What do young children dream about?

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What do young children dream about? a

Alice Sterling Honig & Arlene L. Nealis

a

a

Department of Child and Family Studies, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY, 13244, USA Available online: 04 Jul 2011

To cite this article: Alice Sterling Honig & Arlene L. Nealis (2011): What do young children dream about?, Early Child Development and Care, DOI:10.1080/03004430.2011.579797 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03004430.2011.579797

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Early Child Development and Care 2011, 1–25, iFirst Article

What do young children dream about? Alice Sterling Honig∗ and Arlene L. Nealis

Downloaded by [Syracuse University], [Alice Sterling Honig] at 11:56 07 July 2011

Department of Child and Family Studies, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY 13244, USA (Received 9 March 2010; final version received 5 April 2011) Young children’s dreams can be a way for teachers and caregivers to share with children and an opportunity for children to describe and even draw dreams. In two different preschool settings, in two different geographical locales, 94 children, aged 3 –5 years, shared 266 dreams with a trusted, familiar teacher. Dreams were coded anonymously. The number of words in a dream varied from 3 to 157. Younger preschoolers reported significantly shorter dreams. Threeyear-olds, contrary to previous research, were able to report dreams. Over 80% of the preschoolers’ dreams included specific actions, and over a third of the dreams included three or more actions. More than 36% of the dreamers encountered and struggled with a ‘monster’ protagonist. Family members, human strangers, TV/movie characters, and friends were prevalent in the dreams of young children. Scenarios differed by gender. Girls dreamed more frequently of family members. Boys reported more fighting and chasing. Dream themes of boys, compared with girls, were twice as likely to include monsters, wild animals, pets, and curiosity. Power themes were four times more prevalent in boys’ dreams. Girls were twice as likely as boys to report joyful dreams. Keywords: preschoolers’ dreams; teachers as dream collectors

Introduction All over the world, in different languages and different colours, children are dreaming. They are dreaming about families and monsters, loving and killing, and flying and falling. Sometimes these children are masters of wild beasts, and sometimes they are running for their lives. The oneiric lives of children seem to be full of magic and nightmares, but what else do young children dream about? Do young children have the cognitive ability to understand what a dream is? At what age do young children begin dreaming? When do they have the verbal ability to share their dreams with others? What do we know about the dreams of young children? Nightmares are probably the most notorious of children’s dreams. They are unpleasant or frightening dreams that occur sporadically in virtually all children (Leung & Robson, 1993). Most nightmares seem to occur in children between the ages of threeand six-years old, and both sexes are equally affected. Nightmares usually occur in the middle of the night or early morning. The content of the nightmare almost always involves a specific danger to the child, or a loved one. This danger may involve monsters, ghosts, devils, fierce animals, robbers, or other bad individuals. When the child wakes up, ∗

Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

ISSN 0300-4430 print/ISSN 1476-8275 online # 2011 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/03004430.2011.579797 http://www.informaworld.com

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A.S. Honig and A.L. Nealis


he or she is usually fully alert, and can recall many details of the nightmare. When a young child has a nightmare, adults often are alerted by the child’s acute distress and crying out. They may encourage the child to share the ‘bad dream’ and then soothe and reassure the child. Despite the fact that children as well as adults dream frequently, children’s dreams are rarely the focus of parent or teacher inquiry. Yet we know from fictional characters, such as Dorothy, in the Wizard of Oz film, that children do indeed feel a vivid reality and intensity of their dreams. The present study is a report on the dreams of young children as told to their preschool teacher each morning. History of dream research What scientists know about dream content comes mostly from laboratory work using a brain scanner while subjects are sleeping. The study of dreams began in the 1930s, when sleep researchers developed electroencephalogram (EEG) machines which recorded the electrical brain patterns of sleeping subjects. EEG records showed that sleep was a patterned, complex activity with distinct stages: ‘shallow’, where a sleeper is easily wakened (stages 1 and 2), ‘slow wave’ sleep (stages 3 and 4). Periodically throughout the night, EEG patterns showed a shift from the deeper levels of sleep back to stage one activity. During this shift, the sleeper’s eyes begin to move rapidly back and forth under closed eyelids. Heart rate and blood pressure begin to fluctuate, penile and clitoral erections occur, and breathing becomes choppy and irregular. During the 1950s, two sleep researchers awakened sleeping subjects during this shift in patterned sleep (Aserinsky & Kleitman, 1953). When asked what they had been experiencing, 80% of the subjects reported that they had been dreaming. This rapid-eye-movement (REM sleep) instantly became associated with dreaming sleep. REM sleep Sleepers cycle through these stages several times a night. During REM sleep, there is an increase in activity for many brain regions, such as the limbic system (involved with emotions), and also motoric, hearing, and visual areas. However, during REM sleep, activity goes way down in the frontal cortex, which controls executive planning and functions, and thus the limbic area is set free of controls from the frontal cortex, and some physicians have concluded, ‘that’s why dreams are dreamlike – illogical, nonsequential, hyperemotional’ (Sapolsky, 2004, p. 230). The main technique for studying dreams has been to bring volunteers into a laboratory to sleep, wake them when REM sleep waves are detected, and then ask about any dreams. In Switzerland, Strauch, and Meier (1996) woke 1000 adults (who were good sleepers and who frequently remembered their dreams) during several REM sleep periods during the night. They reported on the different settings, characters, actions, and sensory elements reported in the dreams. Physiologists who note the marked increase in metabolic activity during REM sleep suggest that dreaming gives ‘some aerobic exercise to otherwise underutilized brain pathways’ (Sapolsky, 2004, p. 231). Scientists really do not know what dreams are for. More than a century ago, dreams were thought to be ‘a meaningless conglomeration of psychic processes evoked by somatic stimuli’ (Jones, 1961, pp. 16–17). Freud (1900/1953), the father of psychoanalysis, hypothesised that dreams revealed the contents of person’s unacceptable impulses hidden from consciousness and distorted. He wrote: ‘The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to knowledge of the unconscious activities of the mind’


