Frequent Nightmares Predict Early Death More Strongly Than Smoking or Obesity, Study Finds (economist.com) 59
People who experience nightmares weekly or more frequently face three times higher risk of dying before age 70 compared to those having nightmares less than monthly, according to research by Dr. Abidemi Otaiku at Imperial College London. His analysis of six long-term studies covering more than 180,000 adults and 2,500 children found frequent nightmares predict early death more strongly than smoking, obesity, poor diet, or physical inactivity.
Among 174 people who died prematurely, 31 experienced at least weekly nightmares. Otaiku's research shows chromosomes of nightmare-prone individuals display accelerated aging patterns linked to stress hormones, accounting for roughly 40% of their increased mortality risk. Effective nightmare treatment options are currently limited and require more medical research, the report adds.
Among 174 people who died prematurely, 31 experienced at least weekly nightmares. Otaiku's research shows chromosomes of nightmare-prone individuals display accelerated aging patterns linked to stress hormones, accounting for roughly 40% of their increased mortality risk. Effective nightmare treatment options are currently limited and require more medical research, the report adds.
Smells like BS (Score:1)
Yeah, bullshit.
Must be a slow news day, this is bullshit even for slashdot.
What's the matter, not AI silliness to post?
Re: Smells like BS (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not really crazy. An impending sense of dread is a relatively common symptom of many diseases. Your mind knows something's off, even if it doesn't understand it at a rational level. It would not be super surprising if there were more subtle clues more widely showing up in dreams.
Re: Smells like BS (Score:5, Interesting)
I suffered from sleep apnea for many years. Breathing problems often triggered nightmares, several times a night. A CPAP machine changed my life, I could finally get a whole nights sleep, and the nightmares stopped. I can still recognize an apnea nightmare, which I get if I don't use the machine. Sleep apnea is known to increase many medical problems and to shorten life. I guess other conditions could also provoke nightmares.
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Fortunately, I don't have to deal with that. Mostly when I have odd dreams where every toilet I find is broken, I wake up needing to pee.
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I have odd dreams where every toilet I find is broken, I wake up needing to pee.
May your toilets stay broken!
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The real question is how predictive it is. Of the 174 early deaths, 31 experienced weekly nightmares. The question is how many of the other 180K or so also experienced weekly nightmares.
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"frequent nightmares (occurring weekly or more) are less common, affecting only 2-6% of the population" - Google AI
Assuming that's not a hallucination, the 18% that experienced weekly nightmares in the study seems to be notable.
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Just to see, I asked Google as well and it said 2-8%.
That would make 18% significant, but with a high false positive rate.
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The "impending sense of dread" is more a part of Irukandji Syndrome that it is a symptom of many diseases.
The rest of what you said is correct, but I wouldn't think a "nightmare" (whatever they used to define a "nightmare" as) would be an early-warning of impending death.
From what I remember, dreams are just your brain's way of digesting and sorting and storing information that it has been exposed to during wakefulness, and for some reason, the brain stiches these experiential memories into a dream during t
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It smells like bullshit because it is bullshit. So is the notion that nightmares are somehow linked to subconscious knowledge that you have some kind of life-threatening issue. Nightmares have a variety of causes and treatments, all of which are psychological.
I used to have frequent nightmares about being in tornadoes. The nightmares persisted for years, until one night I had the sneaking suspicion that the tornado ripping through my house a mere few feet away from me was part of a dream. I stood up and wal
Oh no! (Score:4, Funny)
Well that's going to give me nightmares!
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I dream a LOT....but most all of them are pleasant, or maybe just quirky and weird.
I heard something strange the other day...that most men supposedly dream in black and white?
Anyone else heard this?
Mine are all color.....
Strange stuff....I was surprised the other day to hear some people when they remember things don't actually seem pictures of it in my mind....blew me away.
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I dream a lot lately, too. Mine are also in color. But mine, while they contain dreamlike elements, in that some stuff usually happens that doesn't quite make sense, they're generally about pretty ordinary situations, even if things like people and locations are made-up.
As for why I have frequent dreams, I just associate it with getting good, restful sleep.
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My dreams are in colour as well, and they're usually like a parody of real life. I can usually tell they're dreams while I'm dreaming because the dream world is "incomplete" in a way. Like only the parts that affect me or that I can somehow perceive are there.
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Despite all the time I've spent reading history, fiction & fantasy of all kinds and all the 10s of 1000s of hours of watching movies, none of it have EVER impacted my dreams which are all extremely rare & nearly always completely mundane.
Those dreams about having a bad day at work or school then waking up realizing you're going to be late?
I've had those since I was in elementary school. I have - or can only recall - at most 3-6 dreams a YEAR which means I could probably make a list of all the dreams
Re: Oh no! (Score:2)
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I haven't about the black and white thing, but as far as I can tell it's true that you can't read in dreams.
