Psychology dreaming

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Impact of Parental Divorce on Children's Dreams Karoline Proksch Dipl. Psych. a & Michael Schredl Dipl. Psych. a a Lucidity Institute, Stanford, CA, USA b Sleep Laboratory, Central Institute of Mental Health, Mannheim, Germany

Available online: 12 Oct 2008

To cite this article: Karoline Proksch Dipl. Psych. & Michael Schredl Dipl. Psych. (1999): Impact of Parental Divorce on Children's Dreams, Journal of Divorce & Remarriage, 30:1-2, 71-82

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Impact of Parental Divorce on Children’s Dreams

Karoline Proksch Michael Schredl

ABSTRACT. The present article summarizes the findings of major studies investigating the effect of stress on dreams. Forty-four children (11 to 13 yrs.) participated in this study to investigate the impact of parental divorce on their dreams. The dreams of the acute divorce group have not been, as expected, more negatively toned but showed more ‘‘primitivity’’ and ‘‘unsuccessful roles.’’ These findings were discussed within the continuity and mastery hypothesis of dreaming. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-342-9678. E-mail address: [email protected]]

KEYWORDS. Dream content, stress, divorce, children, sleep disor- ders

In 1994, about 30% of all marriages in Germany ended with separa- tion (Statistisches Bundesamt, 1996). The process of divorce for all persons is a period of transition which may be accompanied by stress, depression, and other problems (e.g., Emery, 1994). At least one child was present in 54% of the divorce cases (Statistisches Bundesamt, 1996). These children often experienced family quarrels prior to the divorce, at times accompanied by violence, the breaking-off of paren- tal relationships, or a complete separation from one parent. Results of

Karoline Proksch, Dipl. Psych., is affiliated with the Lucidity Institute, Stanford, CA. Michael Schredl, Dipl. Psych., is affiliated with the Sleep Laboratory, Central Institute of Mental Health, Mannheim, Germany.

Address correspondence to: M. Schredl, Schlaflabor, Zentralinstitut für Seelische Gesundheit, Postfach 12 21 20, 68072 Mannheim, Germany.

Journal of Divorce & Remarriage, Vol. 30 (1/2) 1999 E 1999 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All r ights r eserved. 71

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a variety of studies investigating short-term and long-term effects of divorce on children indicate that children experiencing parental sepa- ration show more interpersonal problems, mental health problems, such as depression or lower school achievement (Chase-Lansdale, Cherlin & Kiernan, 1995; Bolgar, Zweig-Frank & Paris, 1995). Another way to investigate the impact of stress on the well-being of

a person, is to study their dreams. According to the continuity hypoth- esis which states that dreaming is reflecting waking life (e.g., Dom- hoff, 1996), one would expect that dreams after stress or major life events reflect the event itself and the possible negative affects associ- ated with the event. For example, several studies in adults (Goode- nough et al., 1975; De Koninck & Koulak, 1975; Lauer et al., 1987; Powell, Nielson & Chung, 1993) showed that a presleep stress film in some cases lead to the incorporation of film elements and higher self-rated involvement but most dream affects shifted toward negative emotions compared to the affect of watching a neutral film. Other experimental stressors, such as presleep suggestions (De Koninck & Brunette, 1992) and difficult cognitive tasks (Cicogna et al., 1976; Stewart & Koulack, 1993) yield to similar results. However, some researchers (e.g., Breger, Hunter & Lane, 1971) criticized that the impact of experimental stress may be different from the effects of real life stress. Breger, Hunter and Lane (1971) showed that intense psy- chotherapy or awaiting a major surgery is more potent in altering dream content (e.g., higher rates of incorporation) and dream affect than a presleep film. Persons vulnerable to stress tend to rate their dreams as more anxious than controls do and their dreams also contain a greater incidence of misfortunes (Nesca & Koulak, 1991). Other emotional stress, such as menstrual stress (Sirois-Berliss & De Ko- ninck, 1982), interpersonal conflict (Delorme et al., 1996), nuclear accident (Davidson et al., 1988), tornado (Pagel, Vann & Altomare, 1995), release from prison (Pung, 1978), loss of a beloved person (Garfield, 1996) or escaping from homeland (Cernovsky, 1990) lead to similar effects in dreams. Further evidence of the relationship be- tween negative dream emotions and stress is provided by findings that show that stress increases nightmare frequency (Kales et al., 1980; Cook, Kaplan & Wood, 1990; Koulack & Nesca, 1992; Tan & Hicks, 1995). Even many years after severe stressors, for example, sexual abuse (Garfield, 1987; Draijer, 1990; Cuddy & Belicki, 1992) or sur-

