A protocol for eliciting dream associations oriented to the recognition of episodic dream sources

The use of associations with dream reports, although being diffused and greatly useful in psychotherapy, has so far played a limited role in dream research not directly finalized to therapy. On the other hand, it is difficult to investigate a basic property of dreaming, that of establishing connections, without searching for information beyond the dream report: indeed, the simplest and likely most effective way of obtaining this information consists in asking the dreamer for associations. Well-defined and rigorous methods are however necessary for research approaches which aim to achieve a better understanding of how the dreaming mind operates by processing and combining the dreamer’s memory sources: we propose an experimental protocol (“Associations for Dream Reports Protocol”) aiming to give a contribution in this direction. According to this protocol, the dreamer completes a form which asks him or her to describe a recent dream, to name key words or short phrases that characterize the dream, and, for each word or phrase, to provide associations that allow possible episodic sources, definite in space and time, to be identified. To be more effective, the method takes advantage of the presence of a researcher while the dreamer is completing the form: the terms of the interaction between dreamer and researcher are subjected to marked restrictions and rigorously defined. The protocol was applied to a homogeneous group of participants; the observed link patterns presented interesting statistically significant phenomena.