Movie Character Diagnosis: Barney Stinson in How I Met Your Mother
Barnabas “Barney” Stinson is the breakout character in the television series How I Met Your Mother which premiered on CBS on 19th September 2005. The television series which is in its seventh season with the eighth season in the works stars Josh Radnor as Ted Mosby, Neil Patrick Harris as Barney Stinson, Jason Segel as Marshall Eriksen, Cobie Smulders as Robin Scherbatsky and Alayson Hannigan as Lily Aldrin with Ted Mosby as the main character. The plot of the movie is based on a narration and flashbacks by Future Ted as narrate to his two children, son and daughter, played by David Henrie and Lyndsy Fonseca respectively, how he met their mother (CBS, 2009). Through his narration, this begins after sitting down his son and daughter in the 2030, Ted recounts the events from the year 2005 when he was still a single at 27 years. Through the past tense narration, Ted, an architect, the children are able to learn of the womanizing ways of Uncle Barney Stinson, his former girlfriends and the twist and the turns of his lives and that of his friends and the complex and sometimes reckless lives of the many characters in the American sitcom. Through Ted’s eyes viewers and the children are able to see the life of the other characters in the series.
Of all the characters in this television series, Barnabas “Barney” Stinson stands out as the breakout. His perception of life and womanizing and indifferent ways leaves a lot to be desired. Everything around Barney including his nicknames such as Barn Stormer or Barn Man attests to his ways of life; womanizing. In his early thirties, Barney is the son of Loretta Stinson and Jerome Whittaker and a half brother to James Stinson, Carly Whittaker and Jerome “J.J.” Whittaker Jr. Other notable relatives are his cousin Leslie, nephew Eli and brother-in-law Tom. However, due to his womanizing ways, Barney the Barn Stormer is a bachelor but had an almost serious relationship with Shannon his first girlfriend, Robin Scherbatsky and Nora (CBS, 2009). But the list of ladies he has slept with is endless as at some point he even celebrated having had sex with the 200th woman just to achieve an old goal of doubling the number 100 ladies his boyhood friend Matthew Panning, had slept with. Life as a serial womanizer began for Barney after losing his first girlfriend Shannon to a peace corps who was a womanizer. After losing his at virginity at 23 years to her mother’s friend, Rhonda, an incident which was arranged by James, Barney became a womanizer. He even employed the same tactics as the suit wearing womanizer who snatched his girlfriend like wearing a suit (CBS, 2009).
Despite his friends aiming to finally settling down, Barney only wants to sleep and discard the women he meets. To achieve this, he uses numerous strategies, plans and rules which are outlined in the Bro Code, a book he wrote. He even went as far masquerading as a taxi driver and used his illusionist capabilities to bed women. He is a very determined and competitive man who would leave no stone unturned just to show his worth and this mostly led to him losing fortunes as he became addicted to gambling. A very manipulative and opportunistic man, Barney would go a great length just to set up things and watch them go down from a spectator’s stand. At the end he will chip in with his mostly hypocritical opinions. Despite all these he stands out as a very talented, resilient, witty and creative. However, all these capabilities he uses to further his course which to prove his worth and woo more women. He is even eloquent to such languages as Russian, Korean and Mandarin. All in all, though seemingly of sadistic nature, Barney is also a kind man as he helped his “wingman” Marshall reunite with his girlfriend, Lily. All his actions, though sometimes at odd with the wishes of his friends are usually aimed having people around who are like his disciples (CBS, 2009).
Barney admits to having attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) during childhood. However it seems this disorder is still troubling him up to adulthood. The symptom of this disorder is evidenced by the frequent wandering off of his attention from the conversation and event around. In order to promote agenda of sleeping with women, Barney Stinson usually lies to women about his real profession as he lied to one lady that he is an attorney in law. However, his source of richness can be attributed to his salary and earnings as a powerful executive and part of the management team at Goliath National Bank (GNB) which was taken over by his company, Altrucell. He served as the head of the search committee for designing a new GNB building. With such position, he is able to buy expensive 300 inches television sets and expensive memorabilia such as costumes from Star Wars films(CBS, 2009). Moreover his apartment and expensive plane tickets and postage stamps show that he is relatively richer compared to the other four characters. The life of a serial womanizer coupled with pride and very high competitive character of Barney requires money considerable amount of money to maintain thus he seems to be a well paid worker.
Diagnosis of ADHD using DSM-IV
Barney Stinson is suffering from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) a condition which started while he was a child and whose symptoms have continued to adulthood. This developmental disorder is more prevalent in boys than in girls and consequently in more men than in women (Zwi & Ramchandani , 2000). Characterized by difficulty in paying attention coupled with abnormally levels of activity, ADHD is usually diagnosed in children who are as young as six years old (Biederman, 1998). ADHD has three major subtypes whose symptoms may overlap into the other type. The symptoms of the predominantly inattentive ADHD subtype include difficulty in paying attention and learning new ideas, inability to listen without talking and losing interest and becoming bored easily in a particular task. Individuals who talk nonstop, unable to silently perform their tasks and always moving are showing symptoms of predominantly hyperactive-impulsive ADHD subtype. Moreover such individuals also like fidgeting a lot, too playful with anything they come across and are always jittery during such occasion as dinner or story telling times. An individual suffering from the third subtype and the most common subtype of the three would exhibit impatience in almost aspects of their lives and act impulsively and without regard to the consequence of their actions. This mainly results from a combination of at least six symptoms of the other two subtypes. These subtypes have been given codes as follows in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th Edition (DSM-IV) published by the American Psychiatric Association: 314.01 combined, 314.01 predominantly hyperactive-impulsive and 314.00 predominantly inattentive.
