Chapter 8: The Microgenetic Study of Daydreaming

Stacey Pereia and Rainer Dirwachter (this volume) have chosen a common, but largely neglected psychological phenomenon to submit to microgenetic analysis. Daydreaming is an everyday experience, has been approached from different psychological perspectives for over a hundred years, and continues to present researchers of the mind with methodological challenges. Pereira and Diriwächter have taken up the specific challenge of developing a microgenetic account of changes in daydreaming activities. They set themselves the goal of analyzing the processes and characteristics of daydreaming, and showing how it is amenable to microgenetic analysis. They provide evidence of changes in daydreaming in experimental situations and their participants’ reports of their daydreaming experiences. Their goal is not simply a smart exercise in applying microgenetic analysis to an unusual domain. Essentially Pereira and Diriwächter are asking questions about the how and why of daydreaming, proposing that a microgenetic approach makes a unique contribution to our understanding of this common, but enigmatic phenomenon, by revealing how daydreaming experiences emerge and are elaborated.