Theories of dreams

In the early 1900's, Sigmund Freud proposed that while all of our dreams are a collection of images from our daily conscious lives, they also have symbolic meanings, which relate to the fulfilment of our subconscious wishes. (YouTube, 2019). In other words, Sigmund Freud’s theory of dreams suggested that dreams represented unconscious desires, thoughts, and motivations. According to Freud’s psychoanalytic view of personality, people are driven by aggressive and sexual instincts that are repressed from conscious awareness. While these thoughts are not consciously expressed, Freud suggested that they find their way into our awareness via dreams. In his famous book The Interpretation of Dreams, Freud wrote that dreams are "...disguised fulfillments of repressed wishes."

The activation-synthesis model of dreaming was first proposed by J. Allan Hobson and Robert McClarley in 1977. According to this theory, circuits in the brain become activated during REM sleep, which causes areas of the limbic system involved in emotions, sensations, and memories, including the amygdala and hippocampus, to become active. The brain synthesises and interprets this internal activity and attempts to find meaning in these signals, which results in dreaming. This model suggests that dreams are a subjective interpretation of signals generated by the brain during sleep. (Youtube, 2019). 

While this theory suggests that dreams are the result of internally generated signals, Hobson does not believe that dreams are meaningless. Instead, he suggests that dreaming is "…our most creative conscious state, one in which the chaotic, spontaneous recombination of cognitive elements produces novel configurations of information: new ideas. While many or even most of these ideas may be nonsensical, if even a few of its fanciful products are truly useful, our dream time will not have been wasted." (Bartleby.com, 2019)

Dreams are an epiphenomenon - they are not a primary process that has a purpose - they are the accidental result of a more import an process going on behind the conscious brain. (Youtube, 2011). However, some researchers do not believe this. They believe that dreams serve a primary purpose, which is to prepare us for threats. They think this because The most prevalent emotions felt during dreams are negative. People who had terrifying dreams were better at dealing with anxiety in the real world and had stronger genes as a result.

The reverse learning theory of dreams was developed by Francis Crick and Graeme Mitchison and presented in an article in Nature in 1983. This theory says that the neocortex (the part of the brain that is involved with higher levels of thought) is a network in which neural connections are constantly being made. Dreaming eliminates unnecessary connections in the neocortex and so prevents it from becoming overloaded and malfunctioning. Parasidic thoughts could disrupt the thinking you need to do while you are awake.  (Malory, 2019)

Another theory is that we dream to remember. To increase performance on certain mental tasks, dreaming whilst sleeping is benefiting. In 2010, researchers found that subjects were much better at getting through a complex 3D maze if they have napped and dreamed of the maze prior to their second attempt. They were up to 10 times better at it than those who only thought of the maze whilst awake. Researchers believe that some certain memory processes can only happen whilst asleep, and our dreams are a signal that these are taking place. (Youtube, 2019). 

Yet another model proposes that dreams function as a form of psychotherapy. In this theory, the dreamer is able to make connections between different thoughts and emotions in a safe environment.