Towards a Passive BCI to Induce Lucid Dream

Only about 20% of people regularly experience lucid dreams, but induction techniques can increase their frequency. External stimulation aims to integrate cues into dreams to remind the sleeper they are dreaming. This project replicated such induction with low-cost, portable equipment: an OpenBCI Cyton EEG board for sleep scoring and a mask with two LEDs controlled by a microcontroller. Two volunteers slept for two hours in a lab. One reported that blue lights from the mask were incorporated into their dream; the other awoke during stimulation. These results align with prior work. Ongoing research includes automated online sleep scoring and testing vibro-tactile stimulation.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Lucid dreaming (LD) is a phenomenon during which the person is aware that he/she dreaming and is able to control the dream content. Studies have shown that only 20% of people can experience lucid dreams on a regular basis. However, LD frequency can be increased through induction techniques. External stimulation technique relies on the ability to integrate external information into the dream content. The aim is to remind the sleeper that she/he is dreaming. If this type of protocol is not fully efficient, it demonstrates how sensorial stimuli can be easily incorporated into people's dreams. The objective of our project was to replicate this induction technique using material less expensive and more portable. This material could simplify experimental procedures. Participants could bring the material home, then have a more ecological setting. First, we used the OpenBCI Cyton, a low-cost EEG signal acquisition board in order to record and manually live-score sleep. Then, we designed a mask containing two LEDs, connected to a microcontroller to flash visual stimulation during sleep. We asked two volunteers to sleep for 2 hours in a dedicated room. One of the participants declared having a dream during which the blue lights diffused by the mask were embedded into the dream environment. The other participant woke up during the visual stimulation. These results are congruent with previous studies. This work marked the first step of a larger project. Our ongoing research includes the use of an online sleep stage scoring tool and the possibility to automatically send stimuli according to the sleep stage. We will also investigate other types of stimulus induction in the future such as vibro-tactile stimulation that showed great potentials.