Part II    Psychodynamic Theories62
fei75766_ch02_019-071.indd 62  02/19/20 08:59 AMInaddition, asFreud argued, dreams appear nottoberandom incontent. Sev-
eralempirical studies haveconfirmed Freud’s claim inInterpretation of Dreams that
“wishes suppressed during thedayassert themselves indreams” (1900/1953, p.590). 
Thishascome tobeknown intheempirical literature asthe“dream-rebound effect,” 
wherein attempts tosuppress unwanted thoughts prior tosleep leadtoincreased 
dreaming about thatverytarget (e.g., Schmidt &Gendolla, 2008; Taylor &Bryant, 
2007; Wegner, Wenzlaff, &Kozak, 2004). Forexample, insomnia patients report 
having insomnia-related dreams aftertrying tosuppress theirworry about getting 
enough sleep prior tofalling asleep (Riemann etal.,2012). Furthermore, those who
score highonthetraitofthought-suppression (e.g., “Sometimes Ireally wishIcould 
stopthinking somuch”) report dreaming more waking-life emotions thanthose who
arenothabitual active thought suppressors (Malinowski, 2015). 
Thefirststudy todemonstrate this“rebound” ofsuppressed thoughts indreams 
wasconducted byDaniel Wegner andcolleagues (2004). Inthestudy, 300college 
students wereinstructed tothink rightbefore going tosleep oftwopeople: onewhom 
theyhada“crush” on,andonewhom theywere“fond of”butdidnothaveacrush on.
Next, participants wereassigned tooneofthree conditions: suppression, expression, 
andmention. Students asked tosuppress wereinstructed nottothink ofatarget person 
(either the“crush” orthe“fond of”)forfiveminutes. Expression participants weretold
tothink about onetarget person ortheother forfiveminutes. Inthemention condition, 
participants weretoldtothink about anything atallforfiveminutes aftermentioning 
thetarget person’s initials. Results showed, consistent withFreud’s view, thatstudents 
dreamed more about thesuppressed targets thanthenonsuppressed targets. They also
dreamed more about suppressed targets thansuppressed nontargets. Inother words, 
students weremore likely todream about people theyspend some timethinking about 
(targets), butespecially those targets theyactively trynottothink about.
Kröner-Borowik andcolleagues (2013) confirmed andextended Wegner and
colleagues’ work onthedream-rebound effect intwointeresting ways. They asked 
participants toidentify aunique distressing intrusive thought (defined asathought 
thatonedoesnotintend tothink about, butwhich “pops up”sometimes without 
onewanting itto).Then theywereassigned randomly toeither thesuppression or
control group, andreadtheirinstructions, justasintheWegner etal.(2004) study, 
immediately prior togoing tosleep. They followed these instructions notjustforone
night, butevery evening foraweek. Suppression condition participants weretoldto
focus theirminds deliberately ontheintrusive thought theyhadpreviously identified, 
along withitsassociated negative feelings. Then, forthenextfiveminutes, theywere
toldtothink about anything buttheintrusive thought. Theinstructions read: “Donot
think about it,evenforafleeting moment, notevenforasecond, anddowhatever it
takes tokeepthatthought outofyourmind. Then, gotobed.” Thecontrol group were
alsotoldtobegin byfocusing theirmind ontheintrusive thought, andthentoldto
think about whatever theywanted forfiveminutes prior tosleep. Results replicated 
previous studies ondream rebound: those whosuppressed hadincreased dreaming 
about thetarget thoughts, compared tothose whodidnotsuppress. Furthermore, the
suppressors alsohadhigher dream distress (thedreams were“baddreams” ornight -
mares), andthiseffect lasted overtheweek-long period ofthestudy.
Researchers studying theneurochemistry ofsleep—especially therapid-eye 
movement (REM) period where dreams aremost likely tooccur—report activation Final PDF to printer