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(p. 608). Since then, the study of adult dreams has been a popular and intriguing topic. However, research is sparse concerning dream content for very young children, namely three-, four-, and five-year-olds. Does everyone dream? How much time do we spend dreaming? Even though many people are convinced that they never dream, no subject of the thousands observed in sleep laboratories has ever failed to show REM sleep; even newborn infants experience REMs. People spend about 20% of sleep time dreaming (Garfield, 1984). For the average person spending eight hours sleeping, one and a half hours a night are spent dreaming. Young children need more sleep, and they dream more often than adults do. Preschool children typically sleep at least 10 hours, and are therefore dreaming approximately two hours every night. In order to study the content of these dreams, researchers need to find a way to enable children to remember dreams and then verbalise their experiences. Studying children’s dreams Initial study of children’s dreams began as an additional technique for investigating the stages of cognitive development in young children. Traditional research concluded that young children were conceptually confused or ignorant about the subjective nature of dreams. Piaget (1929) claimed that preschool children were realists, believing that dreams were external and objective phenomena. Piaget believed that children only achieve a mental understanding of dreams and other mental states at about age six or seven, and only fully understand the non-physical, private, internal nature of dreams by age 12. As a result, the dream content of younger children went virtually unexplored. Even though they may not yet understand what a dream is, many children will share a dream experience. Inviting young children to share their dreams can give caregivers and parents insights into young children’s developing inner lives. Problems inherent in dream research There are some special problems in the field of dream research. The first problem is validity. How can you validate any dream report? For any dreamer, not just children, there may be distortion and repressive self-editing during recollection. Young children are just beginning to understand what a dream is, and may find it difficult to differentiate a dream from an imaginary story, or a cartoon summary. However, Wooley (1995) and Woolley and Wellman (1992) found that three–five-year-old children not only experienced dreams, but these children had acquired a sensible, albeit initial, understanding of what a dream is. Meyers and Shore (2001) suggest that in Western cultures, children as young as six years seem to have learned that dreams are non-real, private, psychological occurrences. Dream research involves some ambiguity since, ‘the dream is available to no one but the dreamer’ (Elkan, 1969). In addition, there may well be differences in children’s dreams if they have experienced strong stress, such as wartime terrors, physical or sexual abuse, chronic parental hostility, or acute medical problems. For example, some research on children’s dreams has shown interesting differences among children with and without ADHD. When the children filled out dream questionnaires, which asked for dream frequency and the most recent dream, then children with ADHD reported more negatively toned dreams that included more negative endings, physical aggression toward the dreamer, and more threats and misfortunes. However, the bizarreness of the dreams did not differ between the 103 children with ADHD and the 100 control children (Schredl & Sartorius, 2009). Cooper

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(1999) examined whether grieving children tended to recall dreams more frequently than their non-grieving counterparts. Grieving children did recall dreams more requently, and they also appeared to be more aware of their dream worlds. Another problem inherent in dream research with children is methodology. Traditional lab research has not found young children to be capable of rich dream production. We need to wonder whether it is beneficial or even appropriate, to bring young children to a sleep laboratory in order to collect dreams. Where and with whom do young children feel most comfortable expressing their dream experiences? The content of children’s dreams Freud (1965) collected the dreams of several seven- and eight-year-old children, but he did not find their oneiric experiences to be in need of analyses, since he characterised the dreams as much simpler and less disguised than adult dreams. In psychoanalysis, the manifest content of the dream (the shape the dream takes) is the key to deciphering the hidden, deeper message – the latent content. According to Freud, the superego of young children has not developed to a point that would repress a child’s actual dream image and so psychoanalysis would be unnecessary. Freud made no mention of the actual dream content he obtained from school-age children. But he noted that for children each dream represents ‘nothing else than the imaginary fulfillment of an ungratified wish, that has not been repressed’ (Jones, 1961, p. 248). Thus, a child denied the pleasure of going to the circus may dream that night that he is visiting the circus. Foulkes (1982) also presumed that children’s capacity for dreaming evolves in line with their maturation as conscious, symbolic beings, and he considered that at ages three–five years, children were scarcely capable of dream production. Foulkes (1977) found children’s dream content drawn fairly directly from a typical day. Unlike Jung (1973), who believed that dreams consist of fantastic characters and bizarre action sequences, Foulke reported that the most commonly occurring characters in children’s dreams were nuclear family members, known persons, and animals familiar to the children. The most common locales were home and recreational settings; the most common plot sequences involved everyday events with a focus on play activities; most dream outcomes seemed appropriate, rather than omnipotent or self-destructive. Dream study in the lab The majority of the research on children’s dreams has been conducted in a sleep laboratory (Foulkes, 1977, 1993, 1999), and few attempts have been made to collect dream reports in home or school settings. Foulkes concluded, after extensive longitudinal research in a laboratory setting, that the dreams of young children (three–seven-yearolds) are devoid of active self representation, movement or physical activity, and interpersonal interaction. From his sleep lab results, Foulkes also indicated an absence of human strangers or frightening characters, and he asserted that ‘static images’ were prevalent in the dreams of young children. The detrimental effects of attempting to collect dream reports from three-, four-, and five-year-old children in a laboratory are unknown, but these results hardly seem to represent the actual dreams of preschool children. Does the unfamiliar laboratory disorient children? Do children this young feel uncomfortable reporting their dreams to a stranger? In the sleep lab setting, children were periodically awakened three to four times a night during REM sleep. This methodology yielded an ‘absence of dreaming’ during 75% of the awakenings (Foulkes, 1982).


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Do these extremely low dream report rates reflect children’s actual capacity for dreaming, or are these results directly due to the ‘sleep lab paradigm’? Can dreams collected in more naturalistic settings provide more insights into children’s dreams?

Dream study at school In Quebec, Beaudet (1990) interviewed preschool children in their classroom and collected 100 dreams. Choosing natural conversation with an attentive adult as her technique, Beaudet described as key the relationship between interviewer and child, which set the ‘tone of the encounter, and the depth of the listening’ (p. 9). When a young child experiences that an adult is listening specifically to his or her dream, the child feels privileged and recounting the dream is the child’s choice. The school context provided a natural setting where children were already accustomed to visitors and student teachers. The majority of dreams reported involved active participation on the part of the dreamer. She noted that, at first, the dreams seemed scattered, diverse, and incoherent, yet also suggested a fertile and rich imaginative life. Eighty percent of the dreams involved human characters, and 25% involved a type of ‘monster’. Analysing contents, themes, settings, and attitudes of the children’s dreams, she found the majority of dreams revolved around the concept of ‘monster’. Boys were six times more likely than girls to report a ‘monster’ dream, and the monsters in the girls’ dreams tended to be smaller and more realistic. Some children were terrorised by the monster, some were beginning to confront the monster, and others had befriended and controlled the monster in their dreams. Beaudet concluded that ‘encountering the monster’ was the task of a growing child. The combination of a natural setting, willingness on the part of the child, and a trusted adult proved fruitful for the study of dream content in young children. Interviewing preschoolers in a lab school setting, Woolley and Boerger (2002) reported significant changes between three and five years in the role of behavioural experiences and mental processes in children’s generation of dream content. They noted that daily activities and thoughts contributed to dream content and that the preschoolers believed that dream content was not subject to conscious control.

Dream study in the home Some researchers have asked parents to collect dreams. Resnick, Stickgold, Rittenhouse, and Hobson (1994) asked parents to use an open-ended interviewing style to collect dream reports from 4–10-year-old children in the comfortable and supportive environment of their own homes. Parents were instructed to collect dream reports from their children when they awoke spontaneously. The parents were also instructed not to pressure their children into reporting a dream when they could not remember one, and to accept a child’s request not to share a remembered dream. Due to the fragility of dream episodes, children were asked to recall their dreams while lights remained off and before they got out of bed. In contrast to Foulkes’ conclusions, Resnick et al. (1994) reported that young children were able to give long, detailed reports of their dreams. Because these dream reports were only revealed to trusted confidants in a familiar and comfortable environment, an important implication is that the sleep lab may not be the best source of child dream data.


