CALGARY, Alberta, Dec. 22 (UPI) -- Canadian researchers say that dreams that come up to a week after significant emotional events are some of the most therapeutic.
The team from the University of Alberta and the University of Montreal, in a study summarized in this month's issue of the Journal of Sleep Research, analyzed 470 psychology students to find that not only do remembered events influence dreams on the following night, but they also color dreams that occur six to seven days later.
And, compared to dreams on the night immediately after the remembered event, the "delayed incorporations" more often reflected interpersonal interactions, problem resolution and positive emotions, suggesting that these delayed incorporations help the person work through personal difficulties.
"This suggests an ongoing effort to resolve a problem in dreams during the week following the emergence of that problem. The dreams themselves are a kind of treatment," said Don Kuiken, a psychology professor at the University of Alberta. "Something is going on there that at least touches on and alters the resolutions that people come up with," Kuiken said.
