A secure base for mindful dreaming: dispositional and contextually variable attachment security and the experiential quality of dreams

ABSTRACT

In this study, we examined the utility of attachment theory for explaining individual differences in dream experiences. Seventy-six Israeli undergraduates completed a measure of attachment anxiety and avoidance and participated in a daily diary study for 15 consecutive days. Each evening, they rated their daily sense of attachment security. Each morning, they described in writing any dreams they recalled and rated the extent to which they (a) were aware of their sensations and mental states while dreaming and (b) reflected on their subjective experience during the dream. Two judges made similar ratings for each dream. Dispositional attachment anxiety and avoidance were associated with lower levels of within-dream awareness and reflection across the 15-day period. In addition, attachment security on a given day was associated with higher within-dream awareness and reflection that night. The findings provide new evidence concerning the contribution of attachment orientations to the experiential quality of dreams.

KEYWORDS:

• Attachment
• dreams
• experiential openness
• mindfulness
• reflection

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Although what we are measuring (within-dream awareness and reflection) overlaps somewhat with the concept of lucid dreaming, we do not intend to go into this concept in detail. Lucid dreaming includes being able to (or at least attempting to) alter dream contents at will (e.g., zapping an attacker and eliminating the panic his appearance caused). Studying individual differences in this complex process would be interesting but is beyond the aims of the present study.

2. No significant difference was found between psychology undergraduates and community volunteers in gender, age, or scores on the main study variables (participants’ attachment orientations, mindfulness, self-reflection, and daily sense of attachment security), all Fs < 1.90, all ps > .172.

3. No significant associations were found between age, gender, number of recalled dreams in a habitual week, and number of dreams reported during the 15-day study period, on the one hand, and the main study variables (participants’ attachment orientations, mindfulness, self-reflection, and daily sense of attachment security), all rs < .149, all ps > .199.

4. In preliminary HLM analyses, we included gender or type of participants (psychology undergraduates vs. community members) as Level 2 (between-participants) variables and examined their main effects on ratings of dream experience and their interactions with daily security. These analyses revealed no significant main or interactive effects of gender or type of participant, all ts < 1.01, all ps > .314. Therefore, we omitted these between-participants variables from the final analyses.