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Age differences in children’s dreams Foulkes’ (1977) dream reports indicated significant differences between dreams of younger and older preschoolers. The reports from three- and four-year-old children were described as brief and static in quality. Hedonic tone was neutral, with few reports described as pleasant or unpleasant. Settings tended to be at home, and activities were performed by characters other than the dreamer. The feeling content in these dreams was minimal. Foulkes expressed surprise at the relative predominance of animal characters, rather than family characters in the dreams of children this young. The overwhelming majority of animal characters were domesticated animals, appearing in a ‘homey’ context. By the ages of five and six, dream reports changed significantly. The dream reports were at least double in average length, and the dreams became more dynamic in character. Many of these dreams included feelings, activities, and actionbased recreational settings. Foulkes noted that although the dreams of five- and- sixyear-olds were more dynamic, the action seemed to be happening around the dreamer, rather than directly involving the dreamer in the action. Gender differences in children’s dreams Although he found no significant gender differences in dream content at the ages of three and four, Foulkes (1977) reported that girls and boys seemed to move into different dream realms by the ages of five and six. Girls’ dreams tended to be more pleasant; girls took more active roles in their own dreams, and they reported reduced character distortion, such as replacement of familial by animal characters. They tended to dream about home settings, happy feelings, and favourable interpersonal outcomes. Boys were more apt to report unpleasant dreams, take passive roles, and reported a low incidence of family members or home settings. Characters included a large percentage of male strangers and untamed animals, and their dreams were often preoccupied with conflict. Beaudet’s (1990) research also indicated gender differences in dream content. The theme of the ‘monster’ was clearly more prominent for boys and the ‘animal theme’ was three times more frequent for girls. Gender differences were significant, with more boys mentioning home and girls more often mentioning nature settings. Children’s conceptions of dreams Do young children understand where their dream content comes from? Many preschoolers can explain that their bad dream came ‘from a movie’, or that their ‘beach’ dream came from a favourite family vacation. While studying causal thinking in the child, Larendeau and Pinard (1962) concluded that the majority of preschool children do not understand that a dream is not real. They suggested that in early childhood, children may not be able to recognise their dreams as fantasy after they wake up. The dreams still seem to the children to have been ‘real experiences’. Yet, sometimes it is difficult, even for adults, to realise that a dream is not physical reality. Foulkes (1993) explains that this may be an especially difficult understanding for young children, because dreaming is experienced as reality. Until we wake up, we experience the dream as a form of living, not as a form of thinking. When awake, adults may be able to discount the dream, but during the dream itself, dream events may seem to be as real as waking events. Very few people experience ‘lucid dreaming’ where the dreamers realise they are dreaming during the experience itself (Green, 1968). Many preschool children are confused about whether a dream is real or make-believe (Rousso & Gross, 1988). But some researchers have reported that


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three–five-year-old children not only experience dreams, but have acquired a beginning understanding of what a dream is (Woolley & Wellman, 1992). Through interviews in their own preschool with a familiar adult, they reported that children judged dreams to be non-physical, private, and fictional. Many three-year-olds believed that dreams are directly shared by more than one person, whereas most four-yearolds understood that dreams are individual. Lillard and Flavell (1992) have reported that children as young as three years can understand that dreams are non-physical, unavailable to public perception, and internal, and some children can differentiate dreams from reality. Cross cultural beliefs about dreaming Although young children seem to enjoy the chance to speak about their dreams, few typical preschool children share dreams with their parents. How important is the topic of dreaming in the ‘typical household’? Even if parents do talk about their dreams, do they discuss their dream lives with each other in the family? Recently, strategies to alleviate nightmares have become more prominent in parenting literature, and some teachers do try to help preschoolers who report night terror dreams. Jalongo (2003) reports discussing preschooler Jeremy’s dream about a bad monster with him during a comforting dialogue. She encouraged the child to draw the monster and talk about the dream until the child’s tensions were eased. But what about dreams that do not haunt young children? What about dreams that delight children or show their developing curiosity and sense of adventure? The daily dreams of children are often not salient to adults in Western societies. There are cultures in the world where dream life does play a significant and very central role. Music and dreams are interrelated among Australian aborigine people, and they ‘often attribute their songs to ancestors who have appeared to them in dreams’ (Bowra, 1963, p. 47). In the Malaysian Senoi culture, dreams are valued equally with waking activity (Noone, 1972). Anthropologist Pat Noone, who lived with the Senoi people for several years, relates that to the Temiar people, the dream is a spiritual experience, in a sense as real and important as any physical experience during the waking hours. Few important decisions are made by a group without one of its members having a dream that points to a certain course of action. If a Temiar man dreams of a certain spot in the river, he will fish there. Most Temiar inspirations, as well as poetry, songs, music, and dances, are dream inspired. Since all dreams are considered important, Temiar children are encouraged to talk about their dreams from the time that they can speak. At the morning meal, each family member describes a dream from the night before. The child hears his parents describe dreams, and listens as each family member is criticised or congratulated for their actions in the dream. In turn, the child will tell his dream, and he will hear it interpreted and discussed. To dream correctly, the child is told never to be afraid. The Temiar child is taught to struggle against dream images until he is convinced (and his elders and advisors are agreed), that each dream image is benign and acting in the child’s best interests. Implicit in all this dream advice is the idea that a person, with the assistance of friendly spirits, can dominate evil forces, provided he confronts the dream image. The purpose of this study The purpose of this study was to examine the dream content of preschool children, ages three-, four-, and five-years old. What do children this young dream about? Are the

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dreams of young children filled with bizarre monsters and static images, or do they contain familiar characters and friendly animals? Are there age and gender differences in dream content? Do children’s dreams become more active as they grow older? Are the dream narratives of older preschoolers longer than the dream narratives of three-year-olds?

Methods and procedures Subjects Ninety-four children attending early childhood settings shared dreams for this study. Of the 266 dream reports collected, forty-three dreams were dictated by three-year-olds (16%), 144 were dictated by four-year-olds (54%), and 79 were dictated by fiveyear-olds (30%). Boys shared 56% of the dream reports (n ¼ 150), and girls shared 44% (n ¼ 116) of the dream reports. All of the children were enrolled at campus preschool centres, in mixed-age classrooms. As in many mixed-age groupings of three-, four-, and five-year-old preschool children, most of the children enrolled were four years of age for the majority of the school year. Sixty percent of the dreams were collected from subjects attending a university nursery school in northern New York state and 40% of the dreams were collected from children attending a university early childhood centre in Colorado. Approval for the research was obtained from the Internal Review Board at both universities. Individual family permission was obtained in writing for every child whose dream was included in the study. The ratio of trained caregivers to children in each school is approximately one to five. Each school has a Constructivists philosophy of education, based on Piagetian theory. Classrooms are set up to encourage hands-on, child-directed activities. Both universities are located centrally within a city of over one hundred thousand people. The parents of these children were mostly college educated or currently attending the university. The socioeconomic status of the families was lower middle to upper middle class. The sample was predominantly English speaking Caucasians (84%), although Asian (10%), African American (3%), Hispanic (1%), and Indian (1%) children did participate in this study (Table 1). Parental consent forms were distributed at both nursery schools. Figure 1 shows the sample distribution by child age and gender. Although any child could choose to share a dream or ask to have their dream written, only the dreams of children whose parents gave written consent were utilised for this study. Dreams were coded anonymously, to ensure privacy for children and their families.

