How Do Scientists Study Lucid Dreaming?
Post by Laura Maile
What is lucid dreaming?
Lucid dreaming is a state of sleep where the individual becomes aware that they are dreaming. This phenomenon represents a paradoxical situation where the dreamer maintains a level of cognitive awareness while remaining asleep. The concept of lucid dreaming or “sleep awareness” has been written about across the globe for centuries, though it was not studied scientifically until the late 20th century and wasn’t accepted as a legitimate field of study until the 2000s. This phenomenon occurs in about half of individuals, but infrequently. Though lucid dreaming has become a popular field of study among sleep researchers, the small sample sizes in previous research have made the physiology and brain regions underlying this phenomenon difficult to identify.
How do scientists study it?
In the 1970s, scientists began to study the neuroscience of lucid dreaming using electrooculography (EOG) to detect eye movements during sleep. Eye movements occur during normal dream states, but during lucid dreams, the individual can intentionally move their eyes. This allows the dreamer to communicate with the outside world while still in the dream state, giving experimenters an opportunity to observe and record information about dreaming in real-time. EOG, in combination with fMRI and electroencephalogram (EEG) to record brain activity, allows experimenters to confirm the state of lucid dreaming and collect neuroimaging data on the brain regions underlying this phenomenon. The major challenge with studying lucid dreaming is the low frequency with which it occurs. Some neuroscientists are developing methods to encourage lucid dreams to happen more often. These include exercises that train individuals to reflect on their state of mind before sleeping and during short “inverse naps” during the rapid eye movement (REM) stage of sleep. Others have used virtual reality training or direct electrical or ultrasound stimulation of specific brain regions during sleep.
What does the future look like?
Scientists in the field of lucid dream research indicate that standard operating procedures are needed to ensure similar methods of cognitive training, experimental procedures, EOG, and EEG to enhance reproducibility and grow the field. Engaging in cross-lab collaborations and open sharing of data will allow scientists to produce more robust, powered studies. Wearable technology is now available to allow study participants to record EEG and EOG during normal sleep at home with simple, user-friendly devices, which will also greatly increase the amount of lucid dream data acquired. Citizen neuroscience also presents unique opportunities for larger-scale data collection and sharing of experiences and resources between community groups of lucid dream enthusiasts and academic researchers.
Recent advances have allowed for two-way communication between the lucid dreamer and experimenter. Light and sound cues can be used to signal to the dreamer, while the dreamer can communicate with the experimenter using eye movements detected with EOG. Electromyogram technology can also detect subtle facial muscle movements, with the potential for uncovering dream speech. Finally, computational analysis and generative artificial intelligence give scientists new abilities to reconstruct and interpret dream states. Given the surge of interest and the recent technological advances, the future of research of lucid dreaming holds huge potential for understanding the neuroscience of dreaming in general.