Routledge Children's Dreams: From Freud's Observations to Modern Dream Research

This book aims to present a study on the actuality and empirical value of Freuds dream theory, even if through the analysis of a specific part of it - the hypotheses about childrens dreams. It provides a systematic description of Freuds observations on child dreaming and presents the results obtained from four empirical studies on childrens dreams Review "Colace (Operational Unit of Psychology, Italy's National Health Service) proves that Freud's ideas about children's dreams have systematic properties that allow them to be tested empirically. The author reports on four studies he conducted on children's dreams between 1989 and 1999 to test the empirical validity of Freud's dream theory; two of the studies were done in school settings, one in home settings, and one study was based on parents' responses to a questionnaire. The book begins with an overview of Freud's dream theory and the findings of modern dream research. The author then describes Freud's observations on children's dreams and details the characteristics of children's dreams as described by Freud. In the next section of the book, the author presents the results and conclusions of his own research on children's dreams. He examines the elements of bizarreness and wish-fulfillment in children's dreams and how they relate to the development of superego functions."-- (12/01/2011) "OK, psychoanalytic ideas are too complicated to test, right? Claudio Colace is a member of the vanguard of neuropsychoanalysts who are establishing metapsychology's scientific base. In a brilliantly conceived and executed series of studies Colace shows how superego development between ages three and eight changes the nature of dreams from clear wish fulfillment to bizarrely disguised expressions of motivation."--Brian Johnson, Department of Psychiatry "The study of dreams poses intriguing problems about relations between philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience. Claudio Colace's book is one of the most original and significant works in recent dream science. Colace has undertaken a sophisticated programme of research on young children's dreams over a period of ten years: he argues convincingly that central psychoanalytic hypotheses, on topics such as narrative complexity, bizarreness, and motivation in dreams, can thus be rigorously tested. This rich and provocative book will interest historians and philosophers of science, developmental psychologists, affect theorists, neuropsychoanalysts, and all students of dreaming."--John Sutton, Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science About the Author Colace, Claudio