Research Results: Gender, Handedness, Dream Journal Use and Lucidity

[DuB]

Introduction Most of us here at Dream Views are familiar with the idea of "natural" lucid dreamers; that is, people who have always had lucid dreams spontaneously. Natural lucid dreamers are rare in the general population, although we encounter them fairly often here at Dream Views. In my time on these boards I have noticed a pattern wherein naturals seem to be much more likely to be female than male. That is, females are more likely than males to be naturals. However, until now, there has been no solid data to back this up. As long as I was going to study gender differences in natural lucid dreaming ability, I decided to investigate another potential factor: handedness. There is a significant amount of scientific evidence which suggests that the brains of people who are left-handed tend to be organized differently from the right-handed majority (McManus, 2002). Additionally, lefties are overrepresented among certain groups of people including musicians, mathematicians, architects, artists, and those with reading disabilities. It seems reasonable enough that lefties could also be more likely to be natural lucid dreamers. Finally, I tested the truism that diligently using a dream journal will lead to increased recall and more lucid dreams. I have been extolling the use of dream journals for years, but until now, there has been nothing but anecdotal evidence of their actual effectiveness. In summary, the three major hypotheses being tested in this research are: Females have better recall than males, are more likely to be "naturals," and have an easier time learning to lucid dream. People who are left-handed are more likely to be naturals and have an easier time learning to lucid dream. Dream journal use is associated with increased recall and frequency of lucid dreams. Method I created an online survey hosted at keysurvey.com. A text file version of the survey is attached in this thread. A link to the survey was posted in a thread (http://www.dreamviews.com/community/...ad.php?t=56013) in the General Lucid Discussion forum as well as in my signature. A small number of participants were also recruited through the Dream Views chat. Data was collected between 3/31/08 and 4/13/08, during which time there were 120 responses total. The median age of participants was 18 years (M = 21, SD = 9.01) and the median length of time since beginning the practice of lucid dreaming was 6 months (M = 18, SD = 34.53). 30 were female while 89 were male (1 participant declined to indicate his/her gender). Handedness was assessed using the Edinburg Handedness Inventory (Oldfield, 1971). Participants were also asked to rate their frequency of dream recall, frequency of lucid dreams, frequency of lucid dreams prior to beginning practice (an indicator of natural ability), dream journal use, deepness of sleep, and average amount of sleep per night. Results Spoiler for This part can get a bit technical. Some readers may want to skip to the discussion section, where the results are discussed more casually along with their possible implications.: Preliminary The questions based on estimated parental income and composite education level were scrapped due to theoretical problems. No analyses were conducted on these measures. All significance tests are one-tailed unless otherwise specified. Gender As hypothesized, females reported significantly greater dream recall (M = 14.69, SD = 1.795) than males (M = 13.72, SD = 2.564) as indicated by a t-test, t(115) = 1.895, p = .031. Females also reported significantly greater "natural" lucid dreaming frequency (M = 3.83, SD = 4.411) than males (M = 2.20, SD = 3.333), t(116) = 2.121, p = .036. However, there was no gender difference in current lucid dreaming frequency (M = 6.70, SD = 5.147 vs. M = 6.62, SD = 4.021), t(115) = .086, ns. Although females and males did not significantly differ in dream journal use (t(116) = 1.113, ns) and dream journal use was not a significant predictor of dream recall (r = .110, ns), it was still considered that perhaps the gender difference in dream recall could be partially accounted for by differences in dream journal use. Thus, an ANCOVA was conducted to control for gender differences in dream journal use. However, even when controlling for dream journal use, females still had significantly greater dream recall than males, F(1, 116) = 3.091, p = .041. Handedness There were no significant correlations found between handedness and natural lucid dreaming frequency (r = -.014, ns), handedness and current lucid dreaming frequency (r = -.080, ns), or handedness and dream recall (r = -.110, ns). Dream Journal Use Contrary to my predictions, dream journal use was not a significant predictor of either dream recall (r = .110, ns) or current lucid dreaming frequency (r = -.142, ns). Also, there was a significant negative correlation between number of months since beginning practice and dream journal use, r = -.164, p = .044. Lucidity The greatest predictor of current lucid dreaming frequency was dream recall (r = .435, p < .001), followed by number of months since beginning lucid dreaming practice (r = .290, p = .001). Since number of months was also correlated with dream recall (r = .216, p = .011), it seemed likely that one of these variables was mediating the correlation of the other with lucid dreaming frequency. However, when a partial correlation controlling for dream recall was conducted, the correlation between number of months and lucid dreaming frequency remained intact, r = .220, p = .010. When number of months was controlled