I propose that anxiety – especially the degree of anxiety which would extend into the dreaming state – is more likely to be the result of a heightened sensitivity to the world brought about by an irrational belief system surrounding the activating events experienced by the individual. The act of cognitive restructuring, and its immense success, pursued by Cognitive Behavior Therapy suggests maladaptive and often irrational thinking perpetuates anxiety by creating a poorly functioning belief system against which one measures or decides the “fear factor” of something; one takes this faulty belief system into the real world and conjures up more fear than is necessary.

What does one take away from your study? Not much, in my opinion. As you suggested, the set of data is far too small to be useful. In my opinion, all members of our society – from conservative to liberal – are extremely irrational in many ways because we, as humans, are innately irrational and reactionary creatures.

In conclusion, I have the massive amount of research surrounding the positive influence of cognitive restructuring on those with heightened levels of anxiety to support my notion that anxiety, in no way, suggests a heightened sense of realism; but instead, is simply one wavelength of a continuing spectrum of interpretations of a complex reality that does not promote one to comfortably living in our world.