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Karoline Proksch and Michael Schredl 73

viving the Holocaust (Lavie & Kaminer, 1991), the dreams tend to be more negative than those of non-stressed controls. Cartwright and coworkers (Cartwright & Lamberg, 1992; Cart-

wright, 1996) have investigated the effects of divorce on women and found, as expected, more negative dream emotions in the divorce group in comparison with married females (Cartwright et al., 1984). In addition, dream content differentiated women reacting with depres- sion from women who did not. The dreams of the former were domi- nated by non-prefered roles of the dream ego and inadequate coping behavior (Trenholme et al., 1984). A follow-up after one year showed that differences in dream content diminished (such as preponderance of negative dream emotions) in non-depressed women (Cartwright et al., 1984). King (1996), who carried out a questionnaire study, re- ported that adults whose parents were divorced have more negative dreams and dreams which show a higher activity. In children, a considerable amount of research has investigated the

effects of trauma, such as natural and man-made disaster, sexual and physical abuse, war exposure, animal attacks, and hospitalizations on children’s dreams (overview: Nader, 1996). For example, Terr (1979, 1981) has studied a group of 25 children who were kidnapped while riding the school bus. Almost every child suffered, among other symp- toms such as anxiety and pessimistic expectations, from night terrors and nightmares directly after the trauma. Even a few years after the trauma, nightmares did occur at the same intensity although they were less frequent and did not replay the original traumatic experience (Terr, 1983). The psychological impact of the Intifada (Israeli-Arab conflict) on Palestinian children living in refugee camps (10 to 12 years old) was studied by Nashef (1992). Their dreams contained more anxiety and conflict themes than the dreams of controls. Unfor- tunately, almost no systematic research exists on the relationship be- tween everyday stress and dream content in children although Garfield (1984) gave parallels between dream content and waking-life prob- lems, such as being chased in the dream representing feelings of pressure from within or without in waking life. An experimental study of the influence of television was carried out by Foulkes, Belvedere and Brubaker (1971). They found no relationship between film con- tent and negative dream emotions. However, Viermerö and Pajaanen (1992) reported a relationship between the amount of time watching violent TV series and the occurence of ‘‘bad’’ dreams. This discrepan-

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cy may be explained by the recurrent exposure present in the second study over the single exposure design used by Foulkes et al. (1971). To summarize, dreams seem to reflect the effects of stress on adults

and on children. The present study is aimed to investigate the effects of parental

divorce on children’s sleep and dreams. According to the previous findings, it was expected that dreams would be negative-toned, show higher involvement of the dream ego and would be characterized by inadequate coping behavior.

METHOD

Participants

Overall, 44 children (11 to 13 years old) partcipated in the study. They were divided into three groups: children whose parents were divorced within the last year (acute), children whose parents were divorced one to five years ago (non-acute), and a control group of children living with both parents (see Table 1). Twenty-six children attended ‘‘Gymnasium’’ and 18 children ‘‘Hauptschule.’’

Materials

Personality questionnaire. To measure personality, a standardized test (Persönlichkeits-fragebogen für Kinder, PFK 9-14; Seitz & Rausche, 1976) was used. This test measured three different areas: behavior (70 items), motives (72 items), and self-concepts (61 items),

TABLE 1. Description of the Sample

Variable Divorce (<1 yr.) Divorce (1-5 yrs.) No Divorce (N = 12) (N = 10) (N = 22)

age (yrs.) 11.1± 0.3 12.1± 1.0 12.0± 0.7 female/male 8/4 5/5 16/6 Gymn./Hauptsch. 8/4 6/4 12/10 Sleep index 5.6± 2.1 3.5± 2.1 4.2± 2.1 No. of dreams 13.1± 7.7 13.0± 6.4 12.8± 6.4

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such as ego-strength, anxiety, emotionality, extraversion, school achievement, shyness, and social behavior. Interitem consistency of the 15 subscales ranged from r = .587 to r = .812. Sleep questionnaire. To quantify the sleep behavior, the Pittsburgh

Sleep Quality Index (Buysse et al., 1988) was used. The questionnaire was comprised of 19 items measuring sleep quality, sleep efficiency, and sleep disturbances during the last month. The global score ranges from 0 to 21. The cut-off point 5 indicated sleep problems. Dream content analysis. First, several scales of the dream manual of

Riemann et al. (1985) were adopted, such as dream-like quality, visual and auditory perception. Second, dream content rating scales by Breg- er, Hunter and Lane (1971), including formal-descriptive and thematic dimensions, were translated into German. The formal-descriptive di- mensions (five-point scales ranging from 1 to 5) were: ‘‘anxiety’’ experienced by the dream ego; ‘‘cognitive disturbance,’’ such as con- fusion, fragmentation of dream episodes, inconsistencies; ‘‘implausi- bility,’’ i.e., from real life (1) to bizarre (5); ‘‘involvement’’ of the dream ego; and ‘‘primitivity’’ ranging from extremely socialized ex- pression of impulses, such as conversation, intellectual activity, help- ing someone to mostly or extremely primitive or unsocialized expres- sion of impulses, such as stealing, injuring others, destroying something, or murder. The thematic dimensions (three-point scales ranging from 1 to 3) were: ‘‘quality of interactions,’’ pleasant (1), neutral (2), unpleasant (3); ‘‘roles’’ inadequate or unsuccessful (1), for example, when the dreamer fails a task, neutral (2), such as walking around, talking, and adequate-successful (3), e.g., dreamer wins a game or does something well; ‘‘outcome’’ of the dream, desirable outcome (1), neutral (2), and undesirable outcome (3).

