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Dreaming and REM sleep
Author(s) -
FOULKES DAVID
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
journal of sleep research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.297
H-Index - 117
eISSN - 1365-2869
pISSN - 0962-1105
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2869.1993.tb00090.x
Subject(s) - dream , psychology , sleep (system call) , possession (linguistics) , neuroscience , altered state , non rapid eye movement sleep , association (psychology) , cognitive psychology , cognitive science , electroencephalography , consciousness , psychotherapist , philosophy , linguistics , computer science , operating system
SUMMARY The discovery, 40 years ago, of REM sleep and of its putative association with dreaming in the adult human raised the possibility that neuroscientific investigations of REM‐sleep physiology would someday ‘explain’ the distinctive features of dream experience. I argue here against the possibility, since replicated psychological data demonstrate that REM sleep is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for dreaming to occur. Dreaming depends, rather, upon the possession of conscious representational intelligence in conjunction with any psychophysiological state in which ideation is being driven neither volitionally nor by external stimulation.