Procedures In order for the children to feel comfortable and have confidence in reciting their dream narratives, it was imperative that the researcher was a familiar adult. It was also necessary to conduct the research in a setting where the children felt in control – their preschool classroom. The same adult (ALN) collected children’s dreams at Syracuse University, where she was the children’s preschool teacher and at Colorado State where she was a long-time volunteer teacher assistant in the classroom. Rapport while interacting in a natural setting was essential so that these young children would feel comfortable and confident about sharing dreams.


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Table 1. Demographics of dream study participants.


Boys

Gender Population Syracuse Colorado Age group 3 years 4 years 5 years Ethnicity Caucasian African American Asian Hispanic Indian Other Sibling status Only child Twin Eldest Middle Youngest

Girls

Number

Percent

Number

Percent

150

56.4

116

43.6

98 52

65.3 34.7

62 54

53.4 46.6

20 71 59

13.3 47.3 39.3

23 73 20

19.9 62.9 17.2

133 7 7 1 0 2

88.7 4.7 4.7 0.7 0.0 1.3

91 1 20 1 2 1

78.4 0.9 17.2 0.9 1.7 0.9

22 2 43 5 78

14.7 1.3 28.7 3.3 52.0

29 1 34 21 31

25.0 0.9 29.3 18.1 26.7

To initiate dream conversation, the adult read a story during group time that addressed a dream experience. The two stories used for this purpose were Sendak’s (1963) Where the wild things are and Wildsmith’s (1988) The carousel. In this way, the topic of dreaming was brought up in a natural way for the children to discuss together as a group. When group time was about to end, the teacher showed the children the ‘dream clipboard’ and explained how dreams could be shared and recorded. In each of the nursery school classrooms, there was a writing area. The ‘dream clipboard’ hung in the writing area, at a place easily accessible to the children. The

Figure 1.

Gender division by age group.


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clipboard provided a visual prompt. When a child remembered a dream and wanted to tell it, he or she picked up the clipboard, approached the teacher, and requested to tell a dream. The adult sat with the child and wrote the child’s exact words, until the child was finished. The child who wished to do so could also draw a picture to accompany the dream. When the child finished speaking, the teacher asked the child, ‘Do you know what a dream is?’ Any response which indicated that the dream happened at night, when the child was sleeping, in the child’s bedroom, or when the child’s eyes were closed, was considered evidence that the child was reporting a dream suitable for this study. In an effort to collect only actual dream data, children were additionally given the opportunity to tell a story. A ‘story clipboard’ hung next to the ‘dream clipboard’ in the writing area of each preschool room. Taking dictation from preschoolers is a typical language arts activity in a quality early childhood setting. Paley (1990) has reported on the beneficial effects of encouraging young children to dictate play scenarios. Children are familiar with the individual attention that they receive by narrating to an adult. In this study, children received special teacher attention whether they chose to recall dreams or to create and share their own story scenarios. In each setting, dreams were collected over a span of more than a half year. Some days several dreams were collected. The sharing of dreams itself proved contagious. Children would see a peer dictating a dream, and this visual cue would remind other children of a dream they had experienced. Some days no dreams were mentioned. The process was slow, but when the children did remember a dream, they were excited and exact in their dream recall. You could see the children visually remembering the dream as they narrated, often struggling to tie words together with the visual images they were replaying mentally. Within each setting, there were several children who tended to remember dreams frequently and in great detail, and a few children who never shared a dream. Coding and analyses An anonymous copy of each child’s dream was made for coding purposes. Demographics collected for each dreamer included gender, age, ethnicity, residence, and sibling status (Table 1). The length of each dream narration was calculated. Exact word counts were coded, as well as condensed categories for coding purposes (i.e. dreams with fewer than 10 words, 10 to 20 words, etc.). Each entry was assigned a dream number, as well as a subject number. The content of each dream was categorised through thematic content analyses (Appendix 1). Coding categories were initially derived through multiple reviews of dream protocols and independent ratings by each author. Each category was operationally defined for coding purposes. Characters were defined as the people, animals, monsters, or focus objects in each dream. The Protagonist was the focal character within the dream. The protagonist could be any form of monster, unidentified threat, animated object, person, animal, or even the dreamer. The Number of Characters within each dream was calculated. Character Transformation indicated that a specific character changed physical form within the dream. Dream Setting was coded to indicate whether the dream took place ‘inside’ or ‘outside’. If the setting was not explicitly stated, the dream was coded as ‘setting unknown’. Dream Location defined where the dream took place: at home, in nature, or perhaps an imprecise place. When dreams referred to more than one setting, the



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setting in which the central event of the dream took place, or the setting in which the dream culminated was selected. In all other cases, when the dream described characters or events without explicit reference to a specific setting, the setting was coded as imprecise. Time of Day noted a child’s specific reference to the dream story as occurring in the day, in the night, or both. Actions included any ‘action verbs’ dictated within the dream: running, flying, falling, chasing, being chased, aggressing, fleeing, etc. In order to be coded as an action, the verb could not be passive such as ‘went’ or ‘saw’. The Number of Actions within each dream was also calculated. Communication, although an action, was coded to indicate dream experiences where children specifically mentioned talking, crying, yelling, singing, or other forms of communication. Dream Feeling was recorded to indicate the child’s most salient feeling during the dream experience. Some examples of feelings were: joy, fear, power, helplessness, adventure, victimisation, and anger. Although several feelings could be reported as experienced during each dream, the coding process recorded the predominant feeling for each dream experience. In addition to visual experiences, Sensory Experiences were coded. Examples of sensory dream experiences included: a child saw a red ball, tasted sweet watermelon, or felt a fuzzy kitten. Rather than simply eating a watermelon or touching a kitten, the dreamer was remembering the sensory experience within the dream and using descriptive language during dream recall. Dreamer Capacity was coded to indicate the dreamer’s self-representation within the dream. A dream report was scored as ‘active’ if the report indicated that the subject was present in the dream. This required an explicit statement of presence or action (e.g. ‘I cooked at Grandma’s house’). If the child just reported viewing the action, the dream was coded as ‘passive’ (e.g. ‘I saw a cat’). If the child did not explicitly state being present, then the code was ‘narration only’ (e.g. ‘A boy rode the train’). Dream Outcome indicated that the dream came to some type of conclusion. This could include waking up, or an outcome within the dream narration such as a consequence, death, or escape. Some dreams had no outcome. The overall Emotional Tone of the dream was coded into six categories: positive, negative, positive to negative, negative to positive, ambivalent, or neutral. This tone indicated the emotional connection that the child reported for the dream itself. Internal validity is always a concern for any dream research, especially with children. For any dreamer, not just children, there may be distortion within dream recall. Although repressive self-editing during recollection would be less common in children, it could occur. In order to conduct dream research, there needs to be an acceptance of some level of ambiguity. Thus, after recording each dream, the teacher asked each child, ‘Do you know what a dream is?’ Any response which indicated that the dream happened at night, when the child was sleeping, in the child’s bedroom, when the child’s eyes were closed, etc. was considered evidence that the child was reporting a dream suitable for this study. In an effort to reduce creative ‘fabrication’, the children always had the opportunity to receive individual attention from an adult by choosing simply to recount a story which they had created. Fabrications in children this young are sometimes obvious and easily detected. As far as the children were concerned, dreams and stories received equal attention from the teacher. To ensure reliability, two coders with advanced child development backgrounds were trained to analyse the thematic content of a random sample of dreams. An analysis


