Psychology at the Movies Read online

  Perhaps a more revealing question is: What is not psychological about this story? There are elements that could be divorced from the realm of psychology—perhaps the technical use of tracking shots or the historical aspects of America in the 1970s. But these distinctions break down if you think about them too much. After all, a camera shot forms the basis for the audience's perceptual experience. And the history of the 1970s is embodied in characters like Travis, artists like Scorsese, and audience members like Hinckley. Once you start looking for it, you can't escape psychology in the movies. There may be ways of talking about movies without highlighting psychological elements, but as a psychologist, I am not sure why anybody would want to.

  Goals of Psychology at the Movies

  The basic premise of this book is that all movies are psychologically alive, exploding with human drama. This drama has been looked at from many different angles. It is significant that both laboratory psychology and clinical psychoanalysis emerged at almost the same historical point as motion pictures—the end of the nineteenth century.2 The cultural impact of both psychology and film over that next century-plus has obviously been enormous. All along this historical path, there have been many occasions when psychologists have looked at movies as well as many times when movies have looked at psychologists. This book creates a snapshot of the fascinating interweaving between psychology and the movies.

  There is no way to even summarize all of the work that has been done on the psychology of movies in one book. The body of available studies, analyses, and commentaries is truly vast—worthy not of a single book but of a library. One prominent early psychologist (and still the psychologist with the best name), Hugo Munsterberg, wrote a book, The Photoplay: A Psychological Study in 1916, and the scholarship has been expanding for a century. The present book can be thought of as a kind of directory for the mythical “International Library of Psychology and Film,” identifying different sections of the library and calling attention to some of the most interesting works.

  The scope of fields I cover is far-reaching. As far as I am aware, no other book has attempted to bring so many diverse approaches together under one cover. It considers everything from Freudian psychoanalysis of Hitchcock films to the uncanny popularity of certain movies to children's film-inspired aggression toward a Bobo doll. As the research on film has become more abundant, it has also become more fractured; most recent books addressing issues related to psychology and film are likely to cover only one or two of the chapters contained here. Throughout this book, I hope to distinguish different approaches, concisely describe fundamental issues, and provide evocative cinematic examples. In every case, my overviews are not meant to be definitive; instead they are meant to provide clues for further exploration.

  The primary intended readers for this book are students and non-professionals who have a love of movies and/or psychology. Therefore it is relatively jargon-free, and when I do use technical terms, I pause to explain them. All of the research traditions discussed in this book are grounded in essential film-related human phenomena about which many people are curious; my task is to reveal those kernels of widespread fascination to a broad audience. In addition, the book may be useful to individuals already familiar with certain areas of the psychology of film. By drawing connections between diverse areas of study, alternative avenues of exploration are suggested that may be instructive even for experts. Ultimately, my goal is to help as many people as possible more fully appreciate the movies in our midst.

  My personal and professional background has prepared me well for this undertaking. Most importantly, I am a movie fan. Ever since biweekly trips to the grimy movie theater on the American Army post in Germany on which I grew up, I have loved the movies. When I returned to the US in my ‘tweens, I discovered the wonders of an ever-expanding cable revolution that made many movies easily available. In my teens, trips to the movie theater and VHS rentals were a critical part of both my social life and my alone time. I learned to like all kinds of movies—American and foreign, popular and arty, old and new—but I developed a particular fondness for Hitchcock, suspense movies in general, and dark, satirical comedies.

  It was this passion for movies that led to several educational choices when I got to college. As an undergraduate at Miami University (Ohio), I majored in psychology and minored in film studies. I wrote movie reviews for the school newspaper. I did my senior honors thesis on college men's experiences of watching violence in film using the then-current Blue Velvet as my primary stimulus.

  I subsequently chose to do my graduate work at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts. Clark holds a unique place in the history of American psychology: It was co-founded by the prominent early American psychologist, G. Stanley Hall, and it has the honor of being the only place in America where Freud ever spoke.3 Clark's intellectual flavor was strongly influenced when developmental psychologist Heinz Werner settled there after fleeing Nazi Germany. Werner considered “development” to be a guiding concept that considers what it means for humans to progress toward some imagined end point (e.g., maturity, transcendence, enlightenment, happiness, etc.). His approach was more open to interdisciplinary thinking than much of mainstream American psychology, and Werner's work naturally integrated child development, anthropology, clinical psychology, and philosophy.4 This unrestricted spirit thrived at Clark in the 1990s when I was in graduate school. I was trained as a clinical psychologist, but I was also immersed in other dimensions of psychology (including developmental psychology, cultural psychology, narrative psychology, and neuropsychology) and was exposed to cross-disciplinary influences such as interpretive philosophy and literary studies.5 I ended up receiving an almost classical liberal graduate education. In this rich environment, I continued to pursue my interests in the psychology of film.

