Introduction
A Beautiful Mind is an emotionally touching and charged movie, detailing the life of a bright intellectual, John Nash. It is a movie which won the Best Motion Picture as well as four Oscar awards. It narrates the story of the professional achievements of Nash, together with his struggles with paranoid schizophrenia (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). The film also represents the effects that the disease has on the members of his family, especially his wife Alicia. It starts with the arrival of Russell Crowe at Princeton University, immediately after the end of the World War Two. The institution is full of snotty, horrible young people who belittle one another, and Nash, who is socially uncomfortable, is ridiculed the most. He informs Charles who is his roommate that he does not have a lot of liking for people and that people do not also like him that much.
Nash fails to find any brilliant idea in spite of his squiggling of equations on windows, and this goes on and on until he gets himself in a bar, alongside his course-mates, admiring a sensational blonde woman who is with her four charming brunette allies, (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). He realizes that if they all go after the blonde lady, then she may snub all of them. Additionally, the four allies of the blonde woman will also rebuff them, seeing as they may, in the turn of events, feel offended of being treated as if they were reserve alternatives. As such, the group’s interests are best fulfilled when every member takes into account not only his self-interests, but also the interests of other members. Therefore, his group members should not only target the blonde lady, but also her friends. Such a strategy is a simplification of the Nash equilibrium. His achievement earns him a lecturing job and as well, gets him summoned by the Pentagon to decode the communications of the Soviets.
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Background
The Beautiful Mind movie portrays the story of John Nash, who undergoes numerous lows and highs from 1947, when he was a student of Mathematics in the graduate school at Princeton, up until 1994, when he wins the Nobel Prize in Economics, (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). The movie portrays Nash as a bright, antisocial, and arrogant man who preferred spending most of his time on his reflections, which essentially strove to determine the formulae of Mathematics that relate with daily happenings, and not with individuals. Nash meets a group of other gifted science and math graduate students, including Richard Sol, Ainsley, Bender, and Charles, his roommate and a literature student. Nash is in intense pressure to produce his work, but his desire is to produce an original work. He gets inspired when other graduate students talk about how to approach an assemblage of five ladies at a bar. One of the students, by the name Hansen, cites the words of Adam Smith and supports the idea that every person should fight for himself. On the contrary, Nash’s argument is that an approach that is cooperative in nature can result in better chances of being successful. He manages to create a new governing dynamics concept and produces an article about its content. Such efforts earn him a job at M.I.T, where he is later joined by Bender and Sol.
Nash gets invited, years later, to the Pentagon so as to decode encrypted communication of the Soviets. He has the ability to mentally decipher the code, and this surprises other people who only had the ability to break the codes, (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). Nash regards his usual roles at MIT as unexciting and below his talents, and thus, he gets delighted to be given a new task by his inexplicable superior, William Parcher (Harris) from the Defense Department of the United States. His responsibility is to search for patterns in the newspapers and magazines, so as to stop any Soviet plan. Nash gets progressively more fixated on looking for the hidden patterns and develops the belief that that some people are following him whenever he delivers his results to a secret mailbox. On the other hand, a student by the name Alicia Larde, requests Nash to have dinner with her, and they end up falling in love. Nash meets Charles and Marcee when he returns to Princeton, and Charles encourages him to marry Alicia.
Nash starts to fear for his life after he witnesses an exchange of gun fire between a Soviet agent and Parcher, even though Parcher convinces Nash to continue with his project. Nash makes an attempt to escape from the individuals whom he believes to be agents of the Soviet Union, led by Dr. Rosen, (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). In the course of his delivery of a guest talk at the University of Harvard, he punches Rosen and tries to flee, but gets forcefully sedated. Further, he is taken to a psychiatric facility that Nash believes is managed by the Soviets. Dr. Rosen informs Alicia that her husband is suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, and therefore, Parcher, Marcee, and Charles are just but his imaginations. Alicia does her own research and decides to confront Nash with the documents, which even though still not opened, he had delivered to the secret mailboxes. He is injected with an insulin shock therapy course, then, he is released. The side effects of the antipsychotic medication make him unresponsive and lethargic. Eventually, he furtively stops any further usage of the drugs. As a result, he suffers a relapse, such that he sees Parcher once again.
