Dreams might mean nothing, but new research finds many people in at least three countries believe dreams contain important hidden truths, as Sigmund Freud did, according to February's Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

"Psychologists' interpretations of the meaning of dreams vary widely," said Carey Morewedge, an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. "But our research shows that people believe their dreams provide meaningful insight into themselves and their world."

In six different studies, researchers surveyed nearly 1,100 people about their dreams with results detailed in the journal.

Dreams might mean nothing, but new research finds many people in at least three countries believe dreams contain important hidden truths, as Sigmund Freud did, according to February's Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. [file photo: Xinhua]

 In one study on general beliefs about dreams, Morewedge and co-author Michael Norton, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School, surveyed 149 university students in the United States, India and South Korea, and asked them to rate different theories about dreams.

Across all three cultures, an overwhelming majority of the students endorsed the theory that dreams reveal hidden truths about themselves and the world, a belief also endorsed by a nationally representative sample of Americans, Morewedge said.

In another study, Morewedge and his colleagues wanted to explore how dreams might influence people's waking behavior. A total of 182 commuters at a Boston train station were asked to imagine that one of four possible scenarios had happened the night before a scheduled airline trip.

"Most people understand that dreams are unlikely to predict the future but that doesn't prevent them from finding meaning in their dreams, whether their contents are mundane or bizarre," he said.

(Agencies via Xinhua News Agency February 19, 2009)