DREAMS: NOCTURNAL EMISSIONS
Humans seem to have a virtual monopoly on orgasm during sleep: the phenomenon has almost never been noted in other animals. Although such orgasms are a common but quantitatively unimportant occurrence among males in the United States, they have received virtually no clinical attention aside from a study of the content of accompanying dreams. The presence, absence, and frequency of nocturnal emissions have been regarded (or perhaps disregarded) with neutrality rather than utilized as a criterion for evaluating sexual adjustment and emotional status. However, there has been much attention paid, particularly by psychoanalysts, to the content of dreams, and dream analysis has become an almost standard method for exploring the personality of the individual. In such analyses many dreams which appear to be asexual are considered sexual because of their symbolic content: thus dreams of flying, of water, of wells or tunnels, etc., are construed as sexual dreams. In the present study no dream was considered as sexual solely on the basis of symbolism. To be termed sexual in our sense of the word a dream had to incorporate some overt sexual element recognized as such by the person reporting it.
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Men’s Health Erective Dysfunction