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of reliability was conducted as it related to internal consistency. Intercoder reliability results were calculated for each qualitative coding category, resulting in an overall intercoder reliability rate of 94.38% across 16 coding categories. There was 94.5% intercoder reliability for: Character categories (including humans, animals, protagonist, number of characters), for Setting categories (including setting, location, and time of day), for Character Transformation, for Action categories (including main action, number of actions, and communication), and for Dreamer Capacity and Dream Tone. Intercoder reliability was 100% for Sensory and for Outcome categories. The category with the lowest interrrater reliability (80%) was ‘Dream feeling’. The authors then expanded Dream feeling codes to 13 operationally defined categories and had the protocols recoded to indicate the child’s most salient feeling during the dream experience. Intercoder reliability by two independent coders then rose to 90%. The 13 operationally defined categories are: joy, fear, curiosity, power, anger, victimisation, adventure, anxiety, amusement, pleasure, comradery, yearning, and ‘other feeling’. For later analysis, the Feeling categories were condensed into ‘positive’, ‘negative’, or other. Joy, curiosity, power, adventure, amusement, pleasure, comradery, and yearning were coded as ‘positive’. Fear, anger, victimisation, and anxiety were coded as ‘negative feelings’. Data analysis Thematic content analysis was employed to categorise the dreams. Frequencies indicating the different types of characters, settings, activities, feelings, and outcomes were tabulated from these content analyses. To assess whether dream content differed by child age and gender, Chi-square analyses were employed. ANOVAs were used to assess possible interactions between dream content categories and age. Regression was used to test the strength of the relationship between the length of dream narration, age, and gender. Results Thematic dream content Frequencies were tallied to illustrate the thematic content of the dreams. Since there were no significant differences between the dreams collected in New York (n ¼ 160) and the dreams collected in Colorado (n ¼ 106), the total sample was used to determine different dream aspects (see Appendix 2 for some typical dreams of children of different ages in this study). Characters were defined as the people, animals, monsters, or focal objects within each dream. Of the 266 dreams collected, the human character most frequently mentioned within the dream was the dreamer alone (33.8%). Immediate family members were the main characters mentioned in almost one-third of the dreams (30%). Other characters frequently mentioned included a stranger (10.5%), a TV/movie character (9.8%), or a friend (3.4%). Eleven percent of the dreams did not include a human character. The Number of Characters within each dream ranged from 0 to 17. Eighty-five percent of the dreams included four or fewer characters. Most of the dreams included one (17.3%), two (31.2%), three (22.9%), or four (13.2%) characters. Only 1 of the 266 dreams did not mention a single character. Character Transformation, when one character physically changes form from one character to another, was described in 17.7% of the dreams collected. As expected from prior studies, animals were frequently present in the dreams of young children. Almost half of the dreams included animal characters (43%). Wild



13

animals (24%), pets (6%), domestic animals (6%), TV/movie characters (4.9%), and fantasy creatures (2.3%) represented the animals found within the dreams. The Protagonist was the focal character within the dream. Over a third of the dreamers encountered and struggled with a type of ‘monster’ within their dream (36.8%). Other dreams centred around TV/movie characters (14.7%), animals (10.9%), family members (10.2%), toys (7.5%), unidentified threats (5.3%), and animated objects (4.5%). The dreamer alone was the protagonist in 4.9% of the dreams, and friends were the focal characters in 1.9% of dreams. The Setting of the dream indicated whether the dream took place inside or out. Explicit reference was required in order to code a specific setting. Almost half of the dream settings were coded as ‘uncertain’ (47.4%). Children specifically mentioned an ‘inside’ setting 21.4% of the time, and an ‘outside’ setting 24.4% of the time. Dreams took place in combined inside and outside settings almost 7% of the time. The specific Location of the dream setting was also coded. Common inside locations included the child’s home (10.5%), the child’s bed (6.4%), and the child’s bedroom (3.8%). School (3.4%) and a friend’s house (2.6%) were also mentioned. Outside locations included the mountains (2.6 %), the forest (1.5%), and a body of water (2.6%). The specific location remained unknown in over 44% of the dreams. Children rarely mentioned a specific time of day in their dreams. In 87.2% of the dreams (n ¼ 232), there was no explicit statement indicating whether the dream occurred at night or during the day. The children specified time of day as ‘night’ in 4.9% (n ¼ 13) of dreams, as ‘day’ in 5.6% (n ¼ 15) of dreams, and as both ‘night and day’ in 2.3% (n ¼ 6) of dreams. Actions were specified for 81.2% of the dreams, and a third (33.4%) of the dreams included three or more actions within the dream. The most frequently stated actions included: fighting (10.9%), playing (8.6%), chasing (7.1%), fleeing (4.9%), sleeping (4.5%), flying (4.1%), falling (4.1%), eating/drinking (3.8%), searching (3.8%), changing (2.6%), riding (2.6%), and walking (2.3%). In 18.8% of the dream scenarios, no action was mentioned. The number of actions within each dream ranged from zero to nine: 28.9% of dreams cited one action, 19.2% cited two actions, 14.7% cited three actions, 10.2% cited four actions, 3.8% cited five actions, and 5.7% cited more than five actions. In examining communication within the children’s’ dream reports, 91.4% of dreams made no mention of explicit communication. Talking was mentioned in 7.5% of dreams, while crying, yelling, or singing were each mentioned in one dream (0.4%). The Dream Feeling was recorded to indicate the child’s most salient feeling during the dream experience. Joy (20.7%), neutrality (20.3%), and fear (19.5%) were the most commonly coded feelings. Other common dream feelings included: curiosity (7.9%), adventure (7.9%), power (6.8%), anxiety (6.0%), and victimisation (4.1%). Anger and pleasure each were noted in 1.5% of dream feelings. Sensory Experiences were mentioned in just over 20% of the dreams recorded. Touch (9.8%), colour (7.5%), and sound (3.4%) were stated most often, with taste and smell mentioned in one dream each (.4%). Dreamer Capacity was coded to indicate the dreamer’s self-representation within the dream. A dream report was scored as ‘active’ if a child reported that she or he was actively present in the dream. One hundred and fifty-eight dreams (59.4%) involved young children actively engaged in their own dream narrations. When the child only reported viewing the action, the dream was coded as ‘present’ (e.g. ‘I saw a cat’). Twenty-nine dreams (10.9%) were coded as present. If the subject did not