I can sometimes read in dreams, but when I scan back to reread what I just read, it doesn't stay the same.
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Try looking at a clock. It doesn't even matter if it is a digital clock or not.
Re: Oh no! (Score:1)
Dreaming in technicolor [Re:Oh no!] (Score:3)
I heard something strange the other day...that most men supposedly dream in black and white? Anyone else heard this?
That was a myth years back. There's no truth in it. Yes, people dream in color, not black and white.
The only explanation I've heard why this may have been true (or partly true) is that years ago movies, and television, was in black and white. Peoples' dreams echo the format of their entertainment, so if they watch movies in black and white, they (sometimes) dream in black and white.
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"Help! I'm recursively stuck in recursion and can't get out! Did I mention I can't get out? Who said that? Hey that's also me!"
God forgets one little parenthesis and... [xkcd.com]
Who they surveyed. (Score:2)
[Joke]
Did they survey soldiers? Because that would not surprise me at all - the ones on the front have more nightmares than the ones at home.
Same with people in Witness Protection programs.
And of course, people living on Elm street have a similar problem.
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The old adage, "correlation isn't necessary causation". People with PTSD are more likely to have nightmares, but the stress of PTSD itself shortens their life, nightmares probably being mostly a side-effect, not the cause.
Sounds highly implausible ... yet possible (Score:5, Interesting)
I couldn't read the full article (paywalled), but the first paragraph mentions night hags, "night mares," succubi, and incubi. These are now all believed to be historical ways of describing the phenomenon of sleep paralysis. Many people who experience this phenomenon describe the experience as terrifying. They see things like a large, shadowy figure at the end of their bed, or crawling toward them, or sitting or pressing down on their chest.
One of the causes of episodes of sleep paralysis can be chronic obstructive sleep apnea. Even if you don't experience sleep paralysis, sleep apnea can also be associated with nightmares.
You know what else is associated with sleep apnea? Stuff like heart disease, COPD, Type 2 diabetes, and even stroke. So, you know ... don't scoff. It's research.
Stress is a killer? (Score:5, Insightful)
>stress leads to premature death
>stress leads to nightmare
>nightmares lead to premature death
Right.
Re: Stress is a killer? (Score:3)
So if you're relaxed about smoking, it won't kill you as fast as if you're stressed about human interaction to the point that it gives you frequent nightmares? In other words if smoking is your way to relieve stress, is it healthier to smoke than quit because doctors told you to, and be more stressed?
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How would you possibly quantify the relative impact of either of those? :) But fun anecdote, my uncle was a lifetime smoker, started when he was probably 12 or 13. Once diagnosed with congestive heart failure his doctor told him to just keep smoking, as the stress from quitting would kill him sooner.
(I'd wager the stress from being a neet would be worse for you though)
Cortisol (Score:3)
Since the summary does say "effective nightmare treatments are currently limited," I will go ahead and point out the correlation != causation thing. I would be very surprised if there weren't any other obvious causes of the nightmare that are known comorbidities, like poverty, or serious illness, or trauma, and so on.
For example, depression is associated with a 1.5x to 2.5x higher risk of early death, even when adjusting for other risk factors. The summary shows no sign of having adjusted for other risk factors, so 3x doesn't seem out of line.
Correlation is Not Causation (Score:3)
Effective nightmare treatment options are currently limited
This seems like backwards thinking. They link the aging and premature deaths to increased stress hormones and then seem to imply that the nightmares are the cause of this stress. However, given that stress can cause nightmares surely the most likely cause is some underlying stress and both the nightmares and premture deaths are symptoms of that? Instead of attempting to treat the nightmares they first need to show that there is no underlying cause of stress leading to both nightmares and aging because if there is some underlying cause of stress that's probably a lot easier to fix.
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Effective nightmare treatment options are currently limited
Stop reading Slashdot.
3x more doesn't mean anything (Score:3)
Because if the percentage is low (like 1%) then 3x more is 3%. A low percentage is not enough to base any decisions off of. Tell me what the link is between death and nightmares (with probability) not that you are 3x likely to find death if you have frequent nightmares.
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What counts as a "nightmare"? (Score:3)
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How about "Those dreams which haunt you for at least 2 hours after waking".
The very first nightmare I actually remember was around 4 years old. In it I got too close to some gizmo my mom told not to touch, and my dick was sliced off, squirming on the floor like a dying worm. I was very careful around large equipment and tools after that.
I wasn't thinking about sex, but simply the ability to pee. I was afraid I couldn't pee without it and would burst like a water balloon. Hey, I was only 4 and watched too ma
More evidence Donald Trump is (Score:1)
...shortening American's lives. Make that the world, tariff waffling is driving world biz's crazy.
logic (Score:2)
Re: logic (Score:2)
Did you just explain why enlightenment is the end of rebirth?
