Social Psychology In Shutter Island

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In order to analyze a movie from a social psychology standpoint, we have chosen the American thriller Shutter Island, directed by Martin Scorsese that was released in 2010. While doing that, we were looking at four different aspects that are relevant throughout the whole storyline. 2. Plot In 1954, U.S. Marshall Teddy Daniels is assigned together with his partner Chuck Aule, to conduct investigations about a woman that apparently disappeared from a sanatorium, located on Shutter Island near Boston. While having his personal reasons to go on the island, Teddy suspects the mental hospital for carrying out human experiments, in order to sedate the patients. In the end, it comes to light that Teddy Daniels is actually suffering himself by a psychological illness and that the sanatorium tried to heal him by letting him believe that he is a Marshall trying to solve a case, in order to bring him back to reality. 3. Obedience, conformity and compliance Obedience is a social influence where a person acts in a certain way while following an order of an authority …show more content…

A good example is displayed in the scene, where Teddy and his military fellows shot the SS soldiers after the liberation of the concentration center in Dachau. Although the Americans knew that they should not simply shoot the Germans, they still did it and followed the order of their superiors. This example can be also seen as conformity where “a person being influenced by the group changes his attitudes and beliefs” in order to fit in (Scott Constable, Zachary Shuler, Lucretia Klaber, & Mick Rakauskas, March 24, 2015). Assuming that Teddy was alone, he would have probably acted differently. However, the feeling of belonging to a group and acting in a specific way, in order to be accepted is a common behavior of the human

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