Psychosocial Assessment

Michael Oher in the Blind Side – Character Analysis

 Ara Kim   Uncategorized   April 27, 2017 7 Minutes

Michael Oher, the protagonist of the movie “The Blind Side”, is a troubled African American boy. He was one of twelve children growing up in the broken home of their alcoholic and crack addicted mother. Michael’s absentee father was not present in Michael’s life, as he was frequently in prison and away from their home. Raised in Hurt Village, a housing project in crime ridden North Memphis, Tennessee, Michael was exposed to a variety of people, the majority of whom were owned by drugs, alcohol, and violence. Under these circumstances, Michael was taken by Family Services, and as a ward of the state, was placed in several different foster homes. After running away several times, he ends up homeless, and although he had been staying with an acquaintance, Tony Henderson, Henderson’s wife rejects the boy and the family is forced to discard sixteen-year-old Michael onto the streets.  Due to his unstable childhood, Michael has also not been able to receive a proper education; he attended eleven different schools during his first nine years as a student. However, in a stroke of luck, Michael was able to attend a private catholic school, Wingate Christian School, with the help of Tony Henderson. From here, Michael’s life takes a turn for the better.

Psychosocial Development

Michael Oher is a complex figure. Michael’s development into a healthy individual was severely harmed by his unstable childhood. By analyzing his development in the stages of certain cognitive and psychosocial theorists, it is possible to understand the underlying reasons behind the retarded development of this boy. Erik Erikson is a developmental psychologist famous for his unique theory on the psychosocial development of human beings. Different from other theorists like Piaget, Erikson’s theory is grounded in the idea that “social aspects are more significant in shaping the identity of the human personality” (Batra 2013). Every individual must find a balance between his/her inner voice, his/her physiological and emotional urges, and the nature of his/her social influences. From the start, it is clear that there must have been no room for proper development in Michael’s life. Because he was subject to the negligent and aloof adults in his environment, Michael has had no room to grow. The primary adults in a child’s life tends to be the parents of the child, yet Michael was brought up in a violent neighborhood where both parents were absent. Foster care and Family Services were unable to provide him with a stable home, and as a troubled student in eleven different schools, no teacher was ever able to see Michael long enough to make a difference.

In each of Erikson’s eight stages, the individual must balance new instincts and comprehension of the self and other in order to create a unique human identity. In each stage, the person must face two forces, and although mastery of each stage in order is not required to advance to the next stage, the outcome of each stage may affect development in further stages (Berger 2014). If there in an unsuccessful passage through a stage, the person may develop a disposition that resembles one of the two opposing forces (Batra 2013). Development of the individual in these stages help the ego to find a sense of regulation and a sense of balance between the self and the environment. With proper passage, they can achieve virtues (such as hope, will, purpose, and competence) that provide a rich foundation for the child to construct later life experiences upon. Michael Oher is left alone in a hostile environment with no meaningful adults until he is of age sixteen. He is unable to reach full proper development in Erikson’s stages of trust, infancy, toddlerhood, preschool, and childhood; he has not been able to reach a balance and achieve autonomy, initiative, and industry (the goals of Erikson’s first four stages). It is only then when Leigh Anne Tuohy, a mother of two children who attend the same Wingate Christian School, enters Michael’s life that any proper development is met.

In Erikson’s adolescence stage, individuals of age 13-19 are faced with identity and role confusion. Adolescents combine childhood experiences, cultural values, and unique aspirations to search and form an identity (Berger 2014). While they rely on family support, individuals also seek autonomy and communication is imperative to promote adolescent psychosocial health. For Michael Oher, Leigh Anne Tuohy was his final savior. Without a strong adult figure throughout his childhood, Michael severely lacked much significant childhood experiences other than those that involved crime and the police. Hurt Village is ridden with gangs who encourage drugs, alcohol, and sex. Although Michael understands that he does not want to share the values of the adults in Hurt Village, Michael also does not feel connected to his new environment in Wingate School. Unable to follow the class due to his poor academic standing, he writes a poem:

I look and I see white everywhere. White walls, white floors and a lot of white people. The teachers do not know, I have no idea of anything they are talking about. I do not want to listen to anyone especially the teachers. They are giving me homeworks and expecting me to do the problems on my own. I have never done homework in my life. I got to the bathroom and look in the mirror and say “This is not Michael Oher” (The Blind Side 2005)

