Thread: Relationshi between age and number of lucid dreams

Age: 13
Gender: Female
Trying to LD since: I joined DV
Success: Probably one uber-low level LD every week, or two.

Originally posted by Howetzer
As it stands at this point of the survey, the everage age is 18.5 years of age

Somewhere in another topic I dug up some information in a psyshology book that put into detail the decrease in REM sleep as you age.
It went from infancy to childhood - adolesence - adulthood -old age.

Not only did the REM sleep decrease but the amount of sleep required for the aging person lessened. I guess that would go hand in hand anyway. Less sleep = less REM.

It also seems evident to me that we have a tremandous amount of very young people who are members of this forum. And if what they claim is true a good portion of them have good lucid dreaming abilities.

I'm gonna push that average up a little Howetzer

Age 55 and still alive
Gender Male
LDS 4.5 in the last 3 months
The .5 is the last two I felt I was only half lucid maybe 25% whatever

Originally posted by dreamtamer007
I'm gonna push that average up a little Howetzer

It's all good. Glad your on the forum and still kicking.

I appreciate everyone who is posting in this experiment and the clinical approach that everyone has stuck to----> The facts. This makes this research much easier.
[size=18]Thank you!

Age: 22
Lucid Dreaming for nearly 5 years
Number of lucids: too many to count, hundreds

I hope it's ok for me to post an update like this, but I've gotten alot better since then and didn't want the information to be missed.
Age: 14
Gender: Male
Trying to LD since a bit before February 3, 2004.
I actually have more than one LD a night consistently now. Back then it was only a week long thing. Now I've been having about 3 LDs a night on average, sometimes more and sometimes less, for two months. I've had a little under 200 LDs in the past two months and had 50 LDs between that last update and two months ago, so that means...
Number of LDs: A little under 350

Ok I didn't read much posts on this thread but I think I know what to do
Age: 15
Gender: male
Trying to LD since: somewhere around november, or october 2003
I used to have Ld's almost every night in the summer, I had realy good dream recall too, I think I'm getting worse though, because I tend to have trouble thinking straight, my mind works diffrently from most.
Number of LD's: I would say over 100 in my life time, this goes back to when I was a small child.

Gender : Male
Age 35

LD's total <five
One since joining this site.


I also wanted to say that establishing a correlation between LD ability and age will require understanding how the DV community is or is not representative of the general human population. Probably the most we can hope for is that the sample you get here is representativie of the DV distribution (Seeker has info on this and my archetype data also mirrors the demographic distribution of the site). Possibly we could infer about that subset of Americans who apply themselves to their dream life. But this is where it gets hazy because we need to decide on a statistical test for determining p-values (I am taking a class in regression analysis this fall so I should be able to develop the particular tests soon).

If you plot (Excel works fine for this) your data on a "number of LD's" versus "age" plot and then add a linear trendline you should see an R^2 value of over .96. If the slope of the trendline is positive then the data suggests increased ability with age, if the slope is negative then decreased. It is possible that the real population exhibits a bell shaped ability curve with some optimal age signalling the average peak years for LD ability. If this is your hypothesis then you want to think of fitting a non-linear trendline probably a quadratic polynomial will be sufficient. Again the R^2 should be over .96 for a highly significant result. An R^2 of as little as .75 may give reason for further study. I think both Seeker and Peregrinus can help with plotting and interpreting your data.

Questions of this nature were going to be my next focus so if you would like to work on a survey together I would be more than happy to help in that direction.

Good Luck! 8)

EJ

age : 15
trying to LD since: I joined

LD's: 6-7

Age: 17
Trying to LD: Are you kidding? I have naturally LDed since I was 3!
# of LDs: Multiply 14 1/2 & 365, & you will have your answer!

Age 19

Trying to know I am dreaming when in a dream since very young. Became really interested in it since 2001 through to 2004. And Joined DV in 2005.

Since I have been at this forum I've had about 10 lds.

I'm not exackly sure how many I have had In my whole life somewhere between 25-100.
I can remember atleast 25, I could have had as many as 200.

Age: 18
Gender: Male
LDing since: Well, I was trying to LD for a while more than a year ago, but now I am rekindling my efforts. That started about 2 months ago.
LDs (since I restarted my learning): 2 (one quite short, one extremely short)

Just had a quick look in my dream journal, between 30/06/03 and 19/05/04 I had about 12 LDs.

id love to c a graph with age vs LDs a nite

Age: 16

been LDing sinse i can rmber, now nd then i may have non LDs but no fotern
2LDs anite on average

Age: 46
Gender: Male
LD (total) 5, beginning in April, 2005
LD (since intentionally attempting) 2

The first two were spontaneous, about 2 months apart. I believe that the third was triggered after a discussion about the first two. Once discovering that they could be purposely initiated, it took about 2 weeks for the 4th, and exactly one week later, the last one occurred (but without contol, lost lucidity immediately upon realizing it and awoke).

I hope this study is still active. I'm grateful, because it tends to confirm a personal opinon of greater LD activity in youth. Outstanding forum, great idea.

Best to all,
Legend

I fear there is a flaw here that may be fatal. Not to be Miss Negative Killjoy or anything, but:

When the Internet gets involved there is a high level of anonymity that sometimes (often?) calls veracity into question.

From an initial tally, it would appear that, statistically, every 14 year old is able to achieve lucidity more often and more capably than a monk that devotes every waking and sleeping moment to preparing his mind for his literal entire life. When I was 14, my boyfriend and I were *obsessed* with the concept. Neither he nor I had these levels of 'success'. We reality checked each other. We drilled dream-signs together. We talked each other through it every night before bed. We both geekily wore watches with "Am I dreaming?" stickers across the face. We debated and postulated for countless hours.

Today at 33yo I can find "complete" lucidity probably an average of 1:3 times I go seeking it. My journals show that the best I ever did prior to graduating college was 1:10. I suspect a qualitative study would show that maturity and the more complete mental preparation it allows is a better indicator of success. That doesn't mean I don't think that some of the very young have a tremendous amount of dream control. Lucidity would be hard to argue for in a 4 year old since they are not as self aware (atleast from a legal/moral perspective) whereas dream control seems to come almost naturally.

So it could then be derived that instead of careful mental preparation, the Best Practice is to play X-Box games for a few hours, stress about an upcoming algebra test, worry about what people think of you, fantasize about that girl in class, post on half a dozen forums on the Internet, go to bed and naturally attain lucidity 100% of the time.

I suspect that model will fail when tested...

I'm nearly at a point where I'm going to be ready to open an experiment with a limited call for volunteers. I believe I may be able positively identify the lucid state as it's occuring in a test subject. I think maybe a few of these "365 x 14" folks might like to volunteer.