I didn't know this has been observed before, but I did notice the connections between my sleep paralysis along with a few other things by myself, especially after I start becoming interested in spiritual matters. I'm not religious, yet I do have a very strong interest in spiritual theory's, like subjects about higher powers, what happens after death, etc.
I can complete understand the connection between them, being as my personal belief is that our dreams is another reality, not just some fake world we create in our head. So I can understand being stuck between both realities, resulting in sleep paralysis.
Actually this is completely natural. The ability of using your mind is not against nature. It's expanding your current knowledge of the unknown, which is something we should strive for as a human race.