

Monaco¹,

Citti²,

Gaudio³

et al. 2022

Dreaming

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The COVID-19 pandemic has indiscriminately involved the whole world, producing a collective trauma that may have activated socially shared mental processes. It was hypothesized that the content of dreams could reflect a change in the way people are conceptualizing relationships, their environment, and the world in general after the emergency and the lockdown. We used data from “Dream Drawer,” a free online forum where people could read about others’ dreams or write about their own. Our sample consisted of 68 participants and 90 dreams. Most of them were students, and 85% of the participants were facing lockdown at home with families. To identify how dream content could reflect the impact of lockdowns, dreams were analyzed with the emotional text mining methodology. The analysis created a factorial space of 2 factors: “Relationship With the Outside” (between the containing and the losing) and “Relationship With the Inside” (between the processing and losing yourself). Each factor presents a symbolic and reflective dimension. In this space, there are 3 clusters (“holding,” “refind the other,” and “anguish defense”). The findings demonstrate that home isolation, which is portrayed in dreams as an extraordinary and novel event, appears to be the aspect of the pandemic that the unconscious has most exploited, detecting the activation of collective mental processes in dreams. Dreamwork could be the first step in beginning to process this collective catastrophic experience. The results of this research may be useful in determining collective changes in anxiety and distress.

show abstract

Dreaming during COVID-19: the effects of a world trauma

Cited by 13 publications

References 52 publications

Pandemic dreams: A thematic analysis of university students’ dreams during the COVID-19 outbreak.

Pandemic dreams: A thematic analysis of university students’ dreams during the COVID-19 outbreak.

Lockdown dreams: Dream content and emotions during the COVID-19 pandemic in an italian sample.

“Dreams drawer”: Analysis of dreams during lockdown in the Italian population.

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About