Ok so I was watching a video of a youtuber and he said that he experienced a very long REM period by leaving his phone playing a normal 30 sec tiktok video (hes not talking about binaural beats or anything of that kind) on loop while he fell asleep. And he claimed he experienced a ton of dreams which got more realistic and "psycodelic" as time went on. And he claimed that he could hear the tiktok video playing on the background while he was dreaming. And hes not like someone who practices lucid dreaming or anything like it. Is that possible? (btw he mentioned hes phone's volume was on max) (Oh and a detail I forgot to include is the fact the video looped on the background made him lucid by what he claimed was his whole dream period)
If you want to see the video you will need to know portuguese or spanish
(The interesting bit starts at 4:38)
It's certainly possible to us an outside audio source as a means to experience lucidity, this is known as the anchor technique, and this can happen whether one knows about lucid dreaming or not. For many, experiences like this can induce their first taste of lucid dreaming - as often this occurs under circumstances where sleep is disturbed in multiple ways, such as on a flight, while sleeping in a new environment etc. By serendipity, I was using this exact technique for my long Sunday nap this morning, using an audio track to maintain awareness. Anchor does seem to allow for longer periods of lucidity, as the constant reminder keeps one grounded and returning to a state of awareness. However, the longer lucidity experienced with Anchor is also due to the fact that in order to fall asleep under such conditions, one must already be rather tired, or experiencing REM rebound. The YouTuber in question was likely very sleepy, in desperate need of REM, and this is why they were able to sleep during the full volume recording - it wold also explain the long dream (as the mind is playing "catch-up"). It would be foolish to assume that it is a technique that can be replicated without the same circumstances, as for most, playing a track at this volume would simply lead to insomnia. So the principle is sound, however it seems that they have made a sweeping assumption based on a situation with other more important variables at play.