Dream Imagery Becomes More Intense After 9/11/01

Dream Imagery Becomes More Intense After 9/11/01

Earnest Hartmann and Robert Basile are both authors and scientists in Psychology. Hartmann works in the Department of Psychiatry at Tufts University School of Medicine. Basile works at Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology at Yeshiva University. Throughout their careers, Hartmann and Basile have focused on dreams and their speculative purpose. In their most recent experiment, Hartmann and Basile wrote an article entitled “Dream Imagery Becomes More Intense After 9/11/01” where they “examined a series of twenty dreams- the last ten dreams recorded before 9/11/01 and the first ten dreams recorded after 9/11/01- from sixteen individuals in the United States (Hartmann & Basile, 2003, p. 1). Hartmann et al. examine the impact of dream imagery before and after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. From their experiments, they measured the intensity of dreams before and after 9/11/01. Hartmann and Basile debate whether emotions have an important influence on dreaming. They desire to see if traumatic events such as the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks have an impact on dream imagery. Hartmann and Basile argue that emotional arouses increases dream imagery rather than affecting the length or specific content of the dream. This is proven true through their observations of 16 individuals where it was concluded that the attacks of 9/11/01 had a measurable effect on dreams.

Before Hartmann and Basile began their investigation on dream imagery, it was concluded that emotion has an important influence on dreaming. Dreams are best understood as a developmental cognitive achievement that depends upon the maturation and maintenance of a specific network of forebrain structures (Domhoff, G. W. (2001). A New Neurocognitive Theory of Dreams). Studies of dream content suggest the frequent presence of emotion reported in dreams, the exact level depending on how the questions are asked. (Merritt, Stickgold, Pace-Schott, Williams & Hobson, 1994). From recent studies, Hartmann et al. state that dreams after traumatic events have led to the suggestion that dream imagery can often be understood as picturing the dominant emotional concern of the dreamer” (Hartmann, 1996, 2001). Hartmann et al. conclude that “powerful images” are more frequent and intense after acute trauma. Those who scored higher on intensity of the dream image were those who reported to be sexually or physically abused. Hartmann et al. used “an established rating scale measuring the intensity of the “central image” of the dream” (Hartmann & Basile, 2003, p.1). Although, it is difficult to gather sufficient data for studies of trauma, Hartmann et al. believe the terrorist attacks of 9/11/01 produced significant stress and trauma levels in everyone living in the United States. From this, Hartmann and Basile conduct a series of experiments to collect “dream series before and after 9/11/01 from anyone in the United States who had been recording his or her dreams” (Hartmann and Basile, 2003, p. 2). This allows Hartmann et al. to show and prove their theory that traumatic events such as the attacks of 9/11/01 have an effect on dream imagery.

In Hartmann and Basile’s theory, they conclude that dream intensity increases after a traumatic event, such as the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks. To some, dreams serve as a problem solving function. Dreams may deal with the problems that one is unable to solve in the normal or awake state. It is claimed that the function of dreams is to compensate for the “parts of the psyche that are undeveloped in the walking life” (Domoff, 2005). Dreams are correlated to our age, culture, and personal occupations and reveal what is on our minds. Hartmann et al. obtained 324 dreams of 16 United States residents that live outside of New York City. From this, they were able to show increasing dream intensity of residents outside of “ground zero”. This revealed that individuals did not have to be at the “scene of an event” to experience emotional and psychological trauma. Dreams were tallied and scored for the intensity of the central image or “contextualizing image”- “an image which stands out by being especially powerful, vivid or bizarre” (Hartmann & Basile, 2003, p.2). Each dream was also scored for what emotion might be pictured such fear, terror, vulnerability, grief, despair, etc. and the duration of dream length. Dream content dealing with the attacks such as building resembling the “Twin Towers,” and airplanes was also scored. From their observations, Hartmann and Basile were able to compare previous findings to their own on dream image intensity. A traumatic event such as the 9/11/01 attacks is considered to cause grief in the hearts and minds of all and dreams seem to stimulate that mood and symbolize what is truly reality.

Dreams can be accounted for in terms of