Monday, 27 October 2008 21:39

Video Games, Lucid Dreaming, and Flow State

By Moses Silbiger, M.A.

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I would like to share today a quite interesting academic research. In the 2nd part of my recent interview with Ken Wilber at Integral Life, I made some comments about the work of Jayne Gackenbach, Ph.D., who has been doing some significant research on video games, lucid dreaming and flow states for several years.

In terms of Integral Psychology and the AQAL Model, Gachenbach’s research brings a fundamental contribution for the understanding of the role of "states of consciousness" in relation to the potentials of video games to catalyze human development.

According to Wilber (2005, 2007), “subtle body” practices such as continuous and steady access to flow/peek inner states as well as lucid dreaming/Dream Yoga - seen from the perspective of conscious developmental/psychological/spiritual practices - can bring significant enhancement to stabilizing State-Stages (Wilber-Combs Matrix, 2007), which in turn contribute to both Horizontal and Vertical human development (see definitions under Mixed-Methods research menu).

Here is a little bit about Gackenbach’s bio, and some links related to her work (papers, PowerPoint presentations, etc.):

Extracted from spiritwatch.com website:

"Dr. Gackenbach received her Ph.D. in 1978 in Experimental Psychology from Virginia Commonwealth University. She has 70+ professional publications and 17 book chapters primarily on dreams and higher states of consciousness. She co-edited “Conscious Mind, Sleeping Brain: Perspectives on Lucid Dreaming” (1988) for Plenum Publishers; “Dream Imagery: A Call to Mental Arms” (1991) for Baywood Publishers. Her first authored book is “Control Your Dreams” (1989) for Harper-Collins. She was invited in 1992 to present her work on lucid dreaming to the Dalai Lama at a conference on sleeping, dreaming, and dying for the Mind and Life Institute.

In recent years Dr. Gackenbach’s interests have shifted to computer-mediated communications. In this regard she has edited a book from Academic Press (1998), “Psychology and the Internet: Intrapersonal, Interpersonal, and Transpersonal Implications”. She has also collaborated on a documentary film about the psychology of Internet use in conjunction with Access TV which is being broadcast most semesters in conjunction with CMNS 421 at Athabasca University.

In addition to her scholarly interest in dreams, transpersonal psychology, computers and the internet Dr. Gackenbach has done work on Aboriginal perspectives on dreams and has taught for 10 years at several Native colleges in central Alberta".