Pinch me, please (Score:2, Offtopic)
My nightmare from 1999 came true: ALL the articles are either pay-walled or register-walled.
Dreams are interesting (Score:3)
I am more interested in how people have similar yet extremely detailed behaviors that come out nowhere.
My favorite is how in some dreams it is easier to go backwards than forwards. As if trying to run while in a deep pool every step seems to lift you off the ground for too long to get any real traction. Yet turning around to face backwards and pushing off your toes oddly beats the effect or specifically using handrails to kinda pull yourself faster than walking goes.
I have heard many variations of this odd behavior and it effects me often.
I also seem to have geometrically complex dreams where I am in a massive city that makes downtown Manhattan feel like a tiny small little baby town. More interestingly is that I have easily had 50 plus dreams in this place and can find myself explaining to some dream entity casually what I used to do in various places.
Like oh I used to work over in that building, but I would come in on that side. Or I remember hiding in some basement from a past dream and showing someone where it is at in the massive world.
I even have past places I lived in these dreams then I to visit them years later and feel strong nostalgia. All fictional too. One house had weird coal storage room with chute in the basement, one had secret rooms where you would pull a rope that would pull down a secret set of stairs like an attic string.
Just super interesting to me. Anyone else want to share.
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It sounds like you are a fairly active dreamer, or at least you remember them when you wake up. I too do this and can have some very weird ones if I am trying to solve a difficult problem. Things where shapes are somehow ideas etc. I do think everyone dreams. Its the part of remembering that is dif
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My dreams are kind of boring. I get the ones I remember rarely, maybe once a month. The first dreams I remember were already dreams where I knew I'm dreaming and I could control them to some level. But the more control I extorted the sooner they ended. The one in which I managed to fly (for a few seconds in subjective time) was fun. It was and is quite easy to find out I'm dreaming. Reality does not work well while dreaming. E.g. clocks not moving, impossibility to investigate more and more into detail, law
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Well you’re lucky, In my opinion lucid dreams suck. You know you’re trapped in a world you’re unfamiliar with, surrounded by people you don’t know and who will disappear once the dream is over. You have no way to escape, nothing to do. You can’t read anything because it’s all blurry or nonsensical. It’s like being stuck in a jail overnight. I mean sure you can walk around or talk to people but I personally find such an adventure to be disturbing.
The worst may b
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AFAIK the dreams where you have difficulty walking correlate with your legs flailing about in the bed - you're actually trying to walk, but the sheets get in the way, and this feeds into the dream.
It makes perfect sense. (Score:2)
Since Hippocrates, we've speculated that 'all disease begins within the gut' (an exaggeration by today's knowledge, but the point is taken). More recently, even emotional stress has been established as having an affect on the thin barrier between the gut and our blood. "Intestinal permeability" can allow undigested food into the bloodstream causing infection, allergic reactions/autoimmunity and direct microscopic damage to the blood-fed organs (think "Oreo cookie cr
What if (Score:2)
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That’s just treating the symptom
Night terrors (Score:2)
Also, night terrors during early childhood are linked to higher rates of psychosis:
https://www.livescience.com/43... [livescience.com]
Proposed mechanism please (Score:2)
Effective nightmare treatment options are currently limited and require more medical research, the report adds.
Correlation is not enough, we need a proposed mechanism before we worry too much about "nightmare treatments".
How exactly do nightmares shorten life - if they even do? Or are they merely correlated with some confounding variable not identified yet?
Age 76 and still here (Score:2)
I am 76.
I have these dreams, but are they nightmares?
* I have a phone but it has dip switches on the front that you need to set to use the phone. I never make the call.
* I am in a quarterly sales review meeting, but I have not sold anything for 2 years. Zero sales. But no one seems concerned.
* I am in large modern building, but there are only a few toilets and they are full of poop. I wake up and obviously have to visit the bathroom.
* I am walking/hiking and the up is always easy, but the down is impossible
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Effect or cause? (Score:2)
TFA is subscription-walled so I didn't read it. But TFS prompts me to ask if whatever predisposes people to nightmares also leads to premature death, or if the stress of the nightmares themselves is responsible. I guess it could be both.
Abstract (Score:2)
Link to abstract https://www.neurology.org/doi/... [neurology.org] The paper is paywalled, didn't find a preprint.
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Thanks for that.
It seems that they don't know whether nightmares are causal or merely associated:
"Future studies are needed to determine whether treating distressing dreams could slow biological ageing and reduce mortality risk in the general population".
Paid for by... (Score:2)
the makers of Ambien.
If you die in your dream, you die in real life (Score:2)
There are basically two types of stories about dreams. One type says dying in your dream means you die in your real life and the other type says you need to die in your dream to be able to wake up in real life.
One probably finds out which one is true after dying.