My final analysis paper that I wrote while taking Issues in Family Systems. For this paper, I had to watch the film, "Gifted" and analyze the complex relationships of the main characters.

1. RUNNING HEAD: ANALYSIS PAPER 1
Analysis of Gifted
Sydney McEntire
The University of Georgia

2. ANALYSIS PAPER 2
Part A
In the movie, Gifted, a 6-year-old girl living with her uncle after the death of her mother,
shows exceptional talent in the classroom. Mary is able to understand math that college students
are unable to do and this grabs the attention of the principle. When the faculty expresses their
desire to send Mary to a school for the gifted, Mary’s uncle, Frank, refuses to let Mary be taken
away to be treated as different for the rest of her life. This ignites a custody battle between Frank
and his mother, Evelyn, for the rights to determine how Mary should be raised. Before the
custody battle between Evelyn and Frank began, Mary was very content at home with her uncle.
In order to manage the emotional climate, the family system must provide “for members’ needs
for closeness, involvement, acceptance, and nurturance” (Anderson & Sabatelli, 2011, p. 14).
Frank and Mary were very close and did everything together. Frank was very involved in Mary’s
life as he accepted that she was different and did everything in his power to not treat her as such.
Emotional Climate
To have a healthy emotional climate at home it is also necessary to have the ability to
regulate and overcome conflict. To deal with conflict, Frank and Mary openly communicated
about any issues. Frank did not keep many things from Mary as she was mature enough to
understand more than your typical 6-year-old should. For example, when Mary’s birth father
attended the court hearing but did not stay around to meet his daughter, Frank did not hide it
from Mary. Instead of letting someone else tell Mary, Frank decided to openly discuss this with
her and then knew exactly what to do to cheer her up after giving her the news. Frank’s ability to
discuss almost everything with Mary could be considered developmentally appropriate to her
maturity levels, but not necessarily to her chronological age. At just six years old, Mary should
not know everything that is disclosed to her, but because her maturity levels and competence are

3. ANALYSIS PAPER 3
not that of other children her age, open communication supports her development. Frank and
Mary also had very clear rules set to attempt to avoid conflict. For example, Mary was to stay
with their neighbor, Roberta, every Friday night and not return home until noon the next day.
These boundaries allowed Frank to have time to himself once a week and allowed Mary to be
with a female role model.
Boundaries
To also ensure a healthy emotional climate, Frank and Mary had established clear internal
and external boundaries. The external boundaries between Frank and Mary were initially open as
she understood that her family consisted of herself, her uncle, and Roberta, but she also
understood that Frank would date women who could one day become a part of her life. Frank
and Mary began to experience stress that affected their external boundaries when the non-
normative event of her grandmother showing up and deciding she wanted to be a part of Mary’s
life changed the way that they had been living. Although Frank promoted open boundaries in
which other people could join the family, he decided to tighten the boundaries to prevent Evelyn
from entering their family. The entrance of Evelyn in Mary’s life complicated not only the
external boundaries, but also the internal boundaries as Frank had always had authority over
Mary until Evelyn showed up and questioned his parenting skills.
Frank had allowed Mary to be herself and had always promoted individuality, but Evelyn
promoted low individuality. Evelyn and her children had an enmeshed relationship in which she
was overinvolved and promoted an undifferentiated subsystem. Evelyn was a mathematician and
when her own daughter started to show talent in mathematics, she forced her daughter to only
focus on her school work instead of letting her experience a normal childhood. The way in which
Evelyn raised her daughter led to a lack of autonomous development and to prevent this from

4. ANALYSIS PAPER 4
happening to Mary and to protect her emotional climate, Frank had to also tighten the internal
boundaries. This new stress in their life of trying to prevent Evelyn from controlling Mary also
forced Frank to attempt to resist morphogenesis. As Anderson and Sabatelli (2011) explain, “at
all times, there exists within a system a dynamic tension between morphostasis (stability) and
morphogenesis (change),” but this tension was heightened as Frank desperately wanted to
maintain stability for Mary (p. 15). Despite Frank’s best efforts to maintain constancy, he
eventually had to allow space for morphogenesis to occur to better raise Mary. For example,
although Frank was initially against Mary attending a school for the gifted, he eventually
allowed her to go as he began to understand how important it was for her development to be
challenged in the classroom.
Maintenance
Although Frank eventually allowed room for change in Mary’ life by allowing her to
attend a new school, Frank also ensured morphostasis by making sure Mary continued to do
things that other children her age were doing like attending girl scouts. Frank and Mary
accomplished this new afterschool activity and other daily tasks by following a schedule. Frank
would drop Mary off at school and then go work on boats to make an income. They often did
things together like go for boat rides after she was finished with school and spent a lot of quality
time together. Mary also spent a lot of time with her neighbor whom she adored, Roberta, and
Frank used her as a resource whenever he needed time to himself. Frank also initially sent Mary
to a school in which she would make friends and then kept her in afterschool programs with kids
her age when she switched schools. Although Frank did not have a steady income or any health
benefits, he was organized and always made sure that Mary had what she needed. Mary may not
have had all that she desired, but he ensured that she had all the basic necessities, fought for her