14


explicitly state the presence, the role was coded as ‘narration only’ (e.g. ‘A boy rode the train’). Seventy-nine dreams (29.7%) were coded as narration only. For Dream Outcome, 56% of dreams were coded as having a definite conclusion within the dream content. 2.3% concluded with ‘waking up’, and 41.7% of dreams ended midstream, with no apparent conclusion. The Emotional Tone of the dream indicated the emotional connection the child associated with the dream memory. This was often noted in the child’s dictation before the dream even began. A child would say: ‘Oohh, I have a bad dream!’ or ‘A good dream came to me last night’. The emotional outcome is a general summary of the dream’s impact on the child. Almost twice as many dreams were coded as positive (41.8%) rather than as negative (21.4%). Some dreams were coded as having an ambivalent (13.2%) or neutral tone (23.7%). The length of reported dreams varied greatly. Of the 266 dreams collected, there were dreams with as few as 3 words, and dreams with as many as 157 words. Length of narration was coded as an exact number, as well as condensed into categories (fewer than 10 words, 10 to 20 words, etc.). More than half of the dreams (50.4%) had a dream narration of 25 words or more. The average length of dream narration was 33 words (Figure 2). Gender differences in dream content Characters The dreams of girls and boys differed in types of characters, animals, and protagonists (focal characters) (Table 2). Family members were present in 35.3% of girls’ dreams, and 25.3% of boys’ dreams. Strangers were three times as likely to show up in boys’ dreams (15.3%), as girls’ dreams (4.3%). Boys (8.0%) were twice as likely as girls (3.4%) to mention a dream pet. Girls’ dreams were less likely to contain a wild animal (19.8%) than boys’ dreams (27.3%). Monsters There was a significant gender difference (p , 0.001) for dream protagonists (Table 3). The ‘monster’ protagonist was evident in almost twice as many boys’ dreams (46%), as in those of girls (25%). Girls’ dreams focused more frequently on family members Table 2. Dream protagonist categories by child gender. Protagonist

Boys Number

Percent

Girls Number

Percent

Monster Unidentified threat Animated object Self TV/movie character Toy Family member Animal Friend Other

69 8 5 6 19 12 9 14 3 5

46.0 5.3 3.3 4.0 12.7 8.0 6.0 9.3 2.0 3.3

29 6 7 7 20 8 18 15 2 4

25.0 5.2 6.0 6.0 17.2 6.9 15.5 12.9 1.7 3.4

∗

p , 0.05.

p ∗

∗ ∗


15


(15.5%) than did boys’ dreams (6.0 %;). Girls were more likely to mention a TV/movie character (17.2%) than were boys (12.7%). Location Although specific dream locations and time of day did not differ significantly between boys and girls, gender differences were evident for Dream Settings. The setting addressed whether the dream was explicitly stated as occurring inside or outside. Codes for ‘uncertain’ settings and ‘combined settings’ did not show significant gender differences. However, girls’ dreams were more frequently located inside (24.1%) than boys’ dreams were (19.3%). Boys were more than twice as likely (31.3%) to mention an outside dream than girls (15.5%) were. It is interesting that Erikson (1950), who systematically observed gender differences in children’s blockbuilding play, noted that boys tended to build tall outdoor structures, such as skyscrapers, while girls tended to build homier living room enclosures. Actions Dream actions significantly differed between boys and girls (Pearson r¼ 0.048, p , 0.05). The dominant actions of boys’ dreams included fighting (16%) and chasing (11.3%). The dominant actions in girls’ dreams were playing (10.3%) and falling (6.9%) (Table 3). Communication Over 91% of children’s’ dreams did not specifically mention communication, but girls were more than twice as likely to mention talking (11.2%) than boys (4.7%). Regression was used to measure the strength of the relationship between gender and communication, and gender was found to be a significant predictor (p , 0.005) of communication within dream narration. Feelings Dream ‘feeling’ indicated the child’s most salient feeling during the dream experience (Table 4). Girls’ dominant feeling was joy (29.3%), and girls were twice as likely to have a joyful dream as were boys (14%). Boys more often mentioned fear (21.3%), and boys were twice as likely to experience a curiosity dream. The feeling of ‘power’ was four times more likely in boys’ dreams (10.7%), than in girls’ (1.7%). The Pearson r was significant at the 0.05 level (two tailed) for feeling and gender. ‘Feeling’ categories were condensed into positive, negative, and neutral categories for coding purposes, and regression confirmed the significance of the relationship between gender and dream feeling (p , 0.006). Age differences in dream content Setting The setting of each dream was coded as inside, outside, both inside and outside, or uncertain. Explicit reference was necessary in order to code a specific setting. Dreams of three-year-olds were most often coded as having an ‘uncertain setting’ (62.8%). The dreams of older children had more specific dream settings. Only half

16


Table 3. Dream action categories by gender.


Action Walking Chasing Fleeing Falling Flying Playing Eating/drinking Sleeping Fighting Searching Riding Transforming Other No action ∗

Boys Number

Percent

Girls Number

Percent

p

4 17 7 3 8 11 5 5 24 8 4 2 29 23

2.7 11.3 4.7 2.0 5.3 7.3 3.3 3.3 16.0 5.3 2.7 1.3 19.3 15.3

2 2 6 8 3 12 5 7 5 2 3 5 29 27

1.7 1.7 5.2 6.9 2.6 10.3 4.3 6.0 4.3 1.7 2.6 4.3 25.0 23.3

∗

∗

p , 0.05.

of the dreams shared by four-year-olds had an uncertain setting (50.7%), and that percentage decreased to only a third (32.9%) in dreams shared by five-year-olds. The settings of dreams shared by three-year-olds were equally likely to be coded as inside or outside (18.6%). Inside (22.9%) and outside (20.8%) setting results were quite similar for four-year-olds as well. Children who were five-year-olds were much more likely to share dreams that described outside settings (34.2%), rather than inside

Table 4. Dream feeling categories by gender. Feeling Joy Fear Curiosity Power Anger Victimisation Adventure Anxiety Amusement Pleasure Camaraderie Yearning Neutral ∗

p , 0.05.

Boys Number

Percent

Girls Number

Percent

p

21 32 15 16 3 7 14 13 4 2 0 0 23

14.0 21.3 10.0 10.7 2.0 4.7 9.3 8.7 2.7 1.3 0.0 0.0 15.3

34 20 6 2 1 4 7 3 2 2 2 2 31

29.3 17.2 5.2 1.7 0.9 3.4 6.0 2.6 1.7 1.7 1.7 1.7 26.7

∗

∗

∗


17


settings (20.3%). The older preschoolers were more specific about their dream locations, and this age trend was statistically significant (6, N ¼ 266; x2 ¼ 18.046, p ¼ 0.006). The role of the dreamer in the dream Dreamer capacity was coded to indicate the dreamer’s self-representation within the dream. Dreamers were coded as ‘active’, ‘present’, or ‘narrating only’, based on their level of participation in their dream scenarios. Although nearly half of the three-year-olds (46.5%) were coded as ‘merely narrating’ their dreams, only a quarter of the four (26.4%) and five (26.6%) year olds fell into this category. Thus, for older preschoolers, there was an increase in reporting participation in their dreams rather than mere narration (Figure 3). For a dreamer’s capacity to be coded as ‘present’, the child stated that she or he viewed the dream content, but in no way participated. The ‘present’ category contained the smallest percentage at each age level, and steadily decreased in number for the older preschoolers. A fifth (20.9%) of the three-year-olds’ dreams were coded as ‘present’; decreasing to 13.2% of the dreams of four-year-olds’ and only 1.3% of the dreams of five-year-olds. Thus, significant evidence was noted for marked age differences, such that older preschoolers reported more active participation in their dreams (Table 5). ‘Active participation’ percentages were 32.6% at the three-year-old level, but almost twice that, 60.4%, for four-year-olds. Almost three quarters (72.2%) of five-year-olds reported active participation in their dream scenarios. Older preschoolers were less likely than younger children merely to ‘narrate’ dreams and the relationship between age level and Dreamer Capacity was significant (4, N ¼ 266; x2 ¼ 23.675, p , 0.000). Length of dream narration Older preschoolers shared longer dream narrations (Figure 2). An exact word count was recorded for each dream narrated. The shortest dreams were coded into the first group ‘ten words or fewer’. Over a third (34.9%) of the dreams shared by three-year-olds fell into this category. Among the four-year-olds, 13.9% reported dreams with fewer than ten words, and only 5.1% of the five-year-olds dictated the shortest dreams. The longest dream length coded was ‘61 words and more’, achieved by only 2.3% of three-year-olds. Dream narrations tended to be longer for the older preschoolers: 3.2% of four-year-olds and 19% of five-year-olds shared the longest dreams. Thus preschooler age had a significant effect (p , 0.01) on dream length.