  When it came time to pursue my career, I naturally gravitated toward liberal arts colleges. These kinds of (usually small) colleges take a holistic, interdisciplinary approach to education and strive to teach students fundamental intellectual skills such as writing, critical thinking, and the ability to engage in rational dialogue. I am currently a professor in the Psychology Department at Hanover College in Indiana where I have taught for 15 years. I teach clinically oriented classes like Behavior Disorders and Counseling and Psychotherapy, as well as pet courses like The Psychology of Film. I am also a licensed clinical psychologist.

  Teaching at a liberal arts college has helped prepare me for writing this text. I have spent thousands of hours in close proximity to students, giving lectures to small groups, discussing ideas in seminars, and sitting with students working on independent projects. I have frequently used movies, music, and other symbolic media as teaching tools. My students are typically bright, curious individuals, but they do not often share the same language as their professors. This can be a good thing; if one spends too much time around other “experts,” it is easy to get lost in jargon and technicalities and to forget the fundamental assumptions of a field. Undergraduate students, on the other hand, tend to ask the basic questions, and far from being naïve, these often get to the heart of the matter. I want Psychology at the Movies to focus on the heart of the matter as well.

  The type of scholarship that is expected at a liberal arts college is also an advantage in writing this book. Liberal arts colleges are sometimes referred to as “teaching colleges,” indicating the high value these institutions place on teaching and student learning. Professors at most liberal arts colleges do not function with the “publish or perish” mentality that characterizes much of modern higher education. I have published in the area of psychology and the movies, but I have also had the freedom to do research on student retention and even on the music of Bob Dylan.6

  In contrast, much of modern academics has become so specialized that researchers often work in sub-subfields that allow for minimal contact with individuals outside of their specialty, even when they are in the same discipline. The liberal arts philosophy applied to scholarship re
quires an integrative, interdisciplinary approach. Psychology at the Movies casts a wide net designed to fall across many current intellectual divides and, because of this, it will hopefully be stimulating to readers who have an open-minded interest in all things psychological and all things cinematic.

  Story, Entertainment and Art in the Movies

  This book is about “movies,” a term everybody understands intuitively. However, there is some fuzziness around the margins that may occasionally be confusing. So in order to limit the scope of the book, I will focus on narrative, theatrical films created for entertainment/artistic purposes. A few of these terms are worth exploring:

  Narrative: Most of the films that are discussed tell stories that have a beginning, a middle, and an end. Some of the stories are simple, some of them are complex. Some of the stories are told in a very straightforward manner while others make use of flashbacks (e.g., Titanic), intentional ambiguity (Donnie Darko) or mixed-up time sequences (e.g., Pulp Fiction). Occasionally, an experimental film like Koyaanisqatsi, which eliminates story almost entirely in favor of a concentration on abstract movement, shape, and color, will find an audience, but this is rare. In general I make the assumption that there is something special about narrative structure that people find especially compelling.

  Most commercial films tell fictional stories; they do not claim to represent events as they actually happened. Even biopics that strive for historical accuracy are understood to be recreations of past events. Documentary films are the exception because they do purport to present real people and events. Still, in most cases documentaries are organized so that they tell a story about a person, event, or phenomenon. The documentary approach has expanded beyond television news programs and the History Channel to include highly successful films like Fahrenheit 9/11, March of the Penguins, and Waiting for Superman. Documentary stories have somewhat different psychological characteristics, but fictional films are the focus of this book. In particular, commercial feature-length films are my primary concern since most people are not exposed to short or amateur films on a regular basis.7

  Theatrical: Before the 1950s, virtually all movies were meant to be exhibited on a theater screen to a mass audience. Since then, movies intended for theaters have been distributed in numerous formats—on television, VHS, DVD, Blu-Ray, home computer, and so on. These days many visual narratives are created for media other than a theater screen (e.g., a TV sit-com or a “straight-to-video” DVD). There are many similar psychological characteristics shared by film and other visual media. Therefore, some scholars define their subjects of study as “media,” not “film” or “television.” Yet theatrical movies have a special history and prestige compared with other visual media that contributes unique psychological characteristics. While I occasionally refer to TV and other forms of popular culture, I favor examples from theatrical films.

  Entertainment/Artistic: All forms of entertainment have artistic qualities, and all art has qualities of entertainment. The term “entertainment” tends to imply that people seek it out because it is pleasurable. People also presumably get enjoyment from their artistic experiences, or they probably wouldn't seek them out repeatedly. Viewers who claim they watch films only for their aesthetic value and not because they enjoy them are engaged in a masochistic ritual that is far from the visible passion of fans of either Adam Sandler or Ingmar Bergman (of course, Freud would argue that the masochistic aesthetes are deriving unconscious pleasure out from their sacrificial viewing anyway).