Alicia realizes that her husband is once more working on his task. She rushes to the house after having discovered that Nash has relapsed, only to find their child sunken in the tub. Nash tells her that Charles was watching over the child, (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). Alicia gives Dr. Rosen a call, but her husband believes that Parcher is attempting to execute her. He quickly moves to push Parcher away, but ends up knocking Alicia and the child to the floor. Alicia gets scared and runs from the house with the child; Nash gets in front of her car and asks her not to leave. Additionally, Nash informs his wife that he has come to the realization that he has never seen Marcee get old, though he has been seeing her for the last three years. He also acknowledges that all the figures he has been seeing are hallucinations. He goes against the advice of Dr. Rosen and makes the decision not to get back to medication. He believes that he has the ability to deal with the signs himself. As such, Alicia makes the decision not to leave, but to support him and help him deal with the signs.
Nash goes back to Princeton University and talks to his old foe, Hansen, who is the present head of the Department of Mathematics, (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). He gives Nash the okay to offer his services from out of the library, and as well, to inspect classes. Nash discovers that he can ignore the hallucinations two decades later. He gets the permission to teach again by the late 1970s, and he wins the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 1994 for his revolutionary task on the game theory, and fellow professors honor him. The film comes to an end as Alicia, Nash, and their son depart the lecture theater in Stockholm. Nash sees Parcher, Marcee, and Charles standing on the other side of the auditorium, watching him closely by. I would find it important to include more individuals to this assessment because it discusses the symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia that affects adolescents and young adults in the society.
Diagnosis
A Diagnosis using the DSM-5
Paranoid schizophrenia is a psychological disorder whose classification is beneath Axis I of the Statistical and Diagnostic Manual of Psychological Disorders-Forth Edition (DSM-5), (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). Signs of schizophrenia appear characteristically in early adulthood and late adolescence. As per the DSM-5, the diagnosis of schizophrenia may be carried out if more than one of the traits of the active phase signs are manifest for a considerable period of time within a period of one month. The symptoms of the active phase are grouped as affirmative in extreme traits like in the case of hallucinations, delusions, disorganized speech, and catatonic manners. The symptoms can also be manifested as negative in character discrepancy such as flat effect, anhedonia, alogia, or a volition. The disorder must be relentlessly expressed for not less than a duration of six months, and this must encompass not less than a month of the symptoms of the active-phase (DSM-5). On the other hand, the DSM-5 stipulates that the person, just before the onset of schizophrenia, must undergo a functioning that’s lower than their achievement level in such regions as work, interpersonal relationships, or self-care. This is a critical section of the time after the inception of the symptoms that are mentioned above.
Evidently, decisive factors that are revealed by the film are enough for a successful diagnosis to be made, (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). On the contrary, it is noteworthy that the portrayal of Ron Howard is historically incorrect, seeing as the hallucinations on the part of Nash were entirely auditory, and not both auditory and visual as is indicated in the film. It is a fact that the people who handled Nash, including both the administration and the faculty, always introduced him to strangers and assistants. It is true that Nash did not suffer from visual hallucinations and so, did not meet the criteria of DSM-5. Therefore, a diagnosis of Positive Symptom Schizophrenia is the most appropriate, provided the severity of the mental illness of Nash.
Risk and Resilience Factors of Nash
Nash, is ridiculed the most by his fellow graduate students because he is socially uncomfortable with most of the people who try to form relationships with him. He informs Charles, his roommate, that he does not have a lot of liking for people, and that people also do not like him that much (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). He keeps to himself whilst he reflects on the ideas that can result in the excellence of his academic work. Schizophrenia affects people who are in their late stages of their adolescence and also, those people who are in their early adulthood. Additionally, it is imperative to note that Nash developed schizophrenic symptoms as an adult of about thirty years. Also, the mental illness positively correlates with geniuses and it is notable that Nash started exhibiting weird traits and as well, started to experience delusions and paranoia, in the period after his innovative contributions to the discipline of Mathematics. Such contribution was in the Mathematic of decision making, better known as the game theory extension. In the next several years, Nash was severally hospitalized, and was off and on the anti-psychotic drugs. He experiences hallucination and delusions for twenty-five years. Further, he experiences delirium in image misrepresentations of three people.
