Nightmare Distress, Beliefs About Nightmares, and Personality: A Research Note and Replication

Previous research has demonstrated that several factors might contribute to nightmare distress–in addition to nightmare frequency. One of these factors is beliefs about nightmares, e.g., thinking that nightmares contain clues to unconscious fears or nightmares predict the future are associated with higher nightmare distress. The present study aimed at replicating previously reported relationships between gender, neuroticism, beliefs about nightmares, nightmare frequency, and nightmare distress in an independent sample. Overall, 411persons (305 women, 102 men, 3 non-binary persons, 1 missing value) with a mean age of 28.44 ± 13.81 years participated in the study. The findings of the present study indicated–as expected–that beliefs about nightmares, gender, and neuroticism contribute independently to nightmare distress–in addition to nightmare frequency. It would be very interesting for future research to investigate how exactly the relationships between nightmare distress and, for example, neuroticism or specific beliefs about nightmare work.