Reaction To Girl Interupted Essay, Research Paper
Overall I feel that the movie was pretty good and was linked to psychology in many factors. The social disorders of the girls, the mental hospital, the treatments, and the therapy are all aspects of the movie which are linked to psychology.
I believe that Lisa possessed an antisocial disorder to a certain degree. I believe she was naturally antisocial but the fact that she was in a mental hospital for 8 years may have contributed to the level of disorder. Since she has been in there for so long, her mind set may be that she is antisocial and there isn’t anything that she can do. If she wasn’t in the hospital so long she may have not been so set on believing about her illness and it may have helped her recover quicker. Her antisocial behavior is illustrated by her lack of care towards Daisy when she hung herself, knowing that she was the cause, knowing that she was the person who pushed her over the edge, and still showing no remorse and in fact robbing her while she hung there in front of her. She showed no regard for law by sneaking out of the hospital with Susanna, and she showed no care and respect towards privacy when she broke into the therapists office and handed out their diagnosis to each of the patients. Her lack of caring for others is also demonstrated when she is in the basement with the others reading aloud Susanna’s private writing for her book. There are so many instances throughout the movie which demonstrated an antisocial personality and behavior yet it is still possible that the mental hospital confinement has not positively helped her recovery and self-esteem. Knowing that she is a antisocial person, and being locked up for years, does not help one’s self image.
Susanna’s situation was not helped by placing herself in a mental hospital. By being in the hospital she may have convinced herself that she was crazy when in reality she was only a borderline personality disorder. I believe that some of the therapies implemented by the hospital did not help her either. Drugging up the girls everyday may not have been the best way to go about treating her yet the therapy she received may have been beneficial to her. It was standard in those days to drug up the patients and keep them there for long periods of time, but today these things may not have happened and she may have just received therapy rather than hospitalization and drugs. The moment which was a key to Susanna’s full recovery was seeing Daisy hanging in the room. This made Susanna realize how much she cared for life and made her no longer a suicide threat because she cared too much about life. It was at this moment when she realized she could get better because she discovered who she truly was. Her disorder has symptoms of not knowing who you truly are, like her mother, and once she realized who she was and how much she truly cared about life, she was essentially cured, with the help of a little more therapy. The therapies demonstrated in the movie both helped the patients and set the patients back, so I truly feel it was up to the patients to realize themselves what was wrong and how to cure themselves, just like Susanna did.
This movie in general was about different aspects of psychology and i believe it relates well to what we have learned about social disorders, and psychology in general.