for, the correlation between dream recall and lucid dreaming frequency also remained intact, r = .424, p < .001. This indicates that each variable is independently related to lucid dreaming frequency. Deepness of sleep was not predictive of natural lucid dreaming frequency (r = .017, ns), current lucid dreaming frequency (r = -.067, ns), or dream recall (r = -.048, ns). Average amount of sleep per night was also not predictive of natural lucid dreaming frequency (r = -.037, ns), current lucid dreaming frequency (r = .064, ns), or dream recall (r = .052, ns). Discussion As I expected, the data indicate that females are significantly more likely to be "naturals" than males. Also, females tend to have greater dream recall, even when controlling for gender differences in dream journal use. However, when considering current lucid dreaming frequency, there was no difference between males and females. This suggests that while females may have a slight advantage or "head start" in cultivating lucid dreaming ability, ultimately both sexes are equally capable of learning this skill. Handedness was not associated with either natural lucid dreaming frequency, current lucid dreaming frequency, or dream recall. Sorry, lefties. As I stated earlier, I wasn't necessarily expecting left handedness to be conducive to lucidity, although it would have been interesting if that had been the case. The results regarding dream journal use are surprising, to say the least. Dream journals are generally considered to be practically prerequisite to learning to induce lucid dreams. I myself have been preaching dream journal use to beginners for years now. However, the data does not indicate any correlation at all between dream journal use and dream recall. In fact, there was a very slight negative correlation between dream journal use and current lucid dreaming frequency which approached, but did not reach, significance. On the surface it would appear that dream journal use is not helpful at all in cultivating dream recall. However, before we jump to any rash conclusions, I think there are some important points which we must consider. First of all, there was a (quite modest, albeit significant) negative association between the amount of time since beginning the intentional practice of lucid dreaming and dream journal use. This means that the longer that a person has been practicing lucid dreaming, the less they tend to use their dream journal. At the same time, the greater the amount of time since beginning the practice of lucid dreaming, the higher a person's current lucid dreaming frequency tended to be and the greater their recall tended to be (as we would expect; practice does make perfect, after all). So what does it all mean? I think I can explain these associations from some of my personal experiences. Dream recall is hard. We are biologically prepared to forget our dreams - after all, from an evolutionary standpoint, what good does it do us to remember our dreams? Recalling our dreams takes practice. The more you do it, the easier it gets. After years of practice I have gotten to where I can consistently remember 2-4 dreams per night. This is regardless of whether I write them down or not, which I usually do not nowadays, because let's face it, it's not exactly convenient. So how did I get my dream recall to this point? From making a ton of entries in my dream journal as a beginner! There is an important lesson here. The real value of a dream journal is to get you into the habit of actually trying to recall your dreams upon waking in the morning, as well as training your ability to do so. Also, keeping a catalog of your old dreams is handy for identifying your dream signs. However, once you've gotten your recall to a certain point and have a pretty good grasp of what your dream signs are, the journal itself becomes optional. This explains the trends in the data: dream journal use does not appear to help dream recall because the people who are using their dream journals the most tend to be beginners who are still in the process of training their dream recall. Over time, people get better at recall and also become more lax about making entries in their dream journal. Now we move onto some exploratory factors that I included, namely how light or deep of a sleeper one is and the average amount of sleep one gets in a night. Neither factor was associated with dream recall, natural lucid dreaming frequency, or current lucid dreaming frequency. While not completely surprising, the results regarding average amount of sleep do go somewhat against the conventional wisdom, which states that more sleep equals more dreams which equals more dream recall and more chances for lucidity. This does not appear to necessarily be the case. Finally we consider an important question which many of us are probably wondering: so what is the best predictor of current lucid dreaming ability? Besides the obvious one which is natural lucid dreaming frequency, the answer is dream recall. Dream recall was the variable associated most strongly with current lucid dreaming frequency, followed by the amount of time since beginning the intentional practice of lucid dreams. What conclusions can we draw from this? If you want to have more lucid dreams, start by training your dream recall as much as possible and don't give up trying. If you do this, the odds will be in your favor. References McManus C. (2002). Right hand, left hand. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Oldfield RC. (1971). The assessment and analysis of handedness: the Edinburgh inventory. Neuropsychologia, 9:97–113.