The incidence and significance of perceptual qualities in the reported dreams of patients with anorexia nervosa.

The dreams of anorexic patients' were recorded using a standardized sleep questionnaire concerning the perceptual qualities and affects remembered from their dreams. The anorexic subjects consistently had less frequent dream recall, fewer dreams in colour and fewer pleasurable themes than was noted in the normal controls. Anorexics frequently saw themselves in their dreams as having a distorted body (especially an enlarged belly), a younger appearance, and experienced food and hunger dysphoria. The evaluation of an anorexic patient's dreams and their subsequent changes in both sensations and the frequency of reported dreaming may have diagnostic and as well as prognostic importance for the therapeutic assessment of anorexia nervosa.