Social Psychology

Analysis of the Movie A Beautiful Mind

Jennifer M Andrews W404 III B.A. (EPO)

St. Josephs College for Women (Autonomous)

Psychological Analysis of the the film A Beautiful Mind

Are the hallucinationsgone? No, but Ive gotten used to ignoring them, and as a result, theyve kind of given up on me. I think thats sorta what its like with dreams and nightmares. Weve gotta keep feeding them for them to stay alive -John Nash, A Beautiful Mind

Characters in the movie

John Forbes Nash: Charles Herman: Martin Hansen: Richard Sol: Ainsley: Bender: Alicia Larde: Marcee: William Parcher: Dr. Rosen: Nashs wife Charles Niece Agent from the Defense Department of United States Psychiatrist who treats John Other Maths and Science graduate students The Protagonist Literature student and Nashs roommate

Storyline
In 1947, John Forbes Nash arrives at Princeton University as a new graduate student. He is a recipient of the prestigious Carnegie Prize for mathematics; although he was promised a single room, his roommate Charles Herman, a literature student, greets him as he moves in and soon becomes his best friend. Nash also meets a group of other promising math and science graduate students, Martin Hansen, Richard Sol, Ainsley, and Bender, with whom he strikes up an awkward friendship. Nash admits to Charles that he is better with numbers than he is with people. The mathematics department chairman of Princeton informs Nash, who has missed many of his classes, that he cannot begin work until he finishes a thesis paper, prompting him

to seek a truly original idea for the paper. A woman at the bar is what ultimately inspires his fruitful work in the concept of governing dynamics, a theory in mathematical economics. After the conclusion of Nash's studies as a student at Princeton, he accepts a prestigious appointment at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), along with his friends Sol and Bender. In 1953, while teaching a class on calculus at MIT, he places a particularly interesting problem on the chalkboard that he dares his students to solve. He is not particularly interested in teaching and his delusions even cause him to miss the class. When a Salvadoran student, Alicia Larde, comes to his office to discuss why he did not show up, she also asks him to dinner and the two fall in love and eventually marry. On a return visit to Princeton, Nash runs into his former roommate Charles and meets Charles' young niece Marcee, whom he adores. Nash is invited to a secret Department of Defense facility in the Pentagon to crack a complex encryption of an enemy telecommunication. Nash is able to decipher the code mentally, to the astonishment of other code-breakers. Here, he encounters the mysterious William Parcher, who belongs to the United States Department of Defense. Parcher observes Nash's performance from above, while partially concealed behind a screen. Parcher gives Nash a new assignment to look for patterns in magazines and newspapers, ostensibly to thwart a Soviet plot. He must write a report of his findings and place them in a specified mailbox. After being chased by Soviet agents and an exchange of gunfire, Nash becomes increasingly paranoid and begins to behave erratically. After observing this erratic behavior, Alicia informs a psychiatric hospital. Later, while delivering a guest lecture at Harvard University, Nash realizes that he is being watched by a hostile group of people, and although he attempts to flee, he is forcibly sedated and sent to a psychiatric facility. Nash's internment seemingly confirms his belief that the Soviets are trying to extract information from him. He views the officials of the psychiatric facility as Soviet kidnappers. At one point, he gorily tries to dig out of his arm an implant he received at an unused warehouse on the MIT campus, which was supposedly used as a listening facility by the DoD (Department of Defense). Alicia, desperate and obligated to help her husband, visits the mailbox and retrieves the never-opened "top secret" documents that Nash had delivered there. When confronted with this evidence, Nash is finally convinced that he has been hallucinating. The Department of Defense agent William Parcher and Nash's secret assignment to decode Soviet messages was in fact all a delusion. Even more surprisingly, Nash's "prodigal roommate" Charles and his niece Marcee are also products of his mind.