Figure 2.

Length of dream narration by age group.


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Figure 3.

Role of the dreamer by age group.

Discussion and Conclusions Examination of the dream content of preschool children between the ages of three-, four-, and five-years old revealed clearly that indeed, young children do have dream lives, and they are capable of sharing their oneiric experiences. In support of Woolley and Wellman’s (1992) findings, the three–five-year-old children participating in our study not only experienced dreams, but were in the process of acquiring a sensible understanding of what a dream is. Data from this study contrast with Piaget’s (1929) belief that children achieve a mental understanding of dreams only at about age seven, and that they only fully understood the non-physical, private, internal nature of dreams by age 12. In order for their dreams to be included in our study, these three-, four-, and five-year-old subjects had to show an initial understanding of what a dream was by explaining when or where the dream took place. The results clearly indicated that even three-year-olds are beginning to become capable of dream recall and have the verbal ability to share their dream memories. The method of dream collection utilised in dream studies seems to have had a profound effect on the extent and depth of dream reports collected. The majority of the research on children’s dreams has been conducted in a sleep laboratory, and few attempts have been made to collect dream reports in home or school settings. Foulkes (1982) concluded, after extensive longitudinal research in a laboratory setting, that the dreams of young children (three–seven-year-olds) are devoid of active self representation, movement or physical activity, and interpersonal Table 5. Role of dreamer by age group.

Role of dreamer Narrator only Self present Self actively participating

Age droup 3 (n ¼ 43) 4 (n ¼ 144) 5 (n ¼ 79) Number Percent Number Percent Number Percent 20 9 14

46.5a 20.9a 32.6a

38 19 87

26.4b 13.2ab 60.4b

21 1 57

26.6bc 1.3b 72.2b

Note: Percentages in the same row that do not share subscripts differ at p , 0.05 in the Tukey honestly significant difference comparison.



19

interactions. Foulkes’ sleep lab results also indicated an absence of human strangers or frightening characters, while ‘static images’ were prevalent in the dreams of young children. The results of the present study directly contradict Foulkes’ findings, since almost 60% of the preschool dreamers in our study reported being actively involved in their dream narrations. Of the 266 dreams shared, over 80% included specific actions, and over a third of the dreams included three or more actions. More than 36% of the dreamers encountered and struggled with a ‘monster’ protagonist. Family members, human strangers, TV/movie characters, and friends were prevalent in the dreams of young children. Also, in contrast to Foulkes’ studies, the data from our study indicate that young children are able to give detailed reports of their dreams – dreams which share many of the same formal characteristics as dreams of older children and adults. The detrimental effects of attempting to collect dream reports from preschoolers in a laboratory setting are unknown, but the paucity of dreams resulting from laboratory settings does not seem to represent the actual dream capabilities of preschool children. In the sleep lab setting, children were periodically awakened three to four times a night during REM sleep. This methodology yielded an ‘absence of dreaming’ during 75% of the awakenings (Foulkes, 1982). Those extremely low dream report rates do not seem to reflect children’s actual capacity for dreaming in contrast to child reports to a trusted teacher in the present study. Perhaps the unfamiliar laboratory setting disoriented young children and caused them to forget their dreams. More probably, the children may have felt uncomfortable sleeping away from home, out of their daily routine, and sharing their dreams with a complete stranger. Perhaps children in sleep labs are dreaming, but are unable to report their dreams. Thus, an important implication of this study is that a more naturalistic setting is likely to prove more fruitful when collecting young children’s dreams. This study used the combination of a natural setting, children’s willingness to share dreams, and a trusted, familiar adult as prerequisites for the collection of preschoolers’ dreams. The findings support those of Beaudet (1990), both in the success of the method collection, as well as dream content data. Beaudet as well as the present researchers, recorded a high incidence of children ‘encountering the monster’, and noted that the majority of dreams reported involved active participation on the part of the dreamer. Our results were comparable to Beaudet’s findings that 80% of children’s dreams involved human characters and 25% involved a type of ‘monster’. The results of our study also support findings from Resnick et al.’s (1994) collection of home-based dream reports. Children as young as four and five were actively present in over 88% of their dream reports, thus confirming that young children are indeed able to represent themselves actively in their dreams. Their research also noted that dream report rates were much higher in the morning, than in the nocturnal collection attempts. In our study, although both the New York and Colorado preschool settings had morning and afternoon classroom sessions, only 3 of the 266 dreams were dictated during the afternoon program. The morning proved optimal for dream recall, possibly because less time had elapsed since waking, and the dream images were still fresh in the childrens’ minds. Through thematic content analysis, the structural variables of age and gender were explored. Unanimously across dream research, results indicate that the dreams of older preschoolers are longer and the reports more dynamic than those of younger children. Teachers may want to use dream dictation as another technique to


20


encourage and enhance preschoolers’ expressive verbal skills as well as to increase interpersonal feelings of intimacy as teacher and child are involved in the dreamsharing experience. Our study specifically targeted preschool children between the ages of 36 and 72 months. Our eldest subjects (five-year-olds) represented the age at which earlier studies usually began. Notable among our findings was the increase for older preschoolers in length of dream narration, number of characters, number of actions, and the capacity of the dreamer to take an active role in their dream scenario. We conclude that only a naturalistic method of dream collection provides evidence that children as young as three are capable of dream complexity and active self-representation formerly documented only in older children. Research has been divided regarding the impact of gender differences on dream content. Foulkes (1982) reported that the dreams of boys and girls at this early age did not differ significantly in dream content and he described the dreams of children this young as being ‘static’ and having a ‘non-narrative quality’. Beaudet’s (1990) research did specifically note gender differences in the categories of dream ‘theme’ and dream ‘setting’. In her study, the dreams of boys centred on the ‘monster’ and took place within the house. Girls’ dreams more frequently mentioned animals, and the dreams took place in nature. The present study provides strong support for gender differences in children’s dream content. The dream content of boys differed from the dream content of girls, even among children as young as three-, four-, and five-years old. Analysis of the dream codes revealed significant gender differences for categories of Protagonist, Action Type, and Dream Feeling. Boys were twice as likely to mention a ‘monster’ dream, while girls more frequently mentioned family members, TV/movie characters, and animals. Predominant boy dream actions included chasing and fighting. Girls’ dreams were more likely to include playing. Girls were twice as likely to share a joyful dream, and the dreams of boys were four times more likely to indicate power or anxiety. These gender differences in dream life seem to mirror much of the gender-differentiated play that teachers may see in the classroom. Far from Foulkes’ report of static images and stagnant stories, the dream of young children as reported in this study reflected active participation and were filled with a fantastic assortment of characters. The key to entering the dream worlds of these young children was rapport. With three-, four-, and five-year-olds, a familiar, trusted adult in a routine setting provided an ample opportunity for dream dictation and collection. Thus, care providers who would like to encourage dream sharing will first need to create warm nurturing relationships with the children prior to embarking on a curricular goal of daily dream collection. In this study, the teacher needed to be patient and to wait for the dreams as the children brought them. And this delicate process could not be rushed. The children had to have the choice to tell their dreams, a trusted confidant in a familiar setting, and to be given enough individual attention and time to let the dreams emerge as they did. This process of rapport building and dream collection took almost two years and provided an intriguing window to gain insights into the internal lives of young children. The naturalistic dream collection technique elicited a wide range of dream content that children may only feel comfortable revealing to trusted confidants in a familiar and comfortable environment. The lack of differences in dream content among children in the two preschools that participated in this study (New York and Colorado) supports the



