When dreams become a royal road to confusion: Realistic dreams, dissociation, and fantasy proneness

Scientific discussions about false memories have, so far, mainly focused on external determinants (e.g., therapeutic interventions). However, in some cases, false memories might develop more spontaneously. For example, diffic ulties in distinguishing between dreams and reality may lead to false memor ies. The present article discusses two studies (N = 85 and 255, respectivel y) that examined to what extent such difficulties occur. In both studies, a nontrivial minority of respondents (11.8% and 25.9%, respectively) reporte d that they had had the experience of not being able to discriminate betwee n dream and reality. As expected, respondents who reported this type of con fusion scored higher on fantasy proneness and dissociation measures than re spondents who did not report this confusion.