Do Babies Dream?

Dreams are a mysterious subject that has been debated on earth for years. Therefore, this curiosity is reflected in infancy as well. Is the baby crying and laughing in sleep from dreams? Do babies dream or do we attribute meanings to these movements? Let’s talk about dreams!

Do babies dream?

Whether babies dream or not has been debated for years, and it’s still hard to say for sure. Pediatric dreaming specialist Psychologist David Foulkes says babies are thought to have the same perceptual abilities as their dreaming abilities. Other neuroscientists, such as Foulkes, think that the first few years of babies’ lives are dreamless.

Behaviors such as crying or laughing in sleep often raise the question of whether a newborn baby dreams . Neuroscientists speculate that REM sleep has an entirely different role in newborns and infants, that it creates pathways in babies’ brains and aids language development rather than making them dream.

On the other hand, some experts claim that babies dream just like adults. Charles Pollack, head of the Sleep Medicine Center at Weill Cornell Hospital in New York, says that newborns experience the REM phase, but the senses are also effective in dreams. In the REM phase, both eyes move sideways and up and down at the same time, and dreams occur in this phase, according to Pollack. In this case, the question of what newborn babies see in their dreams may come to mind. Charles Pollack says it’s impossible to know what babies see in their dreams.

When we look at it, all of these are hypotheses and they have not been proven yet. That’s why babies dream , the subject seems to be confusing for a long time.

When do babies dream?

You now know that there is disagreement about whether babies dream during the neonatal period and in the first few years of life. So when do babies start dreaming, let’s take this question now.

There are many studies that show that babies dream most of the time. When the sleep stages were examined, it was seen that it consisted of 2 parts as REM and non-REM sleep. Dreams also occur mostly in the REM phase.

Neuroscientists think that dreaming is a cognitive process that occurs in early childhood. Over time, children develop in visual and spatial imagination. According to research by Foulkes and colleagues, even 4-5-year-olds describe their dreams as low-emotion and plain dreams. At the age of 7-8, dreams begin to come alive. They attribute this to the fact that children now have a clear understanding of their own identities.

Does a baby in the womb dream?

While there are differences of opinion on whether babies dream or not, the issue of dreaming in the womb is even more controversial. Some studies show that babies can dream while in the womb. The reason for this is based on the fact that the REM phase is very long in babies in the womb. However, there are also opinions that argue the opposite.

Do babies have nightmares?

Babies don’t have nightmares because they don’t know the meaning of fear yet. Babies begin to pass the stage of understanding the outside life and being affected by the events around them by the age of 2 years. It is thought that these events may affect their dreams, as they are more severely affected by what is happening around them and are able to talk and describe what they see.

Why do babies cry in dreams?

One of the biggest factors that cause babies to cry while asleep is gas pain . However, reasons such as hunger, cold and soiling the baby’s bottom can also cause the baby to cry while sleeping. Situations such as a nightmare or some supernatural entity making the baby cry in a dream are just nonsense.

Why are babies afraid in dreams?

Babies’ nervous systems are not fully developed when they are born. For this reason, loud noises during sleep can cause babies to be afraid in their dreams. So it has to do with the stimuli in the outside world rather than being afraid in the dream.

Behaviors such as startling, arm or leg shaking while sleeping are also extremely natural newborn reflexes . These reflexes start to disappear gradually in the baby’s 4th to 6th months.