21

conclusion that young children do dream and can become engaged in sharing their dreams with trusted adults. Mental health specialists who are consultants and advisors for preschool classrooms may want to enlist teacher support for dream collection, as a therapeutic tool for more intimate understanding of the fears and worries of young children. As a stress-busting technique, Honig (2010) suggested that teachers can diffuse children’s worries by having the children share bad dreams and draw them too. As well, teachers may want to enhance their intimacy with preschoolers and enrich children’s language practice by expressing genuine interest in dream sharing. The metacognitive advantages of dream sharing and discussion were evident in the fact that children began to share dreams regularly as this study progressed. Young children have limited verbal ability to communicate thoughts and feelings. Dream sharing is another technique to enhance communication skills. Sharing dream reports may help children build on their initial understanding of the difference between subjective reality (thoughts and feelings) and objective reality. Child development researchers, as well as preschool teachers and parents, can gain valuable insights concerning the developing inner lives of young children by exploring, with children’s active engagement, the content of the dreams that three-, four-, and five-yearolds share. Counselors interested in assisting children through the grieving process in cases of loss (such as divorce or severe illness or death in the family) might utilise this increased awareness of dreams in a therapeutic manner with children as young as preschoolers. Limitations of this study This study did not include children from rural areas or have a large sample of ethnic minority youngsters. The study did not measure child verbal fluency or intellectual ability which may be correlated with dream reports. Nor were any data collected on parenting style, such as authoritative vs. authoritarian vs. permissive styles (Baumrind, 1971) that could possibly influence child dreams. In addition, no data were available on security of child attachment to parent(s) which may have an influence on dream content. Our study did not investigate whether children had a pet at home, or if the children came into close contact with a domestic pet on a daily basis. It may be of interest to investigate the relationship between dream animals, and pet ownership or exposure. In addition, no data were available for children who live in single family or extended family households. Data were not gathered on each child’s amount of television viewing time nor on their use of electronic game play, and these experiences may influence the content as well as nature of children’s dreams. Future research suggestions Do children who discuss their dreams begin to remember dreams more often, and do they dream with greater confidence? Recognising the salience of daily experiences within a child’s dream theatre might help parents and caregivers understand how their conversations, discipline techniques, play, domestic activity, and entertainment choices can help shape the content of their children’s dreams as well as behaviours. Meta-analytic reviews have reported a strong correlation between risky behaviours and the degree to which persons watched risk – taking on video games or televisions


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Fischer, Gretiemeyer, Kastenmuller, Vaugrincic, and Sauer (in press). Perhaps children’s dream content is also thus influenced; media content watched would need to be noted in future studies of children’s dream content. In the future, it may be possible to examine process variables such as family communication practices in relation to child dream content and how parental choices and child usage and exposure to particular toys, stories, and technology affect children’s dream lives. The effects of verbal expressive skills on dream representations and narration also need to be investigated. Perhaps three-year-olds dream as actively as a five-year-olds, but lack the verbal skills to share the mental images of their dream memory. In a study with five–eight-year-olds, Foulkes (1990) found that children’s representational intelligence predicted their rate of dream production, but language skills did not. More dream research is needed to control for child language and cognitive skills. The dream content coding process in this study resulted in a high level of dream actions coded as ‘other’. Almost 20% of boys’ dream actions and 25% of girls’ dream actions fell into the ‘other’ category (Table 3), which needs to be more specifically explored. Research on children’s dreams is still scarce. The number of children whose dream reports have been studied is small, and those who have participated in these studies have typically been white and middle class (Murray, 1995). More research is needed on the dreams of children from a greater variety of families from different ethnic and culture groups, and in different living situations. Notes on contributors Alice Sterling Honig attended Cornell University, received her BA from Barnard college, MA degree from Columbia University and PhD from Syracuse University, where she is emerita professor of child development. Author of over 600 articles and chapters and two dozen books, Dr. Honig has conducted the National Quality Infant/toddler workshop at SU every summer for 35 years. She has lectured widely in Europe and Asia and is a licensed psychologist in New York State. Courses she teaches include: language and cognition, parenting, prosocial development, cross-cultural styles in child rearing; and theories and applications in child development. Her latest book (2010) is Little kids, big worries: Stress-busting tips for early childhood classrooms. Arlene L. Nealis graduated from Vassar College in 1990, and taught at Vassar’s laboratory school. After earning her MS in early childhood education from Syracuse University, she directed the Child Care Center at SUNY Cobleskill. She teaches third grade at Worcester Central School, and has taught in elementary education for the last 12 years. The dreams of young children, especially her own two young daughters, continue to fascinate her!

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Appendix 1. Dream coding chart: Thematic content analysis

Appendix 2. Representative dream samples by child gender and age Boy (3.7 ) I had a dream about a motorcycle. And it’s mine. It had black things, and black handles, and black wheels. And it was black, all black. And it was black on the sides. And it went fast. It had pedals. Girl (3.8) It was a stairway and I was going down. I fell. Then my parents came.


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4-year-olds: Boy (4.9) He was flying in the air at night time. He was looking for bad guys. And he wanted to get something to eat, so he went home, and he got himself some parrot food and candy. Superman.


Girl (4.2) My Daddy was in my dream. I was in my dream. And my Mommy. And my babies. Everybody was in my dream. And there was a bad guy in my dream. Lots of bad guys. There was a Boulie Monster Made of soot. Then a very very bad snake just bite me and I say “Ahhhhh!” And I said, “Ow, ow, ow.” Then I called my Dad, and he said, “Don’t bite my child?!” And then I said to my Daddy, “I love you, I love you.” 5-year-olds Boy (5.1) It all started that I lost myself in a store in the downtown library. But the second I knew, I found some keys that dropped. From someone’s pocket. But the pocket had a hole in it. So I picked up the keys, but the key had a name on it, but it was my Dad’s keys! I found my Dad. We got out of the library, but when we got out, our car was lost. Me and my Dad found our car parked under a tree. It was a really huge tree. Girl (5.1) I dreamed about my old teacher Shannon teaching us swimming lessons again. I had a flower bathing suit. My teacher helped me. Hot water. Corey and Cara (friends) came too. My Mommy and Daddy were watching me.