  Psychology at the Movies is interested in the broad range of movies—high art movies, low culture trash, and everything in between. “Art” tends to imply that an object has some sort of special quality that stimulates a meaningful, reflective experience. Yet this quality may be true of Hollywood's most entertaining movies—Star Wars, Casablanca, The Wizard of Oz. The issue of whether a given movie is art (thought-provoking) versus entertainment (pleasurable) is a matter of degree that can vary in reference to the intentions of the film makers, the formal qualities of the film, and/or the attitude and viewing context of the audience. Some films may be more sophisticated, wide-ranging and powerful in their artistic potential, but such claims are about good art versus bad art, not whether something is or is not art.

  A Liberal Use of Psychology

  Many people who have never taken an academic course in psychology tend to associate “psychology” with the ideas of Sigmund Freud (e.g., dreams and the unconscious) or with clinical psychology more generally (e.g., counseling and psychological disorders). These associations are relevant but narrow, since psychology also covers neuropsychology (the chemical activity of the brain), social psychology (people's behavior in crowds), sensation and perception (the workings of the inner eye), learning (modeling the actions of others), cognition (memory) and many other areas and subspecialties. Moreover, psychology overlaps other disciplines in the social sciences such as sociology, anthropology, and communication. Since people are biological beings, there is a strong historical connection between psychology and biology. Finally, psychologists are often interested in the same topics—social relationships, products of the imagination, and human nature—as scholars in humanities such as philosophy and literary criticism.

  Psychology is undeniably a broad field, and I treat it even more broadly than most psychologists: I think of it simply as the study of thought and action, with a focus on humans. This definition is not so different from those found in most intro psych textbooks.8 However, textbooks typically follow with caveats about how the study of thought and action must be done in a certain way in order to qualify as psychology—particular methods must be followed.9 This attention to method is important to the textbook writers in distinguishing “real” psychology from what is often referred to as “pseudo-psychology” or “pop-psychology.” It is also used to distinguish psychology from related academic disciplines in the social sciences and the humanities.

  Psychology at the Movies takes a liberal (as in “the liberal arts”) approach to what is meant by psychology. In these pages, experimental psychology, cultural psychology, Freudian psychoanalysis, mass communication and film/literary criticism (not to mention bits of philosophy, neuroscience and pop-psych) coexist and intermingle. One of my models is Malcolm Gladwell and his best-selling books Blink (2005) and Outliers (2008). I find Gladwell to be among the most interesting commentators on social psychological phenomena in the past decade. Gladwell's background as a journalist frees him from strict disciplinary loyalty and allows him to freely mix neuroscience, experiments, demographics, and good old-fashioned case studies as he develops his ideas.10

  In response to the compartmentalizing tendencies of modern academics, Robert Sternberg and his collaborators have called for a “unified psychology” that integrates various related disciplines and subdisciplines by focusing on particular phenomena of interest and not simply drawing lines based on different methods and historical traditions.11 Psychology at the Movies is written in this unifying spirit: people in movies, people making movies, and people watching movies are the phenomena of interest. If there are research traditions out there that have been interested in these phenomena, I have attempted to address them, at least cursorily. Unfortunately, many of these approaches have developed in relative isolation from each other over an extended period of time. When there has been contact, it has sometimes been hostile. By making interconnections, I hope I can facilitate overdue conversations between these previously divorced perspectives and methods.

  All methods are not the same nor equal in achieving particular ends. Some may be based on nonsense and lead to nothing. However, one can safely assume that any of the methods that have been used by intelligent, thoughtful scholars over a period of many years have a basis in reason. That doesn't mean they never lead to mistakes, but it does strongly suggest there is likely some compelling rationale for the “method in their madness.”

  Every method allows us to see some things, but it also keeps us from seeing oth
er things. I like the example of an astronomer looking through a powerful telescope allowing him to see faraway galaxies that are invisible to the naked eye, thereby making enormous contributions to knowledge. However, by using a single method, there are many parts of reality of which the scientist may be unaware: he is not only blind to parts of the galaxy where the telescope is not aimed at a given moment, but even to actions occurring in the room, such as his wife walking up behind him. If he wants to see and understand her, he would be advised to use a different method.12

  Therefore, I will consider all established methodological approaches which claim to shed light on the relationship between movies and human actions. These include methods that lie at the core of psychology as a scientific discipline (e.g., a laboratory-based experiment in which factors are carefully controlled and varied), but also methods that are closer to psychology as a clinical discipline (e.g., a case study of film being used in insight-oriented psychotherapy) and the humanities (e.g., interpretation of a film based on feminist relational theory). Each method is discussed in terms of its advantages (what it tells us) and limitations (what it does not tell us). What might at first appear to be different disciplines reaching contradictory conclusions could turn out to be different disciplines looking at different aspects of reality. This approach to method is at once inclusive yet discriminating.

  A Symbolic Framework for the Psychology of Film

  The psychology of film can be unified by thinking of movies as symbols. Movies are symbols that have meaning; these symbols are created by filmmakers, and they are received by audiences. The four components of this framework are outlined in Figure 1.1:13