THE MORNING RECALL OF RAPID EYE MOVEMENT PERIOD REPORTS GIVEN EARLIER IN THE NIGHT

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
At least three, and in most cases, not more than four, rapid eye movement period (REMP) reports were obtained from 20 male Ss, all of whom had at least four awakenings. Immediately after their terminal morning awakening and report they were asked, without any prior set to do so, to recall in as much detail as they could the reports they had given during the night. Eleven Ss failed to recall at least one of the first three reports, while 22/60 reports were completely forgotten. Studied were the effects of the following variables on recall of the first three reports: cognitive style, rapid eye movement (REM) density, awakening reaction times, times spent awake after awakenings, report length, report affect scores and repression. Field dependence and lower REM densities favored forgetting, as did higher reaction times, shorter times spent awake and shorter reports. Cognitive style and REM density were interrelated, as were reaction times, time spent awake and report length. However, the last three factors were independent of the first two. Affect scores were not significantly related to delayed recall. A clinician judge who used the Ss‘ original dream reports, personality data on them and criteria involving consideration of factors facilitating repression was able to predict ease of recall better than chance only in the case of the third report. The finding that recallers tended to be field-independent and non-recallers field-dependent agrees with the results of published studies of home dream recall. The fact that 63.3 per cent of the reports Ss gave were subsequently recalled either completely or in part is consistent with the notion that spontaneous awakenings from REMPs may contribute to morning dream reports given under home conditions.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: