Dreaming in Black and White

My Mom told me that she usually dreams in  black and white instead of in color.  Since she was raised in the era of black and white films and black and white television, this seems like a normal thing for her brain to have done.  She spent a good part of her day looking at black and white images and so dreamt in black and white images.  In the last couple of decades, she began dreaming in color. 

And Mom was not alone. A study by the University of Dundee published in 2008 reported that 25% people over 55 dreamt in black and white (well -- 25% people over 55 who participated in the survey, anyway.)  12% of people in the study claimed that they always dreamt in black and white.

But another group of people also dream in black and white -- psychopaths.  This is the finding in The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry (Penguin; 2011.)  Author Jon Ronson (best known as the author of The Men Who Stare at Goats) interviewed workers at Oak Ridge, an asylum near Ontario.  One unconventional therapy ca. 1968 involved patients getting naked and being stuck in a large room where they talked to each other and tour groups could watch.  Another was the Dream Group, where patients talked about their dreams.  Dream Group happened sometime in the 1970s.

Turns out the psychopaths really hated Dream Group because they could barely remember their dreams and when they did they were in black and white.  However, the schizophrenics went to town.  Not only were their dreams in color, but they could remember haing multiple dreams a night.  Unfortunately, their dreams bored the rest of the patients -- especially the psychopaths.

Considering the time frame when this Dream Group took place, it is possible that all of the psychopaths at Oak Ridge who dreamt in black and white grew up in the era of black and white film and television.  But I have not been able to find any studies of the dream content of younger   psychopaths. (Although I admit that I didn't look very hard.)

So, if you are under age 55 and dream in black and white, does it mean that you are a psychopath?  Probably not.  Dreaming in black and white is not one of the 20 most common traits of a psychopath as listed in the Hare Psychopathy Checklist.  By the way, it is psychopathologists estimate that about 1% of the human population are psychopaths.

Sweet dreams, kids.