Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-q99xh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T03:20:25.220Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The seahorse, the almond, and the night-mare: Elaborative encoding during sleep-paralysis hallucinations?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 November 2013

Todd A. Girard
Todd A. Girard*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Ryerson University, Toronto, ON M5B 2K3, Canada. tgirard@psych.ryerson.cahttp://www.ryerson.ca/psychology/faculty/girard/
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Llewellyn's proposal that rapid eye movement (REM) dreaming reflects elaborative encoding mediated by the hippocampus (“seahorse”) offers an interesting perspective for understanding hallucinations accompanying sleep paralysis (SP; “night-mare”). SP arises from anomalous intrusion of REM processes into waking consciousness, including threat-detection systems mediated by the amygdala (“almond”). Unique aspects of SP hallucinations offer additional prospects for investigation of Llewellyn's theory of elaborative encoding.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 36 , Issue 6 , December 2013 , pp. 618 - 619
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abrams, M. P., Mulligan, A. D., Carleton, R. N. & Asmundson, G. J. (2008) Prevalence and correlates of sleep paralysis in adults reporting childhood sexual abuse. Journal of Anxiety Disorders 22(8):1535–41.Google Scholar
Addis, D. R., Pan, L., Vu, M. A., Laiser, N. & Schacter, D. L. (2009) Constructive episodic simulation of the future and the past: Distinct subsystems of a core brain network mediate imagining and remembering. Neuropsychologia 47:2222–38.Google Scholar
Adler, S. R. (2011) Sleep paralysis: Night-mares, nocebos, and the mind-body connection. Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) (2001) International classification of sleep disorders, revised: Diagnostic and coding manual. AASM.Google Scholar
Boyer, P. & Bergstrom, B. (2011) Threat-detection in child development: An evolutionary perspective. Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews 35:1034–41.Google Scholar
Cheyne, J. A. & Girard, T. A. (2004) Spatial characteristics of hallucinations associated with sleep paralysis. Cognitive Neuropsychiatry 9:281–300.Google Scholar
Cheyne, J. A. & Girard, T. A. (2007) Paranoid delusions and threatening hallucinations: A prospective study of hypnagogic/hypnopompic hallucinations during sleep paralysis. Consciousness and Cognition 16:959–74.Google Scholar
Cheyne, J. A. & Girard, T. A. (2009) The body unbound: Vestibular-motor hallucinations and out-of-body experiences. Cortex 45:201–15.Google Scholar
Cheyne, J. A., Rueffer, S. D. & Newby-Clark, I. R. (1999) Hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations during sleep paralysis: Neurological and cultural construction of the night-mare. Consciousness and Cognition 8:319–37.Google Scholar
Girard, T. A. & Cheyne, J. A. (2004) Individual differences in lateralisation of hallucinations associated with sleep paralysis. Laterality 9:93–111.Google Scholar
Girard, T. A., Martius, D. L. & Cheyne, J. A. (2007) Mental representation of space: Insights from an oblique distribution of hallucinations. Neuropsychologia 45:1257–69.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hishikawa, Y. (1976) Sleep paralysis. In: Advances in sleep research, vol. 3, ed. Guilleminault, C., Dement, W. C. & Passouant, P., pp. 97–124. Spectrum.Google Scholar
Hishikawa, Y. & Shimizu, T. (1995) Physiology of REM sleep, cataplexy, and sleep paralysis. Advances in Neurology 67:245–71.Google ScholarPubMed
McNally, R. J. & Clancy, S. A. (2005) Sleep paralysis, sexual abuse, and space alien abduction. Transcultural Psychiatry 42:113–22.Google Scholar
Sharot, T., Delgado, M. R. & Phelps, E. A. (2004) How emotion enhances the feeling of remembering. Nature Neuroscience 7:1376–80.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sharot, T., Verfaellie, M. & Yonelinas, A. (2007) How emotion strengthens the recollection experience: A time-dependent hippocampal process. PLoS ONE 2:e1068. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0001068.Google Scholar
Sharpless, B. A., McCarthy, K. S., Chambless, D. L., Milrod, B. L., Khalsa, S.-R. & Barber, J. P. (2010) Isolated sleep paralysis and fearful isolated sleep paralysis in outpatients with panic attacks. Journal of Clinical Psychology 66:1292–306.Google Scholar
Takeuchi, T., Miyasita, A., Sasaki, Y., Inugami, M. & Fukuda, K. (1992) Isolated sleep paralysis elicited by sleep interruptions. Sleep 15:217–25.Google Scholar
Terzaghi, M., Ratti, P. L., Manni, F. & Manni, R. (2012) Sleep paralysis in narcolepsy: More than just a motor dissociative phenomenon? Neurological Sciences 33:169–72.Google Scholar