by LAURA TABOR
Lifestyles Reporter

Ever wondered why your whole body sometimes jerks awake right before falling asleep?

“It’s called a ‘myoclonic jerk,’ which sounds like some kind of 70s dance,” psychology professor Joan B. Woodworth said. “It’s actually when your muscles are relaxing faster than the oxygen can get to them.”

Woodworth has studied sleep and dreams for many years and recently taught an open seminar on the subject.

She discussed five different types of sleep, usually called stages one, two, three, four and Rapid Eye Movement, or REM sleep.

“Most dreams occur during REM sleep,” Woodworth said. “If you wake up someone during REM sleep, 95 percent of the time they will recall a dream.”

REM sleep, which takes up about two hours of a given night’s sleep, is accompanied by a phenomenon called sleep paralysis, which keeps the body still during the time when the body might try to act out its dreams, Woodworth said.

In other stages, sleep walking, sleep talking, and non-REM dreams occur.

“People can do some amazing things in their sleep,” Woodworth said. “It isn’t a very articulated state though.”

Sophomore geography major Emily A. Mason’s only knowledge of her dream life is through her roommate hearing her sleep talk.

“Sometimes, one of us will say something loud enough to sort of wake the other up,” Mason said. “We have a kind of half-conscious conversation.”

Sleep deprivation results in fewer dreams because of less time spent in REM sleep and can also make the sleeper unable to remember the few dreams he or she may have.

“Your life has to do with dream recall – not enough sleep, interrupted sleep, being really busy and preoccupied, can all make you not remember dreams as well,” Woodworth said.

Dreams often contain recurring themes, which some people believe are sources of archetypes common to all people.

“I often dream that I’m in a house,” freshman graphic arts and imaging technology major Devin R. Cremins said. “But it isn’t a house I’ve ever lived in, or even ever seen.”

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