Although it’s something we’ve done for several hours each night since the beginning of human existence, we know very little about sleep. We understand dreams even less. In this breakthrough study, however, scientists learned we can communicate with people who are asleep. (1)
Scientist Can Now Communicate With People Who Are Asleep
In their recent study, scientists discovered something they call “interactive dreaming.” This is a state in which people in deep sleep or lucid dreaming can follow simple instructions and answer basic questions. Essentially, they can communicate with people who are asleep. (1)
“We found that individuals in REM sleep can interact with an experimenter and engage in real-time communication,” says Northwestern University psychologist Ken Paller, one of the researchers involved in the study. “We also showed that dreamers are capable of comprehending questions, engaging in working-memory operations, and producing answers.” (2)
The study included 36 participants in four different laboratories in France, Germany, The Netherlands, and the United States. Experience with lucid dreaming among participants varied, though one participant had narcolepsy and often experienced this type of dreaming. (1)
How The Study Worked
While the participants slept, the researchers monitored them using an electroencephalogram (EEG). They interacted with the sleeping participants using spoken audio, flashing lights, and physical touch (1).
Participants answered simple math questions, counted flashes of light or physical touches, and simple yes or no questions. The participants then answered these questions using specific eye or facial movements that they agreed on before beginning the experiment. (1)
Over a period of 57 periods of sleep, 47% of the time, participants gave at least one correct response during lucid dreaming. The participant confirmed that they were lucid dreaming after being woken up. In each case, multiple researchers were watching to confirm if the participants’ movements were an answer or not. (1)
The researchers always woke the participant up after a correct response to more accurately explain their dream and what they heard, saw, and felt. (1)
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The Participants’ Perspective
While on the outside, the participants only made small eye and facial movements; inside their dreams, they experienced much more. (1)
For some, the external stimuli came into their dreams as something more outside their dream or overtop of it. For others, the stimuli came into their dream through something they saw, like a radio. (1)
Communicating with people who are asleep and what this research means
For a long time, people thought it was useless to communicate with people while sleeping to learn about their dreams. This study has proven that to be false. Now, this international team of researchers has opened a door for a new way to study sleep and the dream state. (1)
One possibility their work brings up is that it might be possible for parts of the brain to be in deep REM sleep while others might not be; this is called hybrid-sleep. (1)
Their research also means we may eventually be able to train our dreams to help us achieve a goal, learn something, or overcome a mental health problem while we sleep. (1) We are only in the early stages of this research now, but it could prove to be highly useful in the future with more studies.
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- “Real-time dialogue between experimenters and dreamers during REM sleep.” Cell. Karen R. Konkoly. February 18, 2021.
- “Scientists Found a Way to Communicate With People Who Are Asleep And Dreaming.” Science Alert. David Nield. February 19, 2021.