After a series of insulin shock therapy sessions, Nash is released on the condition that he agrees to take antipsychotic medication; however, the drugs create negative sideeffects that affect his sexual and emotional relationship with his wife and, most dramatically, his intellectual capacity. Frustrated, Nash secretly stops taking his medication and hoards his pills, triggering a relapse of his psychosis. In 1956, while bathing his infant son, Nash becomes distracted and wanders off. Alicia is hanging laundry in the backyard and observes that the back gate is open. She discovers that Nash has turned an abandoned shed in a nearby grove of trees into an office for his work for Parcher. Upon realizing what has happened, Alicia runs into the house to confront Nash and barely saves their child from drowning in the bathtub. When she confronts him, Nash claims that his friend Charles was watching their son. Alicia runs to the phone to call the psychiatric hospital for emergency assistance. Nash suddenly sees Parcher who urges him to kill his wife, but Nash angrily refuses to do such a thing. After Parcher points a gun at her, Nash lunges for him, accidentally knocking Alicia and the baby to the ground. Alicia flees the house in fear with their child, but Nash steps in front of her car to prevent her from leaving. After a moment, he tells Alicia, "She never gets old"-referring to Marcee, who, although years have passed since their first encounter, has remained exactly the same age and is still a little girl. Realizing the implications of this fact, he finally accepts that although all three people seem completely real, they are in fact part of his hallucinations. Caught between the intellectual paralysis of the antipsychotic drugs and his delusions, Nash and Alicia decide to try to live with his abnormal condition. Nash consciously says goodbye to the three delusional characters forever in his attempts to ignore his hallucinations and not feed "his demons". He thanks Charles for being his best friend over the years, and says a tearful goodbye to Marcee, stroking her hair and calling her "baby girl", telling them both he would not speak to them anymore. They still continue to haunt him, with Charles mocking him for cutting off their friendship, but Nash learns to ignore them. Nash grows older and approaches his old friend and intellectual rival, Martin Hansen, now head of the Princeton mathematics department, who grants him permission to work out of the library and audit classes. Even though Nash still suffers from hallucinations and mentions taking newer medications, he is ultimately able to live with and largely ignore his psychotic episodes. He takes his situation in stride and humorously checks to ensure that any new acquaintances are in fact real people, not hallucinations. Nash eventually earns the privilege of teaching again. In 1994, Nash is honored by his fellow professors for his achievement in mathematics, and goes on to win the Nobel

Memorial Prize in Economics for his revolutionary work on game theory. Nash and Alicia are about to leave the auditorium in Stockholm, when Nash sees Charles, Marcee and Parcher standing and watching him with blank expressions on their faces. Alicia asks Nash, "What is it?" Nash replies, "Nothing. Nothing at all." With that, they both leave the auditorium.

Introduction to the disorder

Schizophrenia is a complex mental disorder that makes it difficult to: Tell the difference between real and unreal experiences Think logically Have normal emotional responses, Behave normally in social situations

It is one of the psychotic mental disorders and is characterized by symptoms of thought, behavior, and social problems. The thought problems associated with schizophrenia are described as psychosis, in that the person's thinking is completely out of touch with reality at times. For example, the sufferer may hear voices or see people that are in no way present or feel like bugs are crawling on their skin when there are none. The individual with this disorder may also have disorganized speech, disorganized behavior, physically rigid or lax behavior (catatonia), significantly decreased behaviors or feelings, as well as delusions, which are ideas about themselves or others that have no basis in reality. There are five types of schizophrenia, each based on the kind of symptoms the person has at the time of assessment. John Nash suffered from Paranoid Schizophrenia. Paranoid schizophrenia is where the individual is preoccupied with one or more delusions or many auditory hallucinations but does not have symptoms of disorganized schizophrenia. They experience the paranoia of thinking others are plotting against them when they are not. Causes: Schizophrenia is a complex illness. Mental health experts are not sure what causes it. However, genetic factors appear to play a role.

Certain environmental events may trigger schizophrenia in people who are genetically at risk for it. One is more likely to develop schizophrenia if he/she has a family member with the disease.

