Science Of Dreams Essays - Dream, Neurophysiology, Sleep

Science Of Dreams The Science of Dreams A dream is a display, usually visual, that occurs during the night while we sleep in order to deal with and asses the things that we have dealt with during the day. A dream is a remembered residue in the form of creatively assembled visual metaphors(Guiley). In 1900 Sigmund Freud wrote in the The Interpretation of Dreams that dreams are disguised wishes arising from ones unconscious mind. Having been suppressed by the conscious mind, the wishes sneak into the sleeping brain in the form of dreams. Due to electoencephalograph machine that recorded the rapid eye movement during sleep and research into the physical nature of dreaming, Freud's theory has been for the most part proven wrong. There is no definitive answer as to what a dream is. There is a raging debate over the neuroscientific point of view and the psychoanalytical point of view about what it is that actually causes dreams. In the next few paragraphs I will look at the proposed answers from both the neuroscientific and psychoanalytical The process of dreaming starts in the brain stem and is controlled by two neurotransmitters that in affect turn the dreams on and of. The one that turns the dreams on uses acetylcholine to begin the dream, and the part that turns the dream off uses norepinephrine and serotonin to end the dream sequence.When the norepinephrine and serotonin are suppressed, the other chemical, acetylcholine allows electrical signals to the cortex. Norepinephrine and serotonin are necessary to imprint the dreams into your long term memory. This may explain why we forget the majority of our dreams. Since the two chemicals are suppressed during the dreaming process, most dreams are not stored in the long term memory of our minds. The brain stem neurons also start a sinusoidal wave known as theta rhythm the hippocampus, a brain structure that looks like a sea horse which is believed to be responsible for the storage of memory. While this happens, the nerves that usually carry information from the world around us shut down(Guiley). If the dream happens during the REM phase of sleep, the person sleeping will experience an increased heart rate and a temporary paralysis. To prevent the sleeper from acting out the dream, the brain freezes the muscular activity. Experiments have been done on cats where the nueral fibers that freeze the movement during REM sleep were removed. This resulted in the cats walking around and acting out there dreams. Some people do act out there dreams. This disorder can be treated by a drug called Clonazepam which is also used to treat epilepsy. Dreams are different according to when the dream occurs in relation to the period of sleep. During the REM stage of sleep and at other times or non-REM sleep. There are four stages of sleep. As the sleeper goes through the stages of sleep the brain waves decrease in frequency. After the sleeper goes through the four stages of sleep, the sleeper goes back through the stages until they are back in stage one. This stage bone is called the Emergent Stage One. This is the time in which most of the REM dreaming occurs. In early 1953 is when the physical science of dreams really began when researchers at the University of Chicago discovered physical signals like rapid eye movement and brain wave patterns that signaled that dreams were in progress. Most all of the research since then has focused on the REM stage of sleep. All mammals, and even a few birds and reptiles go through the REM stage of sleep. In humans as we get older less time is spent in the REM stage of sleep. Fetuses spend most all of their time in the REM stage and new borns spend an average of eight hours a day in REM sleep. Fifty percent of sleep of infants and small children is spent in REM sleep. Adults sleep is usually about twenty percent REM sleep, and for older people only fifteen percent of sleep is spent in the REM stage of sleep. Many scientist believe that this is because that REM sleep plays a part in the learning process and is more important for the younger sleepers(Ackroyd). Eventhough REM sleep has gotten all of the attention when it comes to research, it must be remebered that we do not just dream in the REM stage. NREM are the dreams that are usually more logical and are more likely to