Question: What makes us have nightmares?

Anais Kahve answered on 9 Mar 2016:

Hello, I don’t think anyone knows the true answer to this but there are some theories out there. One theory is that if we experience a traumatic or scary event during the day then our brain remembers it when we sleep at night. This is because it is thought that our brain processes all of the information from the day and puts it in our long term memory. What is odd though is that some people have nightmares even if they say that nothing bad or scary has happened to them during the day. Maybe they have nightmares because sub-consciously they are scared – this could mean that they may not realise they have been scared during the day but only realise that they have been scared when they are asleep.