Russ Searight - Brown Bag Seminar Presentation: Using Film and Memoir to Teach

1. H. Russell Searight, Ph.D., MPH
Lake Superior State University
Presented at the 6th International Conference on
Psychology Education
August 2, 2014

2. Lake Superior State University
Sault Sainte Marie Michigan

4. • Immediacy
• Engaging
• Experiential
• Entertaining
• Able to show situations
that traditional
educational films do not
• Narratives are more
likely to be remembered
• Provoke Critical
Thinking

5.  Purpose: analyze film
characters and
situations in relation
to topics in
psychology
 Structure:
 Lecture
 Worksheet/Film
 Discussion
 Papers

6. • Need a “guide” to help
students recognize the
pedagogical content
• What is not consistent with
current knowledge in your
field in film ?
• How would the film’s
portrayal impact the general
public’s view of mental
health conditions ?
• If based on a true narrative,
how does the film’s fictional
account differ ? Why ?
• What techniques does
filmmaker use to tell the
story ?

7.  Film and memoir
provoke critical
thinking
 Films distort content
 Film Examples:
 A Beautiful Mind
 Rain Main
 Black Swan
 Memoir—Why did
the author go public
with their

11.  Mr. Jones
 Grey Gardens
 Pieces of April
 What about Bob ?

12.  What’s Eating Gilbert
Grape ?
 Antwone Fisher
 Good Will Hunting

13.  Films can be very vivid
 Good films evoke
(strong) emotion from
the audience
 Films about
psychological distress
are often distressing
 Prepare class
 Provide options to
emotionally evocative
films

14.  Estimates of
childhood sexual
abuse among U.S.
college women: 20%
 Film and literature
can provoke re-experiencing
trauma

15.  About 600 published
memoirs focusing on
psychological conditions
 Abnormal Psychology
Texts –Third person
accounts
 People reduced to DSM-5
criteria
 Film—observe the
condition
 What is it like to actually
have this condition
 What is day-to-day
experience of someone
with OCD ?

17. Film : Mr. Jones
Academic
Information: DSM.
Textbook
Memoir: An Unquiet
Mind

18.  Very few realistic
portrayals in film
 Very few books
describing the
experience of
providing
psychotherapy

20.  In many recently-developed and
developing countries,
psychotherapy is not common
 American films are popular world-wide
 Wolff et al. (1996): United Kingdom:
32% indicated that media was
primary source of mental health
information
 What would someone
conclude about
psychotherapists and
psychotherapy if their
knowledge came from
film ?

21.  Psychotherapists are more disturbed than their
patients

22.  Being a psychotherapist is a great way to work
out your own issues and you get paid for it

23.  Being a
psychotherapist is a
great way to meet
your next boyfriend,
girlfriend, spouse
 Your patient/lover
will save you and you
will both live happily
ever after

24.  Psychotherapists conduct termination sessions
with clients in public restrooms ?

25.  Dual relationships—nonsexual
 Abandonment—
 Physical Assault
 Sexual relationships
 Trying to Kill a patient
 Client/ Patient Welfare: Who is the therapy
for? The therapist or the patient ?
 Breaking Confidentiality
 Using Unorthodox (Not evidence-based)
treatments ?

26. • “I think the movie review was effective and
had a profound impact on how people view
films.”
• “The overall strength of the course was the
movie choices; some were VERY depressing
and some were much better. The movie choices
showed aspects of some mentally ill patients
that people would not have seen otherwise.”

27.  Dr Wonderful
 Dr. Dippy
 Dr. Evil
 Dr. Eccentric
 Dr. Love
 (Orchchowski, et al.,
2006)

28.  Miracle Worker
 Wise and Sagely
 Always Available
 Cures Patients
Quickly

29.  Caricature of a
psychoanalyst
 Often speaks with
Viennese accent
 Portrayed as so
doctrinaire that they
are out of touch with
their patients and
their own lives

30.  Sociopathic
 Uses psychological
principles to achieve
own ends
 Manipulative
 Sadistic

31.  Odd
 More disturbed than
the patient
 Private life often a
mess

32.  Has affairs with
patients
 Affairs are curative
 Love can heal all
wounds

33.  Good way to apply
learned information
 Entertaining for
students
 Allows for students to
actively learn material

34.  Six Dimensions
 Separation
 Stereotypes
 Restricted
 Benevolence
 Pessimism
 Stigma

35. Dimension Pre Mean Pre SD Post Mean Post SD Significanc
e
Benevolenc
e
30.00 3.46 29.50 4.86 t=.31
P=.77
Pessimism 12.57 2.85 13.93 1.77 t=-1.57
p=.14
Stigma 5.43 1.40 5.29 1.38 t=.27
p=.79
Separation 20.43 4.85 21.36 4.36 t=.58
p=.57
Stereotype 8.07 2.62 8.36 2.98 t=.27
p=.79
Restrictive 6.21 2.12 6.71 1.77 t=0.68
p=.50