For my second self-motivated learning activity, I decided to watch the well-known family movie Finding Nemo. I have seen this movie multiple times before, but after watching the movie with the knowledge I received from psychology, it made me think about the psychology aspects found within the movie. The first thing I noticed was Marlin possibly having a minor case of OCD in the scene where Marlin and Nemo are leaving for Nemo’s first day of class. Marlin makes Nemo move in and out of the anemone multiple times to make sure they are safe to leave.
Marlin repeats swimming in and out of the anemone while making Nemo do the same. Another thing I noticed about the movie is Dory’s short-term memory loss. I have noticed her short-term memory loss previously when I watched the movie, but I did not think about her memory loss in the depth I did the most recent time I watched it. The type of short-term memory loss Dory has is Anterograde amnesia, which causes Dory to not be able to encode new memories such as the name of Marlin’s son, Nemo, or why Marlin follows her in the beginning of the movie.
Dory does not tell us how she came to have anterograde amnesia, but when researching this amnesia I found that, “ This type of amnesia could be caused by a traumatic head injury which could cause permanent damage, or a more temporary cause would be a blackout from drinking too much alcohol.” Even though we do not know the reason for Dory’s memory loss, we do know that she definitely suffers from it. In conclusion, the movie Finding Nemo possesses aspects of psychology that have been discussed in my general psychology class.
References
- “Memory Loss with Finding Nemo.” Section 12 & 13 F11 Psy 1001. N.p., 23 Oct. 2011. Web. 28 Apr. 2013.
