Definition
Day residues are defined as content from the last or recent days that reappears in a dream during the night.
Introduction
The term was introduced by Freud (1900) in his theory on dreams and how dreams may be interpreted. Day residues are meant to have psychological relevance because they can be characterized as “unfinished business,” problems, conflicts, or tasks that have not yet been solved and that are still relevant for the dreamer. Unlike material from the past, day residues relate to current events in the individual’s life.
Day residues, which are detected in dreams, are assumed to be connected to an unconscious wish that is processed in a dream. They are more neutral or harmless in their content and thus better suited to deceive the censorship when connected to the unconscious wishes that are processed in order to be fulfilled by the dream experience. Sometimes it is difficult to define a day residue because all dream contents are supposed to be experienced during the...
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Hau, S. (2018). Day’s Residues. In: Zeigler-Hill, V., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_577-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_577-1
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