The Development of Cognitive and Emotional Processing

The development of dreaming and its association with brain maturation and cognitive development are rarely studied in spite of adult studies showing a close relationship between dreaming and cognitive functioning. In order to bridge this gap in the literature we aimed to depict the associations between individual differences in neurocognitive maturation and the formal and content related characteristics of children’s dream reports. We analyzed the dream reports of 40 children between the ages of 4 to 8 years. Specific dream content categories, found to change significantly throughout development, were correlated with cognitive performance. To measure the latter we used neuropsychological tests (a modified version of the Fruit Stroop Test and Emotional Stroop Test for Children, and the Attention Network Test [ANT]) and intelligence tests (subscales of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children [WISC–IV], and the Raven’s Colored Progressive Matrices [CPM]). Results suggest that the dreamer’s presence in their dreams (manifested in activities, interactions, self-effectiveness, willful effort, and cognitive reflections) indicates more effective executive control in waking life. The quality and content of these activities and interactions are correlated with the child’s capacities of emotional processing. Contrary to previous findings dream bizarreness and dream recall frequency were