Having nightmares? Scientists say a love of cheese may be linked to bad dreams.
A strong association has been discovered between nightmares and lactose intolerance. In turn, stomach pain or gas during the night can affect sleep.
Understanding that relationship — and potentially cutting out cheese — could help improve sleep quality, which may already be disrupted due to noise and light pollution or other health issues. Good sleep is crucial for the body to function well.
“Nightmare severity is robustly associated with lactose intolerance and other food allergies,” lead researcher Dr. Tore Nielsen, of the Université de Montréal, explained in a statement. “These new findings imply that changing eating habits for people with some food sensitivities could alleviate nightmares. They could also explain why people so often blame dairy for bad dreams!”
To reach these conclusions, the researchers questioned more than 1,000 students at Canada’s MacEwan University about their sleep, eating habits, and any perceived tie between the two.
About a third of participants reported having regular nightmares. The majority of those reporting poor sleep and nightmares were women, who were also more likely to remember their dreams and nearly twice as likely as men to report a food allergy or intolerance.
Some 40 percent of the students said they thought that eating late at night or eating specific foods had affected their sleep, and about a quarter believed that consuming certain foods could make their sleep worse. Many blamed bad sleep on spicy foods, sweets, and dairy. However, just 5.5 percent felt that what they ate impacted the tone of their dreams.
People with less healthy diets were more likely to have bad dreams and less likely to remember their dreams.
The authors compared reports of food intolerances to those of bad dreams and poor sleep, finding that lactose intolerance was associated with gastrointestinal symptoms, nightmares, and low sleep quality.
“Nightmares are worse for lactose-intolerant people who suffer severe gastrointestinal symptoms and whose sleep is disrupted,” said Nielsen. “This makes sense, because we know that other bodily sensations can affect dreaming.”
They noted that improved awareness of food intolerance could mean students in the study ate fewer foods likely to lead to negative outcomes. A previous study, conducted by Nielsen more than a decade ago, showed even more participants reported a link between their food and dreams. Prior research, separate from Nielsen’s, has also pointed to this relationship, and blue cheese specifically has been reported to cause vivid dreams. But, there have also been studies showing that dairy helps sleep quality.
It remains unclear how sleep and diet impact each other. The authors said additional research is needed to confirm these links and identify the underlying mechanisms.
“We need to study more people of different ages, from different walks of life, and with different dietary habits to determine if our results are truly generalizable to the larger population,” said Nielsen.
The article was published Tuesday in the journal Frontiers in Psychology.
