Nightmares in People with COVID-19: Did Coronavirus Infect Our Dreams?

Authors

• Serena Scarpelli, Sapienza University of Rome
• Michael R. Nadorff, Mississippi State University
• Bjørn Bjorvatn, Haukeland University Hospital
• Frances Chung, University of Toronto
• Yves Dauvilliers, Univ Montpellier
• Colin A. Espie, University of Oxford
• Yuichi Inoue, Tokyo Medical University
• Kentaro Matsui, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry
• Ilona Merikanto, University of Helsinki
• Charles M. Morin, Université Laval
• Thomas Penzel, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin
• Mariusz Sieminski, Medical University of Gdansk
• Han Fang, Peking University People's Hospital
• Tainá Macêdo, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte
• Sérgio A. Mota-Rolim, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte
• Damien Leger, Université de Paris
• Giuseppe Plazzi, Istituto delle Scienze Neurologiche di Bologna
• Ngan Yin Chan, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
• Markku Partinen, University of Helsinki
• Courtney J. Bolstad, Mississippi State University
• Brigitte Holzinger, Institute for Consciousness and Dream Research
• Luigi De Gennaro, Sapienza University of Rome

ORCID

Scarpelli: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9260-7111; Dauvilliers: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0683-6506; Merikanto: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1222-6678; Penzel: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4304-0112; Sieminski: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8219-2912; Fang: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0364-8457; Macêdo: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1474-4329; Leger: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1168-480X; Plazzi: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1051-0472; Bolstad: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2297-2778; Holzinger: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5385-4091; De Gennaro: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3613-6631

MSU Affiliation

College of Arts and Sciences; Department of Psychology

Creation Date

2026-06-30

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: A growing number of studies have demonstrated that the coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic has severely affected sleep and dream activity in healthy people. To date, no investigation has examined dream activity specifically in COVID-19 patients. METHODS: As part of the International COVID-19 Sleep Study (ICOSS), we compared 544 COVID-19 participants with 544 matched-controls. A within-subjects comparison between pre-pandemic and pandemic periods computed separately for controls and COVID-19 participants were performed on dream recall and nightmare frequency (DRF; NF). Also, non-parametric comparisons between controls and COVID-19 participants were carried out. Further, we compared psychological measures between the groups collected during pandemic. Ordinal logistic regression to detect the best predictors of NF was performed. RESULTS: We found that people reported greater dream activity during the pandemic. Comparisons between controls and COVID-19 participants revealed a) no difference between groups concerning DRF in the pre-pandemic period and during the pandemic; b) no difference between groups concerning nightmare frequency in the pre-pandemic period; and c) COVID-19 participants reported significantly higher NF than controls during pandemic (p = 0.003). Additionally, we showed that a) anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress-disorder (PTSD) symptom scores were higher in COVID-19 participants than controls; and b) quality of life and health as well as wellbeing (WHO-5) scores were significantly higher in controls than COVID-19 participants. Finally, ordinal logistic regression indicates that DRF (p < 0.001), PTSD (p < 0.001), anxiety (p = 0.018), insomnia (p = 0.039), COVID-19 severity (p = 0.014), sleep duration (p = 0.003) and age (p = 0.001) predicted NF. DISCUSSION: Our work shows strong associations between increased nightmares in those reporting having had COVID-19. This suggests that the more that people were affected by COVID-19, the greater the impact upon dream activity and quality of life.

Publication Date

1-1-2022

Publication Title

Nature and Science of Sleep

Publisher

Taylor and Francis Group; Dove Press

First Page

93

Last Page

108

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Rights

© 2022 The Author(s)

Recommended Citation

Scarpelli S, Nadorff MR, Bjorvatn B, Chung F, Dauvilliers Y, Espie CA, Inoue Y, Matsui K, Merikanto I, Morin CM, Penzel T, Sieminski M, Fang H, Macêdo T, Mota-Rolim SA, Leger D, Plazzi G, Chan NY, Partinen M, Bolstad CJ, Holzinger B, De Gennaro L. Nightmares in People with COVID-19: Did Coronavirus Infect Our Dreams?. Nat Sci Sleep. 2022;14:93-108. https://doi.org/10.2147/NSS.S344299