Contents:
- Medical Video: Why Can't We Remember Being Babies?
- Does the baby dream since he was born?
- What are the stages of a dream experienced by a baby during sleep?
- Is it true that babies can experience nightmares?
Medical Video: Why Can't We Remember Being Babies?
There is no more beautiful sight for parents than to see their babies sleep comfortably. Especially when the little one occasionally smiles while sleeping, it feels eager to know what he was dreaming of at that time. Have you ever wondered, do babies dream like adults? Approximately, what do babies dream of? Come on, find out through the full review below.
Does the baby dream since he was born?
You certainly will never know what the baby dreams of starting from birth. Even though you often see a newborn baby smiling during sleep, in fact the baby has not experienced the dream phase in the first two weeks of his birth.
Actually, dreams are a reflection of what we see and think about everyday. Well, babies certainly haven't experienced much interaction with the surrounding environment like adults. As a result, they have not had any shadow of being sent to the brain and processed into dreams.
According to experts, babies begin to be able to dream actively from the age of two weeks. Jodi Mindell, Ph.D., Head of the Sleep Center at The Children 's Hospital of Philadelphia revealed to Parenting that when babies begin to dream, what appears in their dreams is only a collection of images or events without dialogue. This is because babies don't know the language like adults, so their dreams are likely to be silent without sound.
What are the stages of a dream experienced by a baby during sleep?
Just like adults, babies also experience a phase of sleep, namely REM (rapid eye movement) and non-REM. The difference is that a newborn baby can spend half his sleep in the REM phase. Meanwhile, adults spend only a quarter of their sleep in the REM phase and the rest are more in the non-REM phase.
REM phase is the stage of sleep when a person reaches deep sleep, is easily awakened, and dreams. In infants, this phase is usually characterized by an eyelid that suddenly pulsates or the body jerks. These signs indicate that the brain is scanning while the baby is dreaming.
Uniquely, baby dreams are not the same as adult dreams. The reason, what appears in a baby's dream is just a set of soundless images that they managed to record whenliterateor awake. For example, the atmosphere in the room, toys, to the faces of his parents, but without dialogue - aka without sound.
However, the REM sleep phase can help strengthen the baby's memory of things around him. When baby literateor wake up during the day, your little one is trying to absorb all the information around him and make him learn many things. So, your baby's brain doesn't sleep at all even though he is sleeping.
Is it true that babies can experience nightmares?
Now you already know that babies dream from the age of two weeks, even though their dreams only contain a collection of images without sound. Well, what about nightmares? Can babies experience nightmares?
If you see your child suddenly screaming or anxious in the middle of the night while sleeping, actually this does not mean your baby is having a nightmare. Because the baby can not recognize the fear of bad things. So, it's impossible for babies to be afraid of nightmares because they just don't know what fear is like.
Babies may be nervous because they are uncomfortable. Whether the room temperature is too cold or hot, he feels hungry, or his body is not comfortable.
Starting from the age of 2 to 3 years, children are just starting to be able to tell which are happy and where they are afraid. This is what makes children begin to feel scared and lead to nightmares.
So, there is no need to rush to panic if the baby suddenly shrieks while sleeping. Your baby will be calm again - even without waking up completely - by itself after a few minutes. So, you do not need to try to comfort him, because this will actually make him wake up and literatelonger in the middle of the night.
