Table Of ContentChildren's Dreams in
Clinical Practice
Children's Dreams in
Clinical Practice
Stephen Catalano, D.S.W.
Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
Library of Congress Cataloglng-ln-PublIcatIon Data
Catalano, Stephen.
Cnildren's dreams m clinical practice / Stephen Catalano,
p. ere.
Includes bibliographical references.
1. Child psychopathology. 2. Child psychology. 3. Children's
dreams. I. Title.
RJ499.C299 1990
154.6'34'083—dc20 89-28470
CIP
ISBN 978-1-4757-9684-1 ISBN 978-1-4757-9682-7 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4757-9682-7
© Springer Science+Business Media New York 1990
Originally published by Plenum Press, New York in 1990
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1 st edition 1990
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming,
recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher
This book is dedicated to Margaret,
for her love and encouragement throughout this project;
to family and friends for their support;
and to the purple lion and the pink frog,
who prove that sometimes dreams really do come true.
Preface
Once upon a time I dreamed myself a butterfly, floating
like petals in the air, happy to be doing as I pleased, no
longer aware of myself! But soon enough I awoke and then,
frantically clutching myself, Chuang Tzu I was! I wonder:
Was Chuang Tzu dreaming himself the butterfly, or was
the butterfly dreaming itself Chuang Tzu?
-Chuang Tzu
Dreams are an endless source of mystery and fascination.
Those we remember bring to our conscious awareness
a variety of characters, circumstances, and situations
often implausible or even bizarre in our everyday world.
Sometimes dreams are more mundane and common
place, reflecting memories of recent events of obvious
importance.
It is perhaps because of our lack of ability to under
stand fully the origin of dreams or interpret their exact
VII
viii Preface
meaning that dreams are the subject of such interest and
speculation. Or perhaps, as the Chinese philosopher
Chuang Tzu suggested, they allow us the freedom to ex
pand our thoughts, associations, or spirit in a way that
no other experience, waking or otherwise, can.
Clinical interest in dream content has primarily been
limited to the psychoanalytical perspective. This modern
clinical interest in dreams is the direct result of Freud's
landmark contribution concerning the importance of
dreams in unconscious thought and in the practice of
psychoanalysis. Theoretically, psychoanalytical interpre
tation of dream content as a repressive-defensive content
function dominated clinical practice and application for
many years and remains an influential school of thought.
Recent theoretical contributions have focused on more
adaptive properties and highlighted a developmental per
spective. In this way the meaning and use of dream con
tent in clinical practice also have evolved into a broader
application. As a result of technological and methodolog
ical advances in data collection, much more is now known
about the dreams of children and adults. The data col
lected have enabled dream content to be examined from
a variety of perspectives and provided a much broader
diagnostic and therapeutic application in clinical practice.
After an extended dormant period in which the use
of dream content was restricted to psychoanalytical ap
plications, an exciting rapprochement has occurred, uti
lizing the developmental and adaptive properties of
dreams. This book is an attempt to explain for the reader
the contemporary theory and use of dream content in
clinical practice and its application with children and
adolescents.
Stephen Catalano
Gilford, New Hampshire
Contents
Part I. Introduction .............................. 1
Chapter 1. Why Study Children's Dreams? . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Chapter 2. The Significance and Use of Dream Content
in Clinical Practice with Children and
Adolescents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Part II. Dream Content: Theory and Research. . . . . . . . . 17
Chapter 3. Theoretical and Historical Review. . . . . . . . . . 19
The Meaning of Dream Content ................. 20
The Meaning of Children's Dreams .............. 23
Dream Content of Emotionally Disturbed Children 28
ix
Chapter 4. Methodological Issues in the Study of Dream
Content. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Confabulation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Manifest versus Latent Content of Dreams. . . . . . . . 37
Chapter 5. Children's Dream Content as an Indicator of
Developmental Functioning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Review of Developmental Theory. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Research on Dream Content as an Indicator of
Developmental Functioning ............... 45
Part III. The Study. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Chapter 6. Introduction and Background. . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Review........................................ 55
Design and Methodology. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Hypotheses Tested. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Population and Samples. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Chapter 7. Procedures ............................ 61
Interview Procedure. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Tests Conducted ............................... 62
Instruments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Structured Recall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Elkan Checklist. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Rating the Dream. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Other Instruments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Validity and Reliability. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Chapter 8. Findings and Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Hypothesis I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Quantitative Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
COlltellts xi
Qualitative Analysis ........................ 82
Hypothesis II .................................. 87
Quantitative Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Qualitative Analysis ........................ 93
Summary...................................... 97
Part IV. Theoretical Implications and Practice
Techniques. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Chapter 9. Contributions to Dream-Content Theory . . . . 105
Differences in the Dream Content of Emotionally
Disturbed Adolescents. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 106
The Association between Developmental
Function and Dream Content. . . . . . . . . . . . .. 107
The Use of Clinical Practice as the Laboratory
Setting .................................. 110
Review and Suggestions for Further Study. . . . . . . . 111
Chapter 10. Clinical Applications and Techniques for
Use in Practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 117
Enhancing Dream Recall ........................ 117
School-Aged Children. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 122
Adolescents. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Contraindications and Other Clinical Uses. . . . . . . . 135
Part V. Normal and Emotionally Disturbed Children's
Dream Content. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 141
Chapter 11. The Latency-Aged Child ................ 143
Chapter 12. Dreams of Adolescents. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 147
