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(1977). Journal of American Academy of Psychoanalysis, 5:255-284

Dreams, Free Association, and the Non-Dominant Hemisphere: An Integration of Psychoanalytical, Neurophysiological, and Historical Data

Michael H. Stone

Summary

Current neurophysiological research on the differential function of the two halves of the brain suggests that the “non-dominant” hemisphere (i.e., the hemisphere which is nondominant for language) may play a special role in generating the visual imagery during REM dream formation, and that the qualities of dream content we regard as distinctive (the bizarre or surrealistic aspects) may derive from the activity of this hemisphere. Information processing appears to be holistic and indifferent to time in the non-dominant hemisphere, whereas the mode of the dominant hemisphere is logical, linear, and time conscious. Optimal psychic life presumably depends upon the continuous interplay of the two halves.

Translation of impressions (predominantly visual) of the non-dominant “right brain” into the language of the “left brain” seems related to our fostering mastery in psychoanalysis by making the unconscious conscious. Use of dr

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