Scientist claims to have found the most effective way to control your dreams

A recently-published study has claimed to have found the most effective techniques for controlling dreams.

The study by Australian scientist Dr Denholm Aspy, published in the journal Dreaming, suggests three techniques to increase the chances of lucid dreaming.

This is when you are aware you are dreaming and can therefore control the experience.

The ability to control dreams could potentially help dreamers avoid unwanted nightmares.

Although many techniques already exist for inducing lucid dreams, previous studies have reported low success rates.

The three techniques considered in this study are:

Reality testing

Reality testing involves checking your environment several times a day to see whether or not you're dreaming.

This will help you realise that you are in fact dreaming while you're in a dream.

Wake back to bed

This technique involves waking up after five hours, staying awake for a short period before going back to sleep in order to enter a REM sleep period.

It is during this period in which dreams are more likely to occur.

MILD (mnemonic induction of lucid dreams)

This involves waking up after five hours of sleep and then developing the intention to remember that you are dreaming before returning to sleep, by repeating the phrase: "The next time I'm dreaming, I will remember that I'm dreaming."

You also imagine yourself in a lucid dream.

The findings of the study suggest that people can increase their chances of having a lucid dream by using a combination of all three techniques.

Among the group of 47 people who combined all three techniques, participants achieved a 17% success rate in having lucid dreams over the period of just one week.

Among those who were able to go to sleep within the first five minutes of completing the MILD technique, the success rate of lucid dreaming was much higher, at almost 46% of attempts.

"The MILD technique works on what we call 'prospective memory' - that is, your ability to remember to do things in the future," said Dr Aspy.

"Importantly, those who reported success using the MILD technique were significantly less sleep deprived the next day, indicating that lucid dreaming did not have any negative effect on sleep quality.

"These results take us one step closer to developing highly effective lucid dream induction techniques that will allow us to study the many potential benefits of lucid dreaming, such as treatment for nightmares and improvement of physical skills and abilities through rehearsal in the lucid dream environment."

Dr Aspy is continuing his research into lucid dreams in an attempt to further increase the effectiveness of the technique.

He is conducting a new study, which is open to any English-speaking people aged 18 and over anywhere in the world.

More information about the study and how to take part can be found here .

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