The hallucinations of grandeur and persecution plague him, such that, despite having been dismissed, he develops the firm belief that he is still working for the Defense Department, and that Soviet spies were following him. As such, he undergoes the reduction of functioning achievement level in the world of Mathematic, and as well, this affects his interpersonal connection with Alicia (Crowe, Connelly, Bettany, (Producers) & Howard, (Director), (2001). The treatment that he undergoes does not help him deal with the condition because he stops his medication at will. Alicia’s decision to leave him, after he knocks the baby and his wife to the floor, makes him to rethink his condition. In two decades, Nash discovers that he can ignore the hallucinations. He realizes that Marcee has neither grown nor increased in size ever since he started to see her. His normal mental status is restored when he realizes that Marcee is not real. The presentation of the sealed documents that he had delivered to the secret mailbox by his wife confirms to him that he is having to deal with delusions. Therefore, Nash considers himself healthy and goes back to Princeton University in order to talk to his old foe, Hansen, the present head of the Department of Mathematic, to grant him a job in the institution.
Psychosocial and/or Family Issues
The psychology in the film gives a valuable lesson on the importance of the exercise of self-awareness by people. The film applies a visual medium to convincingly show mental illness and stress within the mind of an individual (Crowe, Connelly, & Bettany, (Producers), Howard, (Director), 2001). The plot of the story supersedes the auditory signs with visual illusions to tell a paranoid schizophrenic’s story, which Nash represents. Schizophrenia is a disease which gets intensified by the anxiety that Nash has concerning the pains of his friends and wife, who seem hard hit by his mental instability. Although he was under medication so as to restrain whatsoever symptoms, the film portrays Nash getting back to a more usual form of life by becoming more self-aware. The visual psychological signs that the film presents effectively express the obstructions to the distinction of unconscious patterns by the brain.
Nash’s primary challenge is his helplessness with regards to the differentiation of his illusions from reality. Nash’s experience exemplifies real life situations, whereby individuals fail to tell between the concrete changes in terms of emotions in the course of their daily activities, from their own subjective points of view (National Alliance on Mental Illness, 2007). A person can be happy in one moment and incensed with bitterness the next moment. Such hidden changes in attitudes and moods have their causes. Psychologists indicate that they take place because the control of one’s brain changes due to the competition pitting conflicting intelligences against each other. Such intelligences were grouped together several years back and they are the current triune human intellect. The brain of a reptile, which is considered as being at a lower level than that of a mammal, is in charge of such primitive roles as heartbeat, hunger, and breathing. On the other hand, the brain of a mammal is in charge of the systems via shame and compassion, despair and love. Additionally, the highest brain level of humans has the Real ‘I’ which is the wisest human stage prefrontal brain. Regrettably, the human brain changes controls between the mentioned entities even without personal conscientious consent. As for Nash’s case, he suffered a lot because the vivacious delusions, primarily created by his emotions, took regular power over his system.
The movie portrays Nash as a mere witness to the events that take place in his mind. He manages to recover from his condition because his Real ‘I’ is in control and understands that the state of the brain was delusional, (Myers, 2007). It is Nash’s negative feelings that triggered his hallucinations. Conversely, his emotions ably restrict his access to the memories. He was put on a sequence of sessions of insulin shock therapy so as to treat this problem. Conversely, the medication adversely affects both his academic and family life. The negative side effects of the medication make Nash to stop any further medication, even without the consent of his wife and of his psychiatrist, thereby eliciting a setback of his psychosis. His state worsened and he unintentionally harmed his baby and wife. The incident took place since Nash’s negative emotions were still vigorously contending with his normal self. The accident with his child and wife, alters the power balance in his brain. He gets challenged to face the panorama of being everlastingly dedicated to an institution. As such, an abrupt insight emerges to forever cure him when his wife attempts to run away and to report on him for his character. After getting healed, Nash prevents new hallucinations from getting into his brain through humorously checking for the truth with his colleagues and students in the event that they also saw his visitors.
Career and Vocation
Nash starts his career as a lecturer in M.I.T after having written a twenty-three paged dissertation paper, which attains him a doctoral degree (Crowe, Connelly, & Bettany, (Producers),Howard, (Director), 2001). He later realizes that his usual roles at M.I.T are unexcitingly below his talents, and thus, gets delighted when he is given a new task at the Department of Defense to decode encrypted communication of the Soviets. His responsibility is to search for patterns in the newspapers and magazines so as to stop any Soviet plans. After his recovery, Nash considers himself healthy and goes back to Princeton University and talks to his old foe, Hansen, the present head of the Department of Mathematic, to grant him a job in the institution.