Michael, at Wingate high school, feels very isolated and alone as the sole African-American boy in the crowd of white Christian students and staff alike. He understands that he does not fit in with the white walls, white floors, and white people of the school. However, although he understands what he is not, Michael does not understand or come to a conclusion about who he is. In the rigid, judgmental, and non-responsive structure of Wingate, Michael struggles with the need and feeling to belong, and to find acceptance. Without the safeguard of feeling wanted and accepted, it is difficult for him to sort out the role-confusion and identity crisis many other teenagers at Wingate might experience. However, as Leigh Anne Tuohy enters Michael’s life and begins to provide for the homeless boy without reservation, Michael begins to open up to adults and peers. Although his sense of identity is not immediately presented after Michael begins to reside in the Tuohy household, by the time Michael makes a decision about where he wants to go to university, he completely realizes and accepts the importance of the Tuohy family as his own real family. The presence of Mrs. Tuohy as an accepting and responsible adult figure in Michael’s life helps him also reform past experiences in previous stages of Erikson’s theory. Michael accepts Leigh Anne as a mother and learns to unconditionally trust her. This is clearly shown at the end of the movie, when he proudly tells the NCAA investigator (who questions Michael’s decision to go to Ole Miss, the university of the Tuohy’s) that he did not choose Ole Miss because other people forced him to. He refuses to believe the NCAA’s assumption that Leigh Anne only adopted him to have him play for her university, but that she did it because they are family. He tells the investigator that he chose Ole Miss because the Tuohy’s are his family. He is able to find autonomy and attain virtues of will, purpose, competence, and fidelity through his years with the Tuohy’s.

Cognitive Development

Lev Vygotsky on the other hand, focused more on cognitive child development. He focused on the idea that social interaction and imaginative play are a crucial part to a child’s development into a healthy adult. Vygotsky asserted that role playing promotes self-regulation and the ability to follow social cues (Davis 2014).  Although the movie does not depict Michael in his childhood, it is easy to imagine the childhood a distraught, homeless boy may have experienced. Unable to find a permanent home, Michael was probably very unlikely to have the freedom to role play for sufficient development in Vygotsky’s theory. Later in high school, he is unable to maintain conversation with teachers or peers his age. He feels more comfortable talking to kindergarteners on the playground.

To continue, the adults around the child are an important source of cognitive development; they transmit the culture the other knowledge the possess to the child who can internalize that information (Berger 2014). It is a symbiotic relationship between the child and his/her environment (usually the adult), where the child absorbs information, and internalizes it so that he/she may develop further (Christy 2013). Usually, this development occurs something Vygotsky called the zone of proximal development. Under adult guidance, a child is able to accomplish something that he/she may not have been able to do independently (Bodrova 2013). This lack of development is strikingly clear when observing Michael in school. Having bounced around eleven schools during his entire academic career, Michael is unable to create a zone of proximal development for any adult to assist him. His absent parents obviously had no time to assist Michael in learning about the surviving in the environment he lived in (they were victims to the crime of that environment), and the teachers of his first eleven schools gave him “just enough passing grades to send him to the next school”. He wasted nine years of his academic life passing through schools because he had no motivation to succeed. However, under Leigh Anne’s care, Michael was able to have the emotional and physical freedom to create a comfortable and welcome zone to allow development. With the help of Mrs. Boswell (Michael’s science teacher) and Miss Sue (Michael’s private tutor), Michael finally receives private attention and care catered to help him learn in school. While Michael doubted his abilities, the several adults from Michael’s new environment advocated for him and enabled him to raise his GPA to become eligible for a college football scholarship.

References

Batra, S. (2013). The Psychosocial Development of Children: Implications for Education and Society–Erik Erikson in Context. Contemporary Education Dialogue, 10(2), 249-278.

Berger, K. S. (2014). The developing person through the life span. New York, N.Y: Worth Publishers.

Bodrova, E., Germeroth, C., & Leong, D. J. (2013). Play and Self-Regulation: Lessons from Vygotsky. American Journal Of Play, 6(1), 111-123.

Christy, T. C. (2013). Vygotsky, Cognitive Development and Language. Historiographia Linguistica, 40(1/2), 199-227. doi:10.1075/hl.40.1.07chr

Clarà, M. (2016). How Instruction Influences Conceptual Development: Vygotsky’s Theory Revisited. Educational Psychologist, 1-13. doi:10.1080/00461520.2016.1221765

Davis, D., & Bergen, D. (2014). Relationships among play behaviors reported by college students and their responses to moral issues: A pilot study. Journal Of Research In Childhood Education, 28(4), 484-498. doi:10.1080/02568543.2014.944721

Dunkel, C., & Harbke, C. (2016). A Review of Measures of Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development: Evidence for a General Factor. Journal Of Adult Development, 1-19. doi:10.1007/s10804-016-9247-4

Share this:

· Twitter

· Facebook