5. ANALYSIS PAPER 5
custody to maintain her physical environment, and did his best to provide for her health and
wellness. Because of all the efforts that Frank made to care for Mary, he provided for her
maintenance tasks in a way that would allow Mary to be individualized.
Identity
In order to protect Mary and to allow her to be herself, Frank attempted to protect the
identity of the family and to go against the mathematician identity that his mother was trying to
enforce. Frank promoted differentiation within the family which allowed optimum tolerance for
individuality (George, 2020). Because Evelyn enforced the exact opposite of this for her
children, Frank’s sister, Diane, felt that her life had no purpose other than the purpose that her
mother had given her. When Diane accomplished the math problem that she had devoted her life
to, she felt that she had no other reason to live and committed suicide. Frank watched how much
having little differentiation between his mom and sister was an unhealthy identity that ruined his
sister’s life and decided to do everything in his power to protect Mary from falling into this same
pattern. Frank also refused to allow himself to follow the identity of his family and moved away
from where he had always lived to stop the unhealthy cycle that his mother had created. Not
allowing Mary to follow the legacy of becoming a great mathematician like her mother and
grandmother is what ultimately led Evelyn to file for custody.
Part B: Social Influences
There are many social factors that have shaped and influenced the way that Frank and
Mary interact and function. The first social factor is Mary’s giftedness and the way in which it
has affected how those around her treat her. Raising a child who is gifted presents many troubles
for parents as, “Parents of the gifted have to deal with unique concerns related to parenting
beliefs, values, and management, such as family roles and adaptations, sibling relationships,

6. ANALYSIS PAPER 6
parental self-concept, neighborhood and community issues, educational concerns, and child
development”(Renati & Bonfiglio & Pfeiffer, 2016, p. 148). Because Mary is gifted, Frank had
to raise her differently than other children as she had different emotional and developmental
needs. For example, Frank could not hide many things from Mary because “gifted children,
whose sensitivity lends itself to heightened perceptiveness, are alert to small changes in their
environment, and they are very aware of their own unique gifts,”(Fornia, 2001, p. 385). He had
to explain to Mary that she was gifted and because she was aware of small changes in her
environment, he could not hide the fact that Evelyn was trying to take her away.
Mary also struggled to make friends in her classes as she could not relate as easily to
them so she was closer to Frank than most parents and children are. Mary’s inability to relate to
kids also had to do with her intensity:
For example, whereas a normally empathic child may frown when she sees someone hurt,
an emotionally gifted child may be on the verge of tears for hours, or even days, thinking
about how unjust the world is for letting hurt exist. (Fornia, 2001, p. 385)
Mary’s intense emotions could be seen during the scene on the schoolbus in which Mary
attacked a boy for breaking another child’s project. This exact incident also pushed her further
away from making friends and closer to Frank as the other children became afraid of her. Not
only did the other children not know how to respond to Mary, but neither did the administration
at her school. As David (2011) explains, “the most important characteristic of the good teacher
of the gifted has been her or his attitude towards the gifted,” which led Mary’s first grade teacher
to attempt to challenge Mary in the classroom and even give her math problems that the older
students were doing (p. 71). Despite her teacher’s best efforts, The social factor of Mary’s
giftedness and the legacy of being a mathematical genius meant that she could not attend a

7. ANALYSIS PAPER 7
normal first grade class and ultimately meant that Frank would have to send her to a school for
the gifted.
Celebrations and Rituals
One of the important rituals between Frank and Mary was allowing Mary to spend one
night a week with their neighbor Roberta. Because Frank was not technically Mary’s father, he
had to leave behind a lot of things he would have done as a single man in order to raise Mary the
way that she deserved. Allowing Mary to spend every Friday night at Roberta’s house meant that
Frank had a chance to be alone for the night to do whatever he pleased and that Mary got to be
with another female. Frank also made sure that he and Mary spent a lot of time together doing
things other than her school. When Mary changed schools and began to attend the school for the
gifted, Frank would drop her off at school, work on boats while she was gone, and then would
drop her off for girl scouts after class. This daily ritual allowed Frank to make an income and
allowed Mary to do something that other children her age were doing since she was not with
other children during school anymore.
Philosophy of Life
Before Mary was left to be under the care of Frank, he was a philosophy professor at a
university. He gave up this profession to raise Mary but still knew much about the philosophy of
life. When Mary asked Frank if there was a god, he explained that he did not know, but that it
was important to have faith because it was about how we feel and not what we know. Mary also
asked Frank if Jesus was God and instead of telling her his opinion, Frank answered by saying,
“I don't know. I have an opinion, but that’s my opinion. I could be wrong, so why would I screw
up yours? Use your head, but don’t be afraid to believe in things either”(Allen et al. 2017). I
believe that allowing Mary to have her own opinion about life was important to Frank as it was

