ROCK, Andrea

PERSONAL:

Female.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Croton-on-Hudson, NY. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut St., Philadelphia, PA 19103.

CAREER:

Money magazine, staff writer.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Sigma Delta Chi Distinguished Service Award from Society of Professional Journalists, 1986, and National Magazine Award, 1987, both for Money magazine article "Inside the Billion-Dollar Business of Blood," 1986; Investigative Reporters and Editors Award; Henry Luce Citation for Outstanding Reporting; American Academy of Physicians Award, for outstanding reporting.

WRITINGS:

The Mind at Night: The New Science of How and Why We Dream, Basic Books (New York, NY), 2004.

Contributor to magazines.

SIDELIGHTS:

Award-winning journalist Andrea Rock's first book, The Mind at Night: The New Science of How and Why We Dream, draws on extensive research from the mid-twentieth century onward to investigate the purpose and meaning of dreams. "Rock has long wondered why the brain develops so many plots and characters during sleep rather than, say, resting or 'just doing routine maintenance,'" Bob Condor reported in the Chicago Tribune. "She set out to answer the question—and uncovered many more answers."

She discusses the discovery in the 1950s of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and the recognition that intense dreaming occurs during this phase; scientists' debates about Sigmund Freud's theories on dreams; and research advances such as brain imaging, which offers detailed information on how the mind works during dreams. She relates that, for some people, dreams provide a means to work out solutions to emotional or practical problems. She discounts some popular dream interpretation lore, such as the concept that a given aspect of a dream symbolizes the same thing for all dreamers, or Freud's idea that dreams are an outlet for repressed sexual desires.

Rock's book gives readers "a well-written, often entertaining look inside the mind," remarked a Kirkus Reviews contributor. Entertainment Weekly reviewer Daniel Fierman found The Mind at Night "a damned compelling read," while a Publishers Weekly critic termed it an "exceptionally lucid and engaging work of science writing." A Science News commentator summed up the work as "a thought-provoking look at an unusual but fascinating line of research."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Chicago Tribune, March 21, 2004, Bob Condor, "In Our Dreams, Our Emotions Run the Show," p. Q7.

Entertainment Weekly, March 5, 2004, Daniel Fierman, review of The Mind at Night: The New Science of How and Why We Dream, p. 73.

Kirkus Reviews, January 1, 2004, review of The Mind at Night, p. 28.

Psychology Today, March-April, 2004, review of The Mind at Night, p. 82.

Publishers Weekly, January 19, 2004, review of The Mind at Night, p. 60.

Science News, May 22, 2004, review of The Mind at Night, p. 335.*