Virtual reality as a metacognitive training tool for lucid dreaming

Lucid dreaming (LD) involves awareness of being in a dream during REM sleep and depends on the reactivation of metacognitive and reality-monitoring processes. This study tested whether a virtual reality (VR) intervention designed to rehearse lucid-dream-relevant metacognitive routines increases LD rates beyond baseline training, and whether generic VR exposure produces similar effects.

Thirty-eight participants with low previous LD experience completed a 5-week program of daily dream diaries and reality checks, assigned to: VR-experimental (n = 13), standard training plus eight LucidDreamingVR sessions preceded by brief open monitoring (OM) meditation; VR-control (n = 12), standard training plus eight LD-unrelated VR sessions; or Control (n = 13), standard training only. Dreams were classified as ordinary, semi-lucid, or lucid; semi-lucid and lucid dreams were treated as lucid-like.

VR-experimental participants reported the highest number of lucid like dreams (26), followed by Control (11) and VR-control (4). A Poisson model with total recalled dreams as offset showed that lucid-like dream rates were significantly higher in VR-experimental than in VR-control, RR = 8.60, 95% CI [3.00, 24.64], p_Holm <0.001, and Control, RR = 4.00, 95% CI [1.97, 8.09], p_Holm <0.001. Responder rates showed a convergent pattern, with at least one lucid-like dream reported by 84.6% of VR-experimental participants, 61.5% of Control participants, and 33.3% of VR-control participants, showing that VR exposure alone was insufficient.

Dream-oriented VR training preceded by OM meditation may facilitate LD by scaffolding metacognitive monitoring from wakefulness to REM sleep.