Using the DSM-IV, the clinical syndromes (Axis I) of ADHD which Barney Stinson is suffering from are mainly combined ADHD, predominantly hyperactive-impulsive ADHD, predominantly inattentive ADHD. Barney acts impulsively and does not first think of the consequences of his behavior. He became addicted to gambling and decided to gamble the whole of his life savings during just to prove a point that he is good at gambling. He sleeps with numerous women and discards them without thinking of the consequences of womanizing. Even though Ted and Stella never wanted Robin to attend their wedding, Barney the Barn Stormer manipulates her and she goes to the wedding. To him all his actions are justified so long as they follow the Bro Code which he wrote himself. Using the multiaxial approach of DSM-IV, ADHD is diagnosed as a developmental disorder since it is first evident at childhood. The onset of ADHD in Barney was at childhood a fact which he admits by himself. However, Barney’s condition does not fit in Axis III of DSM-IV which examines physical conditions that a play a role in the development or exacerbation of Axis I and II disorders. Barney does not have any history of brain injury, HIV/AIDS infection or any other physical condition that might have worked to accelerate or worsen his mental illness.
However Barney’s condition as listed in Axis I and II is impacted by various psychosocial stressors. Being 23 years old and in his first relationship with a lady, Barney loses his girlfriend Shannon to peace corps who is a womanizer. Such an event is traumatizing and he resolves to be a womanizer which he achieves with careless abandon. He sleeps with any woman he wants and would go to any extent to achieve this without caring for the feelings of any other person. This is encouraged by losing his virginity to his mother’s friend, Rhonda. During this time his brother lied to him that he did great. Such encouragement fuelled an already volatile situation as Barney had already started experiencing the disorder at a young age. His carelessness in spending his money especially on gambling was encouraged by his mother who was a bookmaker. Such psychosocial stressors impacted his condition for instead of discouraging such carelessness, they encouraged him and he ended up having the problems resulting from ADHD up to adulthood. Moreover such events as discovering that his own mother had lied to him about his biological is a psychosocial stressors which only serve to encourage his wayward condition as listed in Axis I and II. Analyzing Barney’s behavior throughout all the seasons of the sitcom, it can be diagnosed that, under Axis V on his highest level of functioning, his condition is at a constant. He continues to womanize and live carelessly throughout the sitcom.
Causes of ADHD
ADHD is mainly caused by genetic mutation especially the dopamine transporters which are involved in impulse transmission to the brain. Thus ADHD is heritable as shown by studies in twins. However using the study, scientists have been able to establish the role of environment in the prevalence ADHD (Sherman et al, 1997). These studies showed that smoking, lead poisoning, organophosphate, infections and alcoholism especially during pregnancy and early childhood development are predisposing factors to contracting ADHD (Braun et al, 2006). Moreover, studies also show that evolution has a role to play in causing ADHD. Allelic study shows that nomads and those individuals with history of migrating had high frequencies of alleles responsible for causing ADHD. This study is also supported by those individuals who were mainly hunters had higher cases of ADHD. This gives credence to the theory of evolution that postulates that impulsive and hyperactive characters where adaptations to the hunting life (Chen et al, 1999). However many people of varied professions believes that ADHD is a social construction that the society has come up with in its bid to draw the line between normal and abnormal (Parens & Johnston, 2009). This social construct theory of ADHD can explain why most of Barney’s friends still remain consider him as a friend despite his weird behaviours. Ted even calls him Uncle Barney. Since the onset of ADHD is at a young age, neglect and abuse of children play a major role in causing ADHD or symptoms similar to those of ADHD.
Treatment and Management of ADHD
The major forms of medication for treating ADHD are stimulants such as methylin, Ritalin, dextrostat and focalin among others. However it is important to note that since children are different, these will work differently on different children. Moreover since these are stimulants there is likelihood of dependence and addiction leading to abuse. These drugs too have side effects such as loss of appetite and sleep (Wigal, 2009). The parents and the family as a whole should also undergo a training regime aimed at helping them understand their children’s condition better while the affected individual should undergo a behavioral therapy since it mainly affects the individual’s behavior. Sharing pleasant moments with the affected individuals helps in relaxing their nerves thus reducing the severity of the symptoms of ADHD.
References
CBS. (2009). How I Met Your Mother cast. Retrieved November 19, 2011, from http:/www.cbs.com/primetime/how-i-met-your-mother/bio
Zwi M, Ramchandani P, Joughin C (October 2000). "Evidence and belief in ADHD". BMJ 321 (7267): 975–6.
Biederman J (1998). "Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: a life-span perspective". The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 59 Suppl 7: 4–16.
Chen et al. (1999). Population migration and the variation of dopamine D4 receptor (DRD4) allele frequencies around the globe. Evolution and Human Behavior 20 (5): 309–324.
Parens E, Johnston J (2009). Facts, values, and Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD): an update on the controversies. Child Adolesc Psychiatry Ment Health 3 (1): 1.
Sherman et al. (1997). Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder dimensions: a twin study of inattention and impulsivity-hyperactivity. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 36 (6): 745–53.
Braun et al. (2006). Exposures to environmental toxicants and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in U.S. children. Environ. Health Perspect. 114 (12): 1904–9.
Wigal, S. (2009). Efficacy and safety limitations of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder pharmacotherapy in children and adults. CNS Drugs 23 Suppl 1: 21–31
