The subjective experience of mind wandering in Alzheimer's disease.

Introduction: Little is known about mind wandering in Alzheimer's disease (AD). In this study, we evaluated the subjective experience of mind wandering in AD.Methods: We invited AD patients and control participants to rate the occurrence, intentionality, emotionality, visual imagery, specificity, self-relatedness and temporal orientation of mind wandering.Results: Analysis showed that AD patients rated their mind wandering as more frequent, negative, and more oriented toward the past, but less vivid and specific than that of control participants. No significant differences were observed between AD patients and control participants regarding the intentionality or self-relatedness of mind wandering.Conclusions: These findings demonstrate the negative content in AD. Regarding the reduction of visual imagery and specificity during mind wandering, this reduction may mirror a diminished subjective experience of mind wandering in AD. Regarding temporality, our results may reflect a tendency of AD patients to reminisce over past experiences. Finally, mind wandering in AD seems to trigger significant self-related content.

Off-track thoughts: Intentional and unintentional mind wandering in Alzheimer's disease.

AIM: Despite the recent upsurge of interest in mind wandering (i.e. the occurrence of task-unrelated and stimulus-independent thoughts), little research has attempted to evaluate mind wandering in Alzheimer's disease (AD). We addressed this issue by evaluating intentional and unintentional mind wandering, as well as the relationship between both mind-wandering domains. We also investigated the relationship between mind wandering and depression and working memory. METHODS: A total of 30 participants with AD and 33 control participants participated in the study. RESULTS: The results showed higher intentional and unintentional mind wandering in AD participants than in controls. In AD participants and controls, both mind wandering domains were significantly correlated with depression, but not with working memory. CONCLUSIONS: The present findings show a tendency of AD patients to shift from external stimuli to task-unrelated thoughts and concerns, a tendency that seems to be related with depression. Geriatr Gerontol Int 2019; 19: 342-346.

Investigating on the Methodology Effect When Evaluating Lucid Dream.

Lucid dreaming (LD) is a state of consciousness in which the dreamer is aware that he or she is dreaming and can possibly control the content of his or her dream. To investigate the LD prevalence among different samples, researchers have used different types of methodologies. With regard to retrospective self-report questionnaire, two ways of proceeding seem to emerge. In one case, a definition of LD is given to participants ("During LD, one is-while dreaming-aware of the fact that one is dreaming. It is possible to deliberately wake up, to control the dream action, or to observe passively the course of the dream with this awareness"), while in the other instances, participants are presented separate questions targeting specific LD indicators (dream awareness and dream control). In the present study, we measured LD frequency in a sample of French student in order to investigate for possible disparities in LD frequency depending on the type of questionnaire as outlined above. Moreover, we also study links between the prevalence of LD as assessed, respectively, by each questionnaire with various factors such as Vividness of Mental Imagery and Parasomnia. Results revealed no significant difference between LD frequencies across questionnaires. For the questionnaire with definition (DefQuest), 81.05% of participants reported experience of LD once or more. Concerning the questionnaire based on LD indicators (AwarContQuest), 73.38% of participants reported having experienced LD once or more. However, with regard to the correlations analysis, links between LD prevalence and factors such as Vividness of Mental Imagery and Parasomnia, varied across questionnaires. This result is an argument suggesting that researchers should be careful when investigating links between LD and other factors. The type of methodology may influence findings on LD research. Further studies are needed to investigate on the methodology effect in LD research namely on the respective weight of awareness and control.