The Character Of Howard Hughes: Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

This media project will focus on the character of Howard Hughes in the film The Aviator. Based on the information provided in the film, this character is portrayed as having Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD). The purpose of this paper is to describe the disorder as it applies to the character, describe how the disorder impacted the character’s life, explain factors that likely impacted the character, comment on the accuracy of the character portrayal, and provide information about the respectfulness of the portrayal to the mental health population.

Description of Disorder

OCD is characterized by the presence of recurrent obsessions, compulsions, or both. The obsessions or compulsions feel excessive or unreasonable, cause great distress, take up much time, or interfere with daily functions. Obsessions are defined as persistent thoughts, ideas, impulses, or images that are experienced repeatedly, feel intrusive, and cause anxiety. Compulsions are defined as repetitive and rigid behaviors or mental acts that a person feels driven to perform in order to prevent or reduce anxiety. The character clearly demonstrated the following symptoms. Howard’s main obsessions are his phobia of germs – contamination related fears, and his need for things to be orderly. These obsessions include an anxiety towards crumbs and dirt; old milk; used hand towels; toughing things that may be contaminated, such as the bathroom door handle, public soap, and the steering wheel of the airplane; and items not arranged in a straight line. When his OCD becomes more severe, he experiences anxiety towards most of his house and work area. To reduce his anxiety, Howard performs many compulsions. Some of them include washing his hands excessively with his own soap, ...

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... seem to be making the disorder seem like this horrible, terrifying thing; and may give people the idea that someone with OCD was any of these phrases. To be more respectful these phrases should not have been used.

The portrayal of Howard Hughes in The Aviator provides an interesting case study for OCD. The purpose of this paper was to describe the disorder, report how the disorder impacted the character’s life, explain factors that likely impacted the character, comment on the accuracy of the character portrayal, and provide information about the respectfulness of the portrayal to the mental health population. Overall, analyzing the disorder in the movie allowed me to get a better understand of the features of the disorder, and allowed me to be a more critical thinker while watching a movie that includes a mental disorder, identifying accuracies and inaccuracies.