ABSTRACT
The research method Structural Dream Analysis (SDA) is described which allows for systematic analysis of the meaning of dreams in Analytical psychotherapies. SDA understands dreams as narratives and draws on narratological methods to identify major themes and their development over the course of a psychotherapy; dreams point to the core problems/conflicts, but they also contain elements to solve these problems and the series of dreams follows an inner structure of meaning. As a result the development of the inner world of a patient and the changes brought about by psychotherapy can be reconstructed without referring to other information than the dreams. Comparison with reports by the psychotherapist conducting the treatment about the psychodynamics of the patient and the course of psychotherapy show significant parallels with the results of SDA.
