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Abstract Background Nightmares are associated with parental bonding styles and various psychiatric disorders, but the exact connections between different nightmare experience features and family relationships in healthy volunteers and nightmare disorder patients are still unclear. Methods We therefore invited 62 nightmare disorder patients and 135 healthy volunteers to undergo tests of the Nightmare Experience Questionnaire (NEQ), the Family Relationship Questionnaire (FRQ), and the Plutchik - van Praag Depression Inventory (PVP). Results Besides the higher nightmare frequency and the higher PVP and four NEQ scale scores, the nightmare disorder patients had higher scores of FRQ Paternal Abuse, and lower ones of General Attachment, Maternal Encouragement, Maternal Freedom Release, and Paternal Freedom Release. The PVP was correlated with some NEQ and FRQ scales in both healthy volunteers and patients, and it functioned as a mediator between Physical Effect and Maternal Dominance in patients. Regarding predicting NEQ by FRQ, Paternal Abuse predicted Physical Effect, Maternal Dominance predicted Physical Effect and Horrible Stimulation, General Attachment predicted Horrible Stimulation (−) in healthy volunteers; Maternal Dominance predicted Physical Effect, Meaning Interpretation, and Horrible Stimulation, Paternal Freedom Release predicted Physical Effect (−), and Paternal Dominance predicted Meaning Interpretation and nightmare frequency in patients. Conclusions Our study has demonstrated that the inappropriate family relationships were linked with different aspects of nightmare experience, especially in nightmare disorder patients.