Legal and Ethical Issues
The ethical issues that surround the circumstance of Nash entail the manner in which Nash treats his wife and child, (Crowe, Connelly, & Bettany, (Producers), Howard, (Director), 2001). The state of his mental illness makes him drown his child almost to death and pushes him to explain to his wife that Charles, not him, was looking over his own child. He also stops taking his medication without the consent either of Alicia or Dr. Rosen, and flashes the pills in the sink. Such like a behavior is not ethical, owing to the fact that a patient is required to consult with his doctor before making the decision to stop medication, even when this is as a result of the negative side effects of the drug. Additionally, Nash comes closer to hurting his wife and child when he pushes them to the ground as he claims that he was protecting them from Parcher. His behavior prompts Alicia to sue him before he pleads for forgiveness and even confesses that Marcee, whom he’s been seeing, seems to never grow, therefore, it becomes a fact to him that he is suffering illusions. Nash’s behavior is illegal and invited the institution of legal action against him.
Continued Assessment
It is important for continued assessment to be of priority with respect to any person who suffers from paranoid schizophrenia. This continued assessment ensures that the signs of the illness are closely monitored such that any one of them that feature again can be treated (National Alliance on Mental Illness, 2007). Such is because scientists have not come up with the certain causes of schizophrenia, though scientific studies indicate that individuals with the disorder possess different mindsets as compared to individuals who do not suffer from the disorder. Paranoid schizophrenia, just like diabetes and cancer, comes about as a result of a combination of problems in the make of environmental factors and genetic vulnerability (Franklin, 2004).
The combinations of problems occur while an individual is in the process of development (Myers, 2007). A present research indicates that particular genes enhance the danger of getting the disease even though they do not cause it. As such, approaches for the treatment of the illness are normally a combination of therapies. The various approaches are selected to lessen the chances of recurrence of schizophrenic signs. Doctors apply close to nine therapeutic approaches, including social and community approach, self-help groups, family education, cognitive behavioral psychotherapy, individual psychotherapy, rehabilitation, psychosocial treatment, anti-psychotic medication list, and medication treatment.
Follow-up Recommendations for Treatment
The treatment of schizophrenia should commence at an early stage in order to improve its effectiveness (Franklin, 2004).
Treatment approaches for curbing schizophrenia should be a mixture of therapies that ensure that all symptoms are dealt with. Any such a treatment should reduce chances of recurrence of the symptoms of the disease (Franklin, 2004).
Psychologists should consider providing antipsychotic medication to first-time schizophrenics because this kind of treatment has been effective since the 1950’s as it allows patients to function proficiently (Franklin, 2004).
Patients should always consult with psychiatrists in order for them to devise treatment plans that are best suited to deal with their medical cases (Franklin, 2004).
Doctors should consider using such modern drugs as the clozapine, olanzapine, or risperidone in the treatment of schizophrenia because these drugs are comparatively more effective than the older versions of the same (Franklin, 2004).
It is imperative for a person to be aware of himself since it is through self-awareness that Nash realized that the images he was seeing were not real and instead, that he suffering delusion.
Family members of the patient play a critical role when it comes to helping the patient realize himself and regain the normalcy of his health (Franklin, 2004).
Schizophrenic symptoms feature amongst people who are aged between eighteen to thirty-five years of age. Such are the people who are in college and are about to graduate and as such, join the job market, even though by this time, a few others already are working (Myers, 2007). Early treatment helps to deal with the illness. Additionally, early treatment of the disease helps young people to finish their education, and to pursue their careers. Self-realization is also a path to successful recovery from the disease, as was in the case of Nash. It is also important for patients to consult with only those doctors who know about the best, modern forms of drugs for the treatment of schizophrenia, and who as well, know of the appropriate dosages for treating the disease.
References
National Alliance on Mental Illness. (2007). Mental illnesses. Schizophrenia. Retrieved from http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=By_Illness&Template=/TaggedPage/TaggedPageDisplay.cfm&TPLID=54&ContentID=23036
Franklin, D. (2004). Psychology Information Online. Treatment of Schizophrenia. Retrieved from http://www.psychologyinfo.com/schizophrenia/treatment.htm
Myers, D. (2007). Psychology Eighth Edition in Modules. New York: Worth Publishers
Crowe, R. Connelly, J. & Bettany, P.(Producers),Howard, R. (Director). (2001, December 21st). The Beautiful Mind.
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental Disorders. (5thed., text revision). Washington, DC.
