Rapid eye movement sleep resemblance to waking life), and incorporation of instinctual themes. Sometimes they include elements of the dreamer's recent experience taken directly from episodic memory. By one estimate, 80% of dreams occur during REM. Hobson and McCarley proposed that the PGO waves characteristic of “phasic” REM might supply the visual cortex and forebrain with electrical excitement which amplifies the hallucinatory aspects of dreaming. However, people woken up during sleep do not report significantly more bizarre dreams during phasic REMS, compared to tonic REMS. Another possible relationship between the two phenomena could be that the higher threshold for sensory interruption during REM sleep
Rapid eye movement sleep their muscles are suppressed). This is different from conventional sleepwalking, which takes place during slow-wave sleep, not REM. Narcolepsy by contrast seems to involve excessive and unwanted REM atonia—i.e., cataplexy and excessive daytime sleepiness while awake, hypnagogic hallucinations before entering slow-wave sleep, or sleep paralysis while waking. Other psychiatric disorders including depression have been linked to disproportionate REM sleep. Patients with suspected sleep disorders are typically evaluated by polysomnogram. Lesions of the pons to prevent atonia have induced functional “REM behavior disorder” in animals. Rapid eye movement sleep (REM) has since its discovery been closely associated with dreaming. Waking up