Oedipus East and West: An Exploration Via Manifest Dream Content

Abstract

The frequency of opposite-sex figures in the dreams of 45 female and 51 male Indian university students is found to vary in relation to cultural and subcultural factors. When compared with a large sample of American dreams, the gender-counts of Indian dream-characters is found to differ significantly in a direction explainable by the greater sexual segregation in India. Moreover, when the sex ratio of dream characters for all subjects are correlated with their scores on a specially devised "Transitionalism Index" a significant positive relationship is found between dream contact and indications of daily interaction. It is also found that predictions of preference for the male or female parent which are based on dependency motivations coincide more closely with dream data than do those assuming a sexual motivation. The findings are interpreted as supporting a phenomenological-cultural theory of dreams rather than a classical psychoanalytic one. They are seen as a challenge to previous claims that the sex-ratio of dream characters is cross-culturally ubiquitous and consistent in psychological meaning.

The Religious Content of Dreams: A New Scientific Foundation

“…In each of these cases, strong correlations have been found between patterns in dream content and the variables in question (Bulkeley 2002;Domhoff 1996Domhoff , 2003Foulkes 1999;Gregor 2001;Grey and Kalsched 1971;King 2006;Kramer 2000;Lortie-Lussier et al 1992;Schredl 2003;Strauch and Meier 1996;Yamanaka et al 1982). Taken together, this research supports the idea that dreams accurately reflect the most emotionally important concerns, activities, and experiences of the individual's waking life (for an earlier anthropological argument along the same lines, see Eggan 1952).…”

Oedipus in Hindu Dreams, Gandhi's Life and Erikson's Concepts

“…The men, however, were significantly more friendly to both parents than were the women (77% for men versus 43% for women; p > .01), and even more friendly to their fathers than to their mothers (45% for fathers versus 32% for mothers). These findings (reported in detail in Grey and Kalsched, 1971) are both counter to Freudian expectations and quite consistent with the neofreudian.…”

“…Details of the procedure are reported elsewhere (Grey and Kalsched, 1971) but the degree of their cooperation is suggested by the average of about ten dreams for each subject within fourteen days. This number offers a substantially more representative sampling of a subject's dream life than conclusions based on a single dream report.…”

“…In addition, each student answered a biographical ques tionnaire which included fifteen items assessing the extent to which his particular background fitted the kind of traditional pattern described above, or diverged from it. This information was called a "Transitionalism Index" which provided a numerical score for each participant (see Grey and Kalsched, 1971), indicating whether his life style was closer to an old-fashioned or a modern polarity.…”

“…By contrast, the relative hostility of the male subjects to "older people" is more than double that in direct references to parents, a difference statistically significant at the .001 level! A more detailed examination of these data (available in Grey and Kalsched, 1971) offers even less comfort to the orthodox view, with men's friendly response to "older women" being even weaker than to "mothers" (32% versus 13%). This is hardly indicative of desire hidden behind guilt.…”