Environmentally, the risks of developing schizophrenia can even occur before birth. For example, the risk of schizophrenia is increased in individuals whose mother had one of certain infections during pregnancy. Difficult life circumstances during childhood, like the early loss of a parent, parental poverty, bullying, witnessing parental violence; emotional, sexual, or physical abuse; physical or emotional neglect; and insecure attachment have been associated with the development of this illness. Symptoms: Symptoms of schizophrenia include the following: Positive, more overtly psychotic symptoms

Beliefs that have no basis in reality (delusions) Hearing, seeing, feeling, smelling, or tasting things that have no basis in reality (hallucinations) Disorganized speech Disorganized behaviors Catatonic behaviors Bizarre behaviors Social isolation

Negative, potentially less overtly psychotic symptoms

Inhibition of facial expressions Lack of speech Lack of motivation

Symptoms can vary, depending on the type of schizophrenia you have. Paranoid schizophrenia symptoms may include:

Anxious Angry or argumentative

Delusions of Persecution (False believes that others are trying to harm you or your loved ones)

The course of paranoid schizophrenia may be episodic, with partial or complete remissions, or chronic. In chronic cases, the florid symptoms persist over years and it is difficult to distinguish discrete episodes.

Analysis of the Character

In the movie, "A Beautiful Mind", John Nash displays classic positive symptoms of a schizophrenic. This movie does a fair job in portraying the personality and daily suffering of someone who is affected by the disease, although the film does not give a completely historically accurate account. In the film, John Nash would fall into the category of a paranoid schizophrenic, portraying all the symptoms that are typical for this illness. John Nash is seen exhibiting bizarre behavior from the time he enters Princeton. There is something different about him. He is very calculative and is able to derive at a mathematical explanation for the things around him. He thinks he is not good in social situations. For instance, when he speaks to Charles he says, I dont like people much and they dont much like me; but he strongly believes he is an amazingly talented mathematician (which he is) and of which he is rather too proud. He says the following lines to Martin I imagine youre getting quite used to miscalculation. Ive read both your pre-prints on nazi ciphers and non-linear equationsand I am supremely confident that there is not a single seminal or innovative idea in either one of them. He is so good, in fact, that he spends most of his time trying to find a revolutionary discovery in mathematics. The movie makes it a specific point to highlight that Nash never attended a class. Nash did not simply think classes were a waste of his time. He felt they were counter-productive because they would cause him to think like others had thought. We can better understand when he makes this statement - I cant waste time.......memorizing the weak assumptions of lesser mortals and Classes will dull your mind and destroy the potential for authentic creativity. Refusing to attend classes or read assigned books, Nash looked for "a truly original idea" that will mark his breakthrough contribution in his field. While others are playing a game, John is shown following the movement of pigeons where he makes a statement Im hoping to extract an algorithm to define their movement. This shows his strange behaviour as well as his attempts to come up with an original idea. He also doesnt like to be defeated,

which is seen when he loses the game with Martin. It is also shown that his inspiration, or rather enlightenment, roots from strange events such as the lady in the bar, which helped him to come up with his theory of Governing Dynamics. We also see him suffer from hallucinations which are shown from the moment that he starts college at Princeton University. He hallucinates that he has a roommate, when in reality it is uncovered later in the film that he was in a single occupancy room during his entire stay at Princeton. Additionally, he frequently has conversations and takes advice from this imaginary roommate. He also imagines a little girl (Marcee) that is introduced to him by his alleged roommate. The largest clue that Marcee is too a figment of Johns fragmented mind, is that when she runs to chase a flock of pigeons, they do not move. John also meets William Parcher the agent who is another fragment of his imagination who tells him to break codes. While going about his daily life, he is constantly surrounded by these inventions. These are classic positive symptoms of the paranoid schizophrenic, which are heavily supported by DSM-IV and revised versions. In addition to these hallucinations, Nash experiences delusions of persecution believing that there is a government conspiracy against him. He believes that because he is supposedly a secret agent working for the government breaking Soviet codes, the KGB was out to get him. After he is forcefully taken under custody by Dr. Rosen, the psychiatrist, whom Nash believes is a Russian spy, Nash wounds himself looking for an implant that is used to track him and says The implant is gone. This shows the level or the intensity of the disorder. Inspite of the severity, we see John continue to mentally fight his illness which in the end helps him to live with it in control instead of succumbing to it. This part can be clearly understood when he refuses to take his medicines. For us it might sound irrational but when he states his reasons to Dr. Rosen we come to know his purpose- .because I couldnt do my work, I couldnt help with the baby, I couldnt respond to my wife. So here is a man who is willing to give it a hundred percent to make things work in his life. As time goes, we see how he learns to avoid and neglect the characters his mind made up even though they torment him. sometimes I miss talking to him (Charles) is the statement he makes when he speaks to his wife, which indicates how difficult it is for him to avoid his hallucinations. His wife, Alicia gives a great deal of support to him and thus we see him to be able to work in Princeton later, despite the illness. He learns to ignore his hallucinations and is very careful about whom he interacts with. For example, he asks a student if she could see the man who came to speak to him about being nominated for Nobel Prize, can you see him? He works as a professor till the end

