Personality Psychology and Shrek

The following essay will explain the different personality traits of one a single person that in this case will be Shrek. The approach I will be using is “The big five personality factor” by Cattell. These are Neuroticism, Openness, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness and Extraversion. Shreak’ personality is not easy to explain because it varies on every condition and changes throughout the movie but I feel that represents each factor very well.

The first diagnosed on his personality was Neuroticism. The movie started with an ugly Ogre with a split personality. He experienced the feeling of anger very easily examples of this was when he saw the fairy tale people in is swamp, he got really upset but at the same time agreed to what they were asking him to do. He was yelling at them to leave the swamp. This can also be seems as agreeableness because he was easily convinced to talked to the prince. He scored high on Neurotism at the beginning of the movie because he showed signs of anxiety and worried about what people thought of him. For example when talking to the Dunkin he expressed his concern of why the Dunkin was around him and not running away from him, like everybody else. Also, Shrek was easily irritated by the Dunkin jokes and constantly used to reject him. It was obvious that he wanted to be alone and didn’t want to have any contact with the outside world. This type of personality trait is usually link to score high on introversion.

Extraversion is characterized by the tendency to seek out the company of others and engagement to the external world. Shrek on the other hand he was both an outsider and a sensitive individual. He seemed to enjoy his privacy as well as any activity. He was what the average fairytale hero is supposed to be except he was ugly and had some rude behaviors. Shrek is portrayed at first as a person who wanted to be alone in his swamp because when meeting the Dunkin, he tried to scare him away. At the beginning of the movie, he preferred to eat by himself, didn’t want to bring the Dunkin into his swamp to eat with him. He seemed the type of person that preferred to be on his own because his self stem was somewhat low and this was due to his appearance.

On the other hand, he showed high Agreeableness trait because even though he didn’t want to be around people, he helped in various occasions the Dunkin and the princess Fiona. He showed emotions of generous, helpful and willing to help others. Example of this was when the Dunkin decided to follow Shrek to rescue Fiona, Shrek help the Dunkin to pass over the bridge. Shrek cared about the Dunkin because without his help the Dunkin would have fall into the lava. Even though he wasn’t getting along with others at the beginning he still helped the Dunking in various instances and Princess Fiona. Shrek saved the Dunkin from the Dragon and was always making sure they were saved throughout the journey, this showed that he had a good heart.

Openness was another characteristic of Shrek. Even though he was stuck to his own ways of life, he was willing to experience new ideas and challenges like rescuing Fiona. People that are not interested to explore new situations would not be willing to commit to such challenges because they might be scare to fail. Shrek was willing to go over difficult situations to achieve what he was being asks to do. This also binds together with conscientiousness because this showed self-discipline and a high expectation. He planned the way he was going to rescue the Princess and planned what he needed to do to get his swamp back. Shrek was the ideal character to demonstrate the Big Five because his personality goes from low on Extraversion to high on Neuroticism. By the end, because he found the true love and was able to become for secure of his appearance than this trait could be turning down. He became friendlier and was able to make new friends without any problems, it was difficult to win him over but at the end it turned out more extraverted than he was at the beginning of the movie.