Volunteers are being tickled while waking from sleep in a bizarre experiment at a Welsh university. But it is no laughing matter as far as Mark Blagrove is concerned. Dr Blagrove uses a specially-constructed tickling machine at the University of Wales, Swansea, to investigate the nature of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and dreaming. Dr Blagrove, a reader in psychology and director of the university's sleep laboratory, will present his work at a world conference in the United States this week. REM sleep is the stage when the body is "paralysed" but the brain is very active. It is also when dreams are most likely. Dr Blagrove will tell the Tucson Consciousness Conference at the University of Arizona that the volunteers experience self-tickling as though it were done by someone else. "Everyone knows that, if you are awake, you can't tickle yourself as well as other people can tickle you," Dr Blagrove said. "However, if you are woken from REM sleep and tickle yourself it feels as intense as if you are being tickled by someone else." A device developed by the Institute of Neurology in London produces the tickling sensation on the palm of the hand. Researchers believe their work may be of help in helping patients determine what sensations they can control. "People with schizophrenia can successfully tickle themselves because they produce hallucinations, but think that what they see is real, coming from outside themselves, not actually produced by them," the doctor added. "They experience self-tickling with the same intensity as if it were produced by someone else. "REM sleep allows you to believe that the events of the dream are real, that you are not producing them, and this characteristic of REM sleep carries over for a few minutes when you are awake and enables you to tickle yourself for a few minutes after waking up." Dr Blagrove said the study being carried out had "really major implications" for the science of consciousness.
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