INDIVIDUAL-DIFFERENCES IN ORIENTING ACTIVITY MEDIATE FEELING REALIZATION IN DREAMS .2. EVIDENCE FROM CONCURRENT REPORTS OF MOVEMENT INHIBITION

The ineffectuality that is characteristic of existential dreams (Kuike n & Sikora, 1993) may prompt shifts in feeling that sensitize dreamers to aspects of their lives they have previously ignored. Consistent wi th this hypothesis, Kuiken and Nielsen (1996) found that individual di fferences in retrospectively reported movement inhibition during the w aking orienting response predicted dream ineffectuality and dream-indu ced self-perceptual depth. We replicated and extended these findings u sing concurrently reported changes in bodily feeling during waking ori enting activity. Study 1 indicated that the accentuation of feelings o r sensations in stimulated emotion-related body areas (e.g., the upper chest) and the inhibition of feelings or sensations in stimulated emo tion-unrelated areas (e.g., the non-dominant foot) predicted for whom dreams deepened self-perception. Similarly, Study 2 indicated that sim ultaneously accentuated feeling in a stimulated emotion-related area a nd suppressed feeling in an emotion-unrelated body area predicted for wham dreams deepened self-perception. Thus, individual differences in the activation and inhibition components of orienting activity during dreaming may mediate increased self-perceptual depth.