Procedure

In public schools children were asked to participate in the study. If a child was willing to participate written consent of the parent(s) was obtained. First, sociodemographic data were elicited, and then the children completed the personality and sleep questionnaires. During a period of twelve weeks the participants kept a dream diary writing down every dream recalled in the morning. In weekly sessions chil- dren rated their dreams along the scales by Breger et al. (1971). In these sessions questions about dreams and emotional issues of the children were discussed. In addition, dream content was judged along

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the scales of Riemann et al. (1985) and Breger et al. (1971) by an independent rater, and the dream words were counted out. The statisti- cal analysis included ANOVA procedures with contrasts between di- vorce groups and controls and ANCOVA procedures to control for word count.

RESULTS

Personality questionnaire. The analysis of variance of the personal- ity dimensions led to one significant result: the children whose parents were divorced within the last year scored higher on the dimension ‘‘need for improvement.’’ Sleep questionnaire. The mean global score of the sleep question-

naire amounted to 4.43 2.52. Although analysis of variance for the three groups did not reach significance, a tendency of heightened values was found in the acute divorce group in comparison with con- trols (p = .0654, one-tailed; see Table 1). Dream recall and dream word count. Overall, 568 dream reports

were collected over the twelve-week peroid. Dream recall did not differ between the three groups (see Table 1). Mean word count was 47.7 43.0 words per dream (range: 4 to 327 words). The analysis of variance revealed significant group differences (F = 6.5, p = .0016; see Table 2) so that word count was used as covariate in further analysis. Dream content. In Table 2 the formal aspects measured by the

Riemann et al. scales are depicted. When word count was partialed out (all effects p < .0001), all three scales still showed differences between children of the acute divorced group and controls. For example,

TABLE 2. Formal Dream Aspects of the Three Groups (Riemann et al., 1985)

Variable Divorce (<1 yr.) Divorce (1-5 yrs.) No Divorce (N = 157) (N = 130) (N = 281)

word count 37.4± 33.4*** 49.6± 50.1 52.5± 43.4 dream-like quality 1.73± 0.94** 1.89± 0.82 2.06± 0.77 visual perception 1.17± 1.21*** 1.25± 0.88* 1.48± 0.87 auditory perception 0.20± 0.58* 0.38± 0.65 0.42± 0.77

*p < .05, **p < .01, *** p < .001 comparison to controls (covariate word count)

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dreams of the acute divorce dream group were less dream-like (more realistic) and contained a lower amount of visual and auditory percep- tion. Significant differences were also found for the dimension ‘‘prim- itivity’’ and ‘‘roles’’ (see Table 3). A similar but smaller difference in the dimension ‘‘roles’’ was found for the non-acute divorce group. The self-rated dimension ‘‘involvement’’ of the dream ego was more pronounced in both divorce groups than in controls. The correlations between self-ratings of the children and the ratings made by a judge were high: ‘‘anxiety’’ (r = .905), ‘‘cognitive disturbances’’ (r = .581), ‘‘implausibility’’ (r = .784), ‘‘involvement’’ (r = .777), ‘‘primitivity’’ (r = .749), ‘‘quality of interaction’’ (r = .747), ‘‘roles’’ (r = .801), and ‘‘outcome’’ (r = .793). The results of the judge’s ratings showed similar patterns to the

children’s self-ratings (see Table 4), with the exception of the dimen- sion ‘‘involvement.’’ One unexpected finding was the significantly lower value of the dimension ‘‘implausibility’’ of the non-acute di- vorce group.

DISCUSSION

As expected, marked effects of parental divorce on personality measures were not found, yet this may be due to the small sample size.

