Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
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Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#2I wonder if there's any links to possible negative affects (potential for dementia, etc) of vivid dreaming and/or recall.
I have tons of vivid dreams that I can usually remember. I am fairly creative, although many would probably us the adjectives 'weird' or 'smart-ass'.
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#3Interesting! Anecdotally, I have one friend who has vivid, very involved dreams that she can recall almost nightly, and she works as a professional artist who is talented and prolific across a few different areas of visual art.
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#4As mentioned by the authors, the causal relationship cannot be answered by this study. But if you want to recall your dreams more frequently, I highly recommend keeping a dream journal (also mentioned in the link). In my teenage years I went from remembering an average of a dream per week to vividly remembering 3-4 dreams per night. As soon as you wake up, immediately start writing all details you remember. Whether or not this increases your creativity in the waking world, it's fun to see what your brain constructs while you're asleep.
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#5As mentioned by the authors, the causal relationship cannot be answered by this study. But if you want to recall your dreams more frequently, I highly recommend keeping a dream journal (also mentioned in the link). In my teenage years I went from remembering an average of a dream per week to vividly remembering 3-4 dreams per night. As soon as you wake up, immediately start writing all details you remember. Whether o…
I've written down every dream I've had for the past 10 years. Hard to say whether it's improved my creativity, but it's fun to search and see trends. Like you said, dream recall improves if you immediately record dreams upon waking.
I wrote a very crappy web app for this back in 2012: http://keepdream.me/. It emails me every morning to ask what I dreamed and records my reply. There must be better alternatives now.
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#6I don't get particularly vivid dreams but I sometimes get dreams of really interesting stories. The dream itself is like a movie, I'm not the main character but I'm just kind of watching it unfold.
What's really interesting is that these "dream movies" always have a half-decent plot. IMO a lot of movie plots are really bad and stick to typical tropes and lessons. My dreams don't stick to these tropes and have actual twists, lessons, etc. Like if they were a real movie I might actually watch it.
For example one of them followed a rebellion against an oligarchy, but it never stuck to any main character. First we're introduced to someone, then eventually new people are introduced, and then eventually the original character dies but we just continue the story focusing on the new people, then even more people are added and they die and so on. So it's a bit more realistic and nobody gets plot armor.
Idk how creative I am, I usually identify as someone whose more left-brain.
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#7I've had heightened dream recall before. It was due to poor sleep quality (presumably too much REM) and was pretty much living hell.
Nevertheless, taking advantage of the increased visibility into one's dreams for the sake of analysis is at least fun.
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#8Anecdotally, I've found dream recall linked to novel experiences in real life. When I expose myself to new environments or interactions I tend to recall dreams more.
Have others noticed this?
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#9Of course this all depends on if the Guildford Uses Task test https://www.creativehuddle.co.uk/post/the-alternative-uses-t... is actually an accurate measure for creativity.
Did they also score well on the Torrance tests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torrance_Tests_of_Creative_Thi... , based on Guildford but...
I read an article once where Robert Frost took a creativity test and scored extremely low (based on seeing images in Rorschach inkblots) and remarked afterwards that creativity was not about seeing the images but in training oneself to ignore the non-essential images (paraphrasing, have never been able to find this via google - supposedly this happened while Frost was Poet Laureate.)
Also the following points seem relevant:
1. ability to remember dreams is at least partially based on being woken up during them or shortly afterwards, this is why you can generally only remember the last dream you had.
2. A good nights sleep is often described as being central to high intelligence.
3. What is the relation between high creativity and high intelligence? Which brings me back to the question of how accurate the tests are, given that there generally agreed on foundational problems with all IQ testing methods (that I'm familiar with)
finally then, if it is true, the thing to help creativity would be to remember your dreams: https://www.wikihow.com/Remember-Dreams
Re: Heightened dream recall ability linked to increased creativity, connectivity
#10Anecdotally, I've found dream recall linked to novel experiences in real life. When I expose myself to new environments or interactions I tend to recall dreams more. Have others noticed this?
This tracks my experience, and is consistent with the idea of dreams as a memory consolidation mechanism.