Research Topic · Peer-Reviewed

Rem Sleep Behavior

REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD) is a parasomnia in which the normal muscle paralysis (atonia) of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep is lost, allowing affected individuals to physically act out the content of their dreams. During healthy REM sleep, vivid dreaming occurs while skeletal muscles are actively inhibited, pr…

Curated from this journal's research 📚 10 peer-reviewed articles cited Cited 48× across the literature 🔖 ISSN 2574-4518 🗓 Reviewed July 2026

Overview

REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD) is a parasomnia in which the normal muscle paralysis (atonia) of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep is lost, allowing affected individuals to physically act out the content of their dreams. During healthy REM sleep, vivid dreaming occurs while skeletal muscles are actively inhibited, preventing movement; in RBD this protective atonia fails, so dream enactment produces movements that may include talking, shouting, grabbing, punching, kicking, or leaping from bed. These behaviors often correspond to action-filled dreams and can injure the sleeper or a bed partner and disrupt sleep. RBD becomes more common with advancing age. Its particular clinical importance lies in its strong association with neurodegenerative disease: idiopathic RBD is recognized as an early marker that can precede the onset of alpha-synuclein-related disorders such as Parkinson's disease, sometimes by many years. The disorder is distinguished from other parasomnias and nocturnal events through clinical history and video-polysomnography, which documents REM sleep without the expected atonia. Management focuses on protecting against injury through a safe sleep environment and on pharmacological measures to reduce dream-enactment behaviors, alongside evaluation for associated neurological conditions. Research in sleep medicine examines the mechanisms underlying loss of REM atonia, the link between RBD and neurodegeneration, and approaches to diagnosis and treatment, making RBD a significant focus within sleep and neurological science.

Research published in this journal

10 peer-reviewed articles, ranked by relevance. Each links to its DOI.

How this research is being cited

The 10 articles above have been cited 48 times in the scholarly literature. Citation data via OpenAlex and Crossref, updated Jun 2026.

A sample of recent works citing this journal's research on Rem Sleep Behavior, linking to each citing work.

Editorial oversight

Curated from peer-reviewed research published in Sleep And Sleep Disorder Research (ISSN 2574-4518).

Journal editorial board
Dragos Octavian Palade · Romania Mauro Manconi · Switzerland Karim Sedky · United States

This page summarises published research for orientation; it is not medical or professional advice.