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A question from reader Josiah: “Do blind people see when they dream? I think there are two sides to the question, dealing with people who were born blind, and those who used to be able to see.”
Whether visual imagery is present in the dreams of the blind has been pondered by scientists since the early 19th century. Josiah is right about that last part. People who are sighted, people who were born sighted but were blinded later in life, and people who were born blind all dream differently. As the Royal National Institute of the Blind in London puts it, “Dreams are experienced in the same way as life is lived.” (Some people over 55 occasionally dream in black and white, while younger people who grew up with color television tend to dream only in color.1) How much visual imagery someone has experienced in their waking life—if they’ve experienced it at all—affects how much visual imagery is in their dreams.
A series of questionnaire and interview studies conducted in the 1970s2 led to four generalizations about the dreams of the blind:
1. People born blind, and who never experienced visual imagery in waking life, have no visual images in their dreams.
2. People who became blind before the age of five rarely experience visual imagery in their dreams.
3. People who became blind between the ages of five and seven sometimes retain some visual imagery and experience it in their dreams.
4. Most people who became blind after the age of seven continue to experience at least some visual imagery in their dreams, but the clarity and frequency of the imagery is often reduced with time.
Several studies in sleep laboratories, in which blind participants were woken up during REM sleep for the collection of dream reports, reported similar results.
A more recent study3 analyzed a sample of 372 dreams from 15 blind adults—some born blind, and others who went blind later in life. Again, the study found that people blind since birth or very early childhood experienced no visual imagery, and people blinded later in life did retain some visual imagery from their sighted waking lives and experienced it while dreaming.
One participant in the study, though, reported visual imagery inconsistent with the trends described in previous findings. Participant 13, a 24-year-old man blinded at age four, reported that he was able to see objects “clearly” or “plainly” during the dream, so it is possible that some people who became blind before the age of five can experience visual imagery in dreams.
The study also expanded upon the previous research and revealed two interesting things:
1. While less than one percent of sighted participants surveyed in two previous studies reported experiencing gustatory, olfactory, or tactual sensations in dreams, all but three of the blind participants in this study reported experiencing them. One participant, who has been blind since birth, reported that 48 percent of the sensations in his dreams were auditory and the other 52 percent were a mix of taste, smell and touch sensations.
2. Sixty percent of the blind men’s dreams that involved locomotion or transportation, and 61% of the blind women’s, had at least one incident of “dreamer-involved misfortune” (the norms for sighted men and women are 31 percent and 28 percent, respectively), which the researchers hypothesize is a continuation of the waking-life concerns that the blind have about getting from place to place.
1 Murzyn E. (2008). Do we only dream in colour? A comparison of reported dream colour in younger and older adults with different experiences of black and white media. Consciousness and cognition. Dec;17(4):1228-37.
2 Kirtley, D. (1975). The psychology of blindness. Chicago: Nelson-Hall.
3 Hurovitz, C., Dunn, S., Domhoff, G. W., & Fiss, H. (1999). The dreams of blind men and women: A replication and extension of previous findings. Dreaming. 9:183-193.
[Image courtesy of Christophe Moustier.]
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Comments (18)
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I have always wondered about this but was afraid that asking would make me look discriminatory or something. Thanks!
posted by Kelly on 9-9-2009 at 4:23 pm
I wonder if born blind could I imagine what something would look like without ever seeing something to reference it to. Interesting article.
posted by Jane on 9-9-2009 at 5:46 pm
“less than one percent of sighted participants surveyed in two previous studies reported experiencing gustatory, olfactory, or tactual sensations in dreams”
Less than 1% ?! I almost always experience multiple senses. I’ve been burned, bitten, and shot in dreams and felt all of them. There was no outside influence to account for the sensations. I also dreamt of what carrot cake tasted like before I had ever tried it!
posted by Leah on 9-9-2009 at 5:52 pm
This is not surprising.
I often dream in text and in pixels, pretty predictably when I’ve been reading a lot, or playing older video games.
posted by Kiya on 9-9-2009 at 6:46 pm
but do mentally disturbed deaf people hear voices?
posted by mrwaturi on 9-9-2009 at 7:26 pm
I am a teacher of the blind (and visually impaired) and my students reflect what this study says. I have a few kids who were born blind and they have told me about voice and smells in dreams. Some have dreamed that they were reading Braille in their dreams. I once had a middle schooler who had gone blind at age 7 and he would report seeing things in his dreams. (My kids are very sweet and love to tell me everything and sometimes at odd times…like months after things happen, but they tell it like it just happened :))
The saddest thing was one little girl who was haunted by the computer voices that their computer programs use–it made me so sad because we are a very poor district and there is no way to afford the fancier software where you can change the voices!
posted by TeacherPatti on 9-9-2009 at 9:25 pm
This is a very interesting article. I’ve often wondered about this.
posted by Mary Shaw on 9-10-2009 at 1:32 am
I don’t understand the comment re: mrwaturi made, why would you say “mentally disturbed deaf people”? What does that have to do with anything? I am hard of hearing and I can “hear” in my dreams. I do know ASL as well and friends have caught me signing in my sleep after I have hung around my deaf friends. But I am also known to talk (vocally) in my sleep.
And yes I was curious about blind people dreaming not visually but auditorily.
posted by Abby on 9-10-2009 at 2:21 am
but do sheep dream of analog androids?
posted by frenchy on 9-10-2009 at 6:40 am
I used to be able to control my dreams. I would rewind them in an attempt to change outcomes. It played backwards in my dream just like a video tape rewinding, static and everything.
Sometimes I had to rewind multiple times to change the dream. Other times only once. I specifically remember being very aggitated when I had to rewind multiple times. It was always as if I was sleeping, and watching myself dream at the same time.
I rarely do this any more.
And yes, I am a control freak.
I do have dreams that are all auditory though. It is like watching a blank screen and I only hear the action. I am not visually impaired.
posted by Karen on 9-10-2009 at 8:49 am
I’ve often wondered about this… also do deaf people hear anything in their dreams?
posted by Julia on 9-10-2009 at 11:33 am
Karen-
I do the same thing. Heck, I’ve had credits roll at the end of some of my dreams.
posted by Anthony on 9-10-2009 at 12:45 pm
On a similar note, I have spent a lot of time wondering what a deaf person’s inner monologue was like. Anybody have any insights?
posted by Frank on 9-10-2009 at 1:42 pm
as someone who is multilingual i have often been asked in what language do i dream in
posted by dre on 9-10-2009 at 4:24 pm
Someday, no doubt, our carbon-based lifeforms will be replaced by silicon-based life forms, and I wonder if they will dream. Which brings up another question: at what evolutionary stage did dreaming first appear. So far as I know, there is evidence (based on REM sleep) of dreaming only in mammals and birds. But this may be dated info.
posted by Dail on 9-10-2009 at 4:56 pm
I am blind. I am fascinated by what sighted people believe about us. It’s hilarious how they try to get “inside information” about things that are none of their business.
By the way, the 1975 text on the psychology of blindness is completely outdated. Don’t use it for anything that matters.
posted by Lynn on 9-10-2009 at 6:32 pm
Wow, Lynn – that was quite rude. I’m certain you don’t speak for all blind people when you say “none of their business”.
posted by Logan on 9-13-2009 at 5:09 am
i want to know if a blind person doesn’t matter if they were born blind or became blind later on in life, if they dream in color or not.
please fill me in on the details. Thank You
posted by Raven on 9-28-2009 at 6:26 pm