Question

How does the film Split relate to psychology?

Answer 1

Split, a captivating thriller about the kidnapping of 3 teenage girls offers tremendous insight into the mind of a villain with Dissociative Identity Disorder, also called Split personality. This disorder is still a mystery to psychologists and it is presumed that even if it does exist, it is a result of trauma, after which multiple personalities emerge within the same individual i response to the pain of the past that has not been dealt with yet. It goes without saying that this subconscious series of choices is severely dysfunctional, and the therapeutic end goal is integration - get back to a single, coherent sense of identity.

In the movie, we see how the mind and body once takes the form of a 9-year old at one moment and the next, he is a 24 year old British female with Obsessive compulsive Disorder. The movie shows the actual struggle faced by people who suffer from this disorder, and the movie did a good job in portraying how the personalities change within such people. It is hard for the general public and clinicians to believe that this disorder actually exists. However, there are a lot of people that are struggling with this as we speak, and the movie did a good job in bringing this out in the open and making more people aware of this condition.

People develop as many ‘alters’ as necessary to survive their situation with whatever characteristics they need, often, the different personalities will include different genders, ages, voices and characteristics that all have a meaning. These characteristics often are triggered by certain things and they show up and perform their function and then they’re gone. The transition of personalities can be abrupt. But because these people have learned to survive in the public, these changes can be so subtle that other people don’t even notice the shift.

Although there are different opinions of the entertainment this movie brings, this is still a real disorder that many people deal with today. He said these people can function normally in society, and many of these people are often misdiagnosed with a variety of conditions like schizophrenia or bipolar disorders.