The Neuroelectric Alignment of Dreaming: The Sleep/Dream State Frequencies of Consciousness

This article presents a restructuring of the classification of dreaming in which the states of dreaming, like the states of sleep, are tied to their defining electrophysiology. Each sleep stage is characterized by a phenomenologically distinct form of dreaming associated with the specific physiologic brain frequency used to define each sleep/dream state. These different forms of sleep-state-associated consciousness have significant phenomenological, physiologic, and electrophysiologic differences, yet in most current literature they are all considered to be a loosely defined state called dreaming. This proposed neuroelectric classification of dreaming acknowledges the associated electrophysiology of each dream state producing a tighter and more coherent description of dreaming-associated physiology and the association of reported dreaming with sleep-state-specific dreams and parasomnias. This merging of the neuroelectic framework with the sleep-associated phenomenology of each dream state expands the importance and relevance of dreaming to modern theories of neuroconsciousness.