8. ANALYSIS PAPER 8
hard for them to make meaning of the things that had happened to them, like her mom dying or
Evelyn trying to take her away, but all of these things happened for a divine reason.
Family Life Cycle
As Anderson and Sabatelli (2011) explain, “the family unit is unique in that it is the
social institution charged with the responsibility of regulating human reproduction, socialization,
and survival” (p. 83). In a normative family life cycle, stage one begins when a man and woman
get married and fulfill their husband and wife roles (Anderson & Sabatelli, 2011, p. 88). Stage
two is when this couple decides that they are ready to have children. The family life cycle of
Frank and Mary began in a different way than the normative life cycle as Mary was given to
Frank to raise as his own when her mother passed away. In stage three, the child’s preschool life
is established and in the case of Frank and Mary, this consisted of them and Roberta. In stage
four of the family life cycle, the child is entering school and the family is tasked with
“organizing their family to fit into the expanding world of school-aged children”(Anderson &
Sabatelli, 2011, p. 88). Frank and Mary strayed from the norm in this stage as well as their
family continued to consist of the two of them and Roberta.
It was in stage four of the life cycle that Evelyn entered the picture and began to change
what Mary’s life had always consisted of. Evelyn’s entrance into Mary’s life added stress into
Frank's life as he had managed the developmental tasks within each stage of Mary’s life in a
certain pattern ever since he was given custody of her. Not only was Frank responsible for Mary
in these already difficult tasks, but he also has to parent and regulate her socialization and
survival in a different way as, “having an academically gifted child in the home alters normal
family roles”(West & Hosie & Mathews, 1989, p. 121). Frank also had to protect Mary from
knowing too much about her giftedness as, “problems tend to arise when there is an

9. ANALYSIS PAPER 9
overemphasis on the child's giftedness”(Snowden & Christian, 1999). Because Frank had harder
tasks than other parents in a normative family life cycle, he had to work to adapt and change the
different stages of Mary’s life.
Frank and Mary had a very special relationship in which they truly understood each other
and relied on each other to fulfill the needs of their subsystem. Because Mary was gifted and was
much more cognitively mature than other children of the same age, Frank openly communicated
with her for the benefit of her development and to promote the healthy functionality of their
relationship. Frank also always allowed Mary to be herself and permitted the differentiation
between them that the rest of his family had always lacked. When Evelyn entered the picture and
threatened that functionality, Frank did everything that he could to tighten the open boundaries
that he had always enforced. By fighting for the custody of Mary and ultimately allowing her to
attend a school where she would be better educated while still allowing her to be a kid after
school, Frank saved her from falling into the same legacy that had hurt other family members in
generations past.

10. ANALYSIS PAPER 10
REFERENCES:
Allen, M., Basner, G., Browning, B., Cohen, A., Knowles, T.K., Lunder, K., & Ryant, C. (2017).
Gifted [Motion picture]. United States of America: Searchlight Pictures.
Anderson, S. A., & Sabatelli, R. M. (2011). Family interaction: A multigenerational
developmental perspective. Boston, MA: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.
David, H. (2011). The Importance of Teachers' Attitude in Nurturing and Educating Gifted
Children. Gifted and Talented International, Volume 26(1-2), pp. 71-80.
Fornia, G. L. (2001). The Social and Emotional Needs of Gifted Children: Implications
for Family Counseling. The Family Journal: Counseling and Therapy for Couples and
Families, Volume 9, pp. 384-390.
George, J. (2020). Internal Boundaries [PowerPoint presentation].
https://app.tophat.com/e/030712/assigned/
Renati, R & Bonfiglio, N & Pfeiffer, S, (2016). Challenges raising a gifted child: Stress and
resilience factors within the family. Gifted Education International, Volume 33 (2), pp.
145-162.
Snowden, P. L., & Christian, L. G. (1999). Parenting the young gifted child: Supportive
behaviors. Roeper Review, Volume 21(3), pp. 215.

11. ANALYSIS PAPER 11
West, J., Hosie, T., & Mathews, F. (1989). Families of Academically Gifted Children:
Adaptability and Cohesion. The School Counselor, Volume 37(2), pp.121-127.