Spiritual and religious imagery in dreams: A cross cultural analysis

Abstract

The continuity hypothesis of dreaming suggests that waking day experiences are reflected in dream imagery; research suggests that some waking day experiences have a higher probability of being reflected in dreams than others (Schredl, 2006; Schredl & Hoffmann, 2003). In order to assess the degree to which religious or spiritual beliefs are incorporated from waking life into sleep mentation, a cross-cultural study was undertaken to compare the frequency of dream imagery between two different cultural settings (the United Arab Emirates, and Canada). Results suggested that the dreams from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) sample contained significantly more religious/spiritual imagery than the Canadian sample. The UAE student dreams also had more frequent incorporations of a wider variety of imagery categories. Results suggest that religious/spiritual beliefs and practices may have a large impact on dream content.