enthusing the eager minds and sharing his knowledge. And the world gives John its highest recognition-the Nobel Prize.

Treatment given in the movie

John Nash was treated with antipsychotic drugs and also given insulin shock therapy. During his stay in the hospital he was treated with such therapies and medications. When he moved back to his home, he was asked to continue with antipsychotic medications that were prescribed, which he refuses.

Factors that lead to the development of the disorder

It is difficult to trace the actual reason for Nash Schizophrenia because the movie does not tell us of his history. Since this information is not given, we cant say affirmatively that it was hereditary though we could still consider the possibility. However, we can list out the environmental factors that could have led to the development. As we know that the chance of developing schizophrenia has been found to increase with the number of adverse social factors (e.g. indicators of socioeconomic disadvantage or social exclusion). Socioeconomic factor can be disregarded here because in his conversation with Charles, John states - despite my privileged upbringing, Im actually quite well balanced, which tells us that he hailed from a wealthy family. And we also do understand again from the same conversation that John is quite unhappy or bitter about something that happened in his past I have a chip on both shoulders. This phrase chip on both shoulders is used only if a person is angry or bitter about something that happened in their past. It could be a reason that triggered the dormant gene. When it comes to social exclusion we can call it a probable reason because John always felt he was not good with people. This can be proved with the statement he makes in his conversation with Charles as mentioned earlier and also when he says to Parcher as to why he was still single, without family or close friends I like to think its that because Im a lone wolf. But mainly its because people dont like me. So here we come to know that he was always alone. John always felt he had a superior knowledge when compared to others around him. It could be that his teacher must have instilled something like that in him because while speaking to Charles, he says, My first grade teacher told me I have two helpings of brain but only half-a-helping of heart. His behavior

throughout is seen with the pride he carried himself with. This could possibly be a reason that he couldnt make friends or move socially. He never had people around who liked him and thus a lone wolf. Stressful life events generally precede the onset of schizophrenia. John is also a person who is always working to find something, to make a discovery. This could have added to the stress in his life, considering that he never had friends who could have been his only diversion or entertainment. Besides the fact that John had symptoms of Schizophrenia when he entered Princeton, it could again be likely that the stressful instances and the life he lead in trying to break the soviet codes and escaping from the Russian spies, who were after him, only increased the severity of the disorder. It brought it to its heights. Thus, these factors are probable causes that lead to the development of schizophrenia in John Nash.

Conclusion
The psychology in A Beautiful Mind (the movie) provides a valuable lesson for the practice of self awareness by ordinary people. Artistically differing from the actual events, it is a film, which convincingly uses the visual medium to portray stress and mental illness within one person's mind. Psychological predictions also agree with the behavior John Nash exhibited in the movie. This movie accurately teaches the public the positive affects of a schizophrenic. The movie does not portray schizophrenia as a split of Nash's personalities, rather a split from reality. He imagines other people and hallucinates vividly throughout the movie. Even at the conclusion of the movie, John Nash learns to accept and cope with his psychological disorder. ____________