The life of a visually impaired person is different from that of a sighted person. As such, some of those privileged to see always wonder what kind of dreams blind people have. Do they have the visual aspect of a dream, or are they just sensations like sound, touch, and smell? Are the dreams colored and vivid? Even though there is no direct answer to these questions, we’ll explain as much as we can regarding this.
Factors That Determine What Blind People Dream About
Starting with the visual aspect, this heavily depends on when the person in question went blind. The congenitally blind or those who were born blind do not see anything in their dreams, the same way they do not see anything when they are awake.
Two things support this conclusion. First, because they have never seen objects such as people, cars, and buildings, their subconscious minds cannot recreate such scenarios in the brain. Secondly, people with congenital blindness experience fewer eye movements during sleep in REM (rapid eye movement). This is the phase when most complex dreams occur. So, with few REMs, vivid dreams are unlikely to happen.
However, the second explanation has some drawbacks because people who also go blind later on experience fewer REM. In such cases, they benefit from memories of visual objects. That said, a person who was born blind will likely experience fewer visual dreams compared to a person who is sighted.
As for those who went blind before age 5 or 7, they will experience more visual dreams than those born blind. According to scientific research, the later a person goes blind, the more visual dreams they can experience. For instance, those who go blind after age 5 or 7 will have more visual dreams of places they visited or people they saw.
In general, blind people can dream about a wide range of things. However, most of their dreams are about movement or travel. This is due to the challenges that they experience when moving. A study done in 1999 on 15 blind adults showed that these individuals dream about animals such as service dogs, food, and interactions. The study also showed that blind people rarely dream about aggressive interactions, personal failures, or successes.
Is There a Difference in a Blind and Sighted Person’s Dreams?
A critical element of a blind person’s dreams is that they will experience heightened sensations of smell, touch, taste, and sound compared to the visual aspect. In the same way, a dream about a bear running to attack you can seem scary.
In a blind person’s dream, their senses of smell and sound will go into overdrive. At the end of the dream, both sighted and blind people experience an overwhelming feeling of emotions. Therefore, their dreams are equally vivid despite lacking the visual element.
Do Blind People Get Nightmares?
Like sighted people, blind people also get nightmares – they actually have four times more nightmares than sighted people. If they are worried about something, it may appear as a nightmare. It’s crucial to understand that the visually impaired face challenges similar to those of the sighted. They may be worried about relationships, jobs, friends, and many other things. So, when one of the core areas of their life is being tested, it’s normal to develop some fear and even have nightmares about it.
How Do Blind People Tell Whether They Are Dreaming or Awake?
Still, on dreams, some wonder, how blind people can tell when they are dreaming or awake. It’s simple. Everyone has a circadian rhythm. For the sighted, this rhythm is guided by light and darkness. For blind people, the darkness also plays a crucial role.
The blind can sense light even if they can not see it directly. Also, by living in a community of sighted people, movements and routines help establish a circadian rhythm. In other cases, different body parts communicate to the brain when someone is conscious or unconscious. As a result, blind people can easily tell when they are awake or sleeping, especially considering this has been their way of life for a while. Therefore, the same way you set up alarms to wake up and run errands, it’s exactly how their life is.
Dreams Remain a Mystery for Everyone
The mystery of dreams has fascinated human beings for centuries. Up to date, no one knows what causes them and why they even occur in the first place. To complicate the matter, very few studies have been done on blind people’s dreams, so we’re working with limited information.
For those who are wondering why they can’t just ask blind people what they dream about, it’s not that straightforward. If this question is posed to a person born blind, they will say no because they have no context of visual dreams. They do not know what an apple looks like, so they cannot see it in their dreams. Assuming you have never eaten sugar all your life, would you comprehend what it is even if people spent decades trying to explain it to you?