TABLE 3. Descriptive and Thematic Dream Dimensions of the Three Groups (Self-ratings, Breger, Hunter & Lane, 1971)

Variable Divorce (<1 yr.) Divorce (1-5 yrs.) No Divorce (N = 157) (N = 130) (N = 281)

Anxiety 2.29± 1.54 2.05± 1.40 2.25± 1.59 Cognitive disturbances 1.59± 0.93 1.63± 0.89 1.70± 0.92 Implausibility 3.27± 1.46 2.86± 1.39* 3.25± 1.35 Involvement1 2.46± 1.59* 2.47± 1.51* 2.20± 1.47 Primitivity 2.55± 1.10*** 2.21± 1.04 2.21± 1.08 Quality of interaction 1.99± 0.74 1.93± 0.76 1.97± 0.76 Roles 2.52± 0.76*** 2.66± 0.60* 2.81± 0.48 Outcome 2.00± 0.79 1.98± 0.82 2.12± 0.82

*p < .05, **p < .01, *** p < .001 comparison to controls (covariate word count) 1one-tailed tests

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TABLE 4. Descriptive and Thematic Dream Dimensions of the Three Groups (Ratings by judge, Breger, Hunter & Lane, 1971)

Variable Divorce (<1 yr.) Divorce (1-5 yrs.) No Divorce (N = 157) (N = 130) (N = 281)

Anxiety 2.27± 1.46 2.12± 1.41 2.25± 1.42 Cognitive disturbances 1.66± 0.86 1.49± 0.75 1.59± 0.80 Implausibility 3.41± 1.24 3.19± 1.38 3.44± 1.21 Involvement1 2.40± 1.57 2.39± 1.54 2.19± 1.46 Primitivity 2.55± 0.99* 2.52± 1.07 2.40± 1.06 Quality of interaction 2.03± 0.69 1.94± 0.73 1.96± 0.71 Roles 2.59± 0.71*** 2.70± 0.59 2.80± 0.50 Outcome 2.09± 0.76 2.12± 0.78 2.22± 0.75

*p < .05, **p < .01, *** p < .001 comparison to controls (covariate word count) 1one-tailed tests

On the other hand, increased sleep difficulties were associated with recent divorce, congruent with findings indicating that stress increases sleep problems in adults (e.g., Hohagen et al., 1993). Whereas dream recall frequency did not differ between the three

groups, dream length was considerably lower in the acute-divorce group. If one interprets dream length as a measure of dream recall, as done by Waterman (1991), one could say that stress reduces the amount of recalled dream material. In the literature, the findings con- cerning the effect of stress on dream recall are inhomogeneous, for example, stress increases dream recall in females but reduces dream recall in males (Armitage, 1992). It may also be possible that sleep disturbances influence dream recall since it was found that dream recall and dream length were higher in long sleepers (Taub, 1972). The formal aspects of the lowered auditory and visual perception in

the dreams of the acute-divorce group cannot be explained by the influence of stress on dreams, and thus warrants further research. Although dream content of the acute-divorce group did not reflect

an increased global negative affect (‘‘anxiety,’’ ‘‘quality of interac- tions’’ and ‘‘outcome’’), as predicted by previous findings (see introduction), it showed more ‘‘primitivity,’’ such as unsocialized ex- pression of impulses and ‘‘inadequate’’ or ‘‘unsuccessful’’ roles.

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These dreams may reflect role confusion the child experiences during the time of separation and adaptation to new family structures (e.g., Knoke, 1994). Although a small difference was still found in the non-acute divorce group, the increase of ‘‘adequate’’ and ‘‘success- ful’’ roles in these dreams may indicate an increase of coping behavior in those children adapting to the new situation. Whether dreams them- selves contribute to the adaption process is discussed in the literature as mastery hypothesis (Koulack, 1993). Wright and Koulack (1987) assumed that the process of mastery in dreams is the same that occurs during the waking state. When we are confronted by a stressful event or a problem during the waking state, we think about it, until obtaining a successful resolution or until having to put it away because of other demands of our waking life. Support for this hypothesis was provided by the findings of Cartwright (1991, 1996) who found that incorpora- tion of the ex-spouse in the dream was helping the investigated women to cope with divorce. The findings of Hajek and Blecher (1991) re- ported that persons with negative toned dreams about smoking are those who stayed abstinent. In the present study, higher self-rated involvement in dream action and more realistic (less dream-like) dreams in the acute-divorce group may reflect the process of mastery within the dream. On the other hand, dream work was adopted in group therapy with

women undergoing divorce to cope effectively with the demands of this transition period (Falk and Hill, 1995). Overall, the results of the present study indicate that children’s

dreams were influenced by the stressor divorce. To extend the present findings, it will be of interest to carry out a prospective longitudinal study of children prior to divorce, during the process, and at least one or two years after the divorce. Additional measures such as subjective stress experienced by the child and the investigation of incorporation of the life event into dreams (the separated parent, family conflict) will shed more light on the possible coping function of dreams. Whether or not the reported pattern (no change in dream emotions but more ‘‘primitive’’ themes and ‘‘unsuccessful role’’ behavior) is typical for children of divorce could be evaluated by studying dreams of children who experience other stressors, for example, mental illness of one parent, school problems or loss of a near relative.

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