Anakin Is Still BPD After All These Years

[lazypadawan]

Remember a few years ago, some psychology researchers came to the conclusion that Anakin suffered from borderline personality disorder? Here's a second article about the same researchers and their findings:

http://www.livescience.com/culture/psychology-darth-vader-revealed-100604.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Livesciencecom+%28LiveScience.com+Science+Headline+Feed%29

Comments

[ladyaeryn.livejournal.com]

Even as someone who loves psychology and mythology, for some reason I have this instinctive aversion to labeling mythological archetypes (which I very much see Anakin as) with post-modern psychological labels. I think part of it's my worry that some people might be oversimpifying what I see as wonderfully complex characterization with a pat, packaged 'diagnosis.' On the other hand... if this helps someone better understand the character, or the disorder, who am I to judge? And, I remind myself, even if someone fits all the textbook traits of a so-called disorder, this doesn't mean that that disorder is all there is to that person.

In any case, it's an interesting question to ponder. There are a couple of major BPD traits that I don't see Anakin possessing - suicidal/self-mutilation tendencies, for instance. While he has some recklessness, you don't see him cutting himself or doing drugs or having a bunch of sex with random people. When considering BPD and Anakin, though, there was one BPD characteristic that stood out to me sharply: the tendency to see those around him as black and white 'good' or 'evil.' Padmé and Palpatine can do no wrong; in RotS the Jedi can do no right. And the notion of 'splitting,' where a seemingly minor trigger causes a BPD person's perception of someone to shift suddenly - as happens with Padmé and Obi-Wan in RotS - that's very Anakin/Vader.

[sreya.livejournal.com]

Interesting how, while they discuss the idea that "many" teens may be BPD and therefore relate to Anakin, they fail to mention that in the second movie, Anakin is still a teenager. (It also sounds more like BPD is a developmental issue, being stuck in a teenage state of mind, from their description anyway. Of course, that could be just that it's a short article oversimplifying something.)

[knight-ander.livejournal.com]

That's a very interesting article. Thanks for sharing. :)

[darth-pipes.livejournal.com]

There was someone who read the first Clone Wars campaign (comics, books, etc.) that Anakin did look like he suffered from severe PTSD.