Stewie+Griffin

**//__Stewie Griffin__//** By: Luciana Batista

 **Biography** Stewie Griffin is a TV character from the series //Family Guy// which was created and produced by Seth MacFarlane since 1999. This show about a middle-class family of New-Englanders won the Emmy nomination for Outstanding Comedy Series in 2009. Stewie’s family consists of his father, Peter, his mother, Lois, his brother, Chris, his sister, Meg, and his dog who is also his best friend, Brian. Stewie is a one year old baby who is extremely sophisticated and knowledgeable of the world and current events. He also has an unexplainable British accent that just contributes to his appearance of an intellectual. It seems as if his main goal in life is to dominate the world so he will destroy anything that stands in his way to power. Although he wants this ultimate control, he is still in a baby’s body and frequently experiences obstacles that don’t allow him to achieve his goal; such as not being big/tall enough, people not understanding him or people not taking him seriously. Being a baby also works against him when trying to be powerful due to the physiological changes of his body (such as teething) or him uncontrollably giving in to childish urges (such as being very closely connected to his teddy bear –Rupert, or wanting his people’s attention when bored). Seeing his sensitive, naïve and innocent side come out during his road to dominance is very humorous because he has no control of the situation and gets very frustrated with himself. With all of his intellect, need for power yet uncontainable charm “The Top-Tens” website shows that Stewie is considered viewer’s favorite //Family Guy// character. If only he was made aware of this poll, his response would most likely be “Victory is mine”!

**Neo-Analytical/Ego Perspective** By looking at a neo-analytical or ego perspective of Stewie’s personality, I was able to get a better understanding on what his wants really are and why he acts the way he does in certain situations. Carl Jung was a psychologist in this field who worked off of Freud to establish his theory of personality; this consisted of three different parts: the ego, personal unconscious and collective unconscious. The ego is the conscious part of our personality that embodies your sense of the “self”, who you really are, and is normally developed at age 4. Since Stewie is only a one year old, it is obvious that his wants and emotions are unstable. In one episode he is determined to dominate the world, killing anyone who comes his way, but in the next episode he is devastated because his teddy bear, Rupert, was sold in a garage sale (in the episode “Road to Rupert”). He is unquestionably struggling with figuring out who his true self is; a tough, dominant soul or a childlike and compassionate one. The Personal Unconscious is the part that contains thoughts not in our awareness which includes dreams and/or unimportant events. Stewie, like everyone, contains this aspect of personality since he cannot constantly be aware of everything that is going on in his life at all times. The Collective Unconscious is a deeper level which contains four different archetypes that all of humanity share; animus/anima, person/shadow, mother and hero/demon. Stewie contains animus/anima to quite an extent since it is often questioned whether or not he is homosexual. In the episode “Boys do Cry” Stewie dresses as a girl to hide from the cops and when asked how he feels he responds saying he ‘feels right’. This suggests that he feels comfortable acting and dressing feminine. When looking at the persona/shadow archetype I would consider the persona being his outward baby/infant appearance that no one is afraid of; the shadow on the other hand is his desire to rule the world and control everything. Stewie’s mother archetype would relate back to his inner care for people, especially for Rupert and his dog Brian. The final archetype has to do with a strong force for good vs. cruelty and evil; he possesses both. Being only one, I believe he tries very hard to be powerful and often times commits very serious evil acts but still has an inner ability to be innocent and thoughtful. Alfred Adler is another psychologist in this field who also talks about peoples psyche or inner self. He believes there are four aspects to your psyche: organ inferiority, aggressive drives, masculine/feminine traits and superiority striving. When speaking about organ inferiority, Adler is referring to a physical weakness or deficiency that everyone acquires; in Stewie’s case, him being a baby and having to be dependent on older people or adults for a variety of things causes this weak point. Aggressive Drives is a reaction one gets when feeling helpless or inferior. Stewie displays this part of his psyche many times; at one point when Lois stops him from committing a violent act he proceeds to say, “Damn you, vile woman”. I would say he has ‘little man syndrome’; this is when a smaller or weaker man feels the need to act out in order to gain respect and feel a little more superior. Masculine/Feminine traits would once again go back to his questionable sexuality like in the episode “The Tan Aquatic with Steve Zissou”; his feminine side shows when he begins tanning and becomes in love with the appearance and look of it. Adler’s final aspect for a psyche is the superiority striving; in Stewie’s case it causes him to have a superiority complex. Due to feeling little and inferior, he is always making very important and significant devices to assist him in ruling the world such as a weather machine in the episode “I never met the dead man”.

**Trait Perspective** In the trait perspective view of psychology, researchers are interested in seeing specific personal qualities each person contains. Gordon Allport is a psychologist who was very interested in personality and what unique qualities each person contained. Allport established ‘The Big Five’ which was emerged through factor analysis as a way to describe people’s personality. The big five traits were: extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism and openness. Stewie Griffin in my opinion is pretty low on extroversion as well as agreeableness since he is not that sociable to new people and often fails at being forceful, although he makes a good attempt. In “Chick Cancer”, Seth MacFarlane shows us how introverted and egocentric Stewie is when the one relationship he actually pursues with another child his age, Olivia, goes downhill due to him only thinking of himself and not being modest. Conscientiousness, meaning his competence and impulsivity, on the other hand is a higher trait in his personality according to his actions. When Stewie sets his mind to going somewhere, he will act on it immediately and not really think twice; like when he decided to go to Europe to live with the members of his favorite TV show, Jolly Farms ( in “Road to Europe”). This idea was not thought out rationally and was very impulsive on his part to attempt this journey. Allport’s view of neuroticism was focused on a person’s emotional instability and I think it is safe to say Stewie is high on this trait. When brought up in conversation I have often heard people call him a ‘little Nazi’ or just completely ‘crazy’. For a one year old baby to possess so many strong urges for power, violence and control there is definitely something wrong with his mental state. The final trait that Allport discussed was openness to different experience, intellect and imagination. With all of Stewie’s inventions, sporadic trips, and evil plans he shows a high relation with this trait. Henry Murray contributed to the study of trait psychology when talking about motivation. He believed people develop needs in life and that is what shapes our personality and how we act. The four main needs that people acquire include achievement, affiliation, power and exhibition. From watching //Family Guy// for a very long time now, I would say that Stewie’s main need is for power. Murray says that when people have this need as their main motivation, they are likely to want to engage in a position where they are able to have control over others. Stewie is definitely a person who wants to be in command, have authority and dictate what is acceptable; his need for power is demonstrated when he decides to make a less intelligent clone of himself whom he calls ‘Bitch Stewie’. In this episode (called “Quagmire’s Baby”) he uses this clone as a personal assistant and has him carry out errands and any tasks he doesn’t feel like doing himself. It is very clever of him to make a clone of himself because this is a guaranteed way of having power over someone- it’s technically still you. Murray would say that for him to go to this extent as to making a personal assistant for himself shows his necessity for being superior.

**Discussion** After analyzing Stewie Griffin’s through a neo-analytic/ego as well as a trait perspective, a lot more insight has been shown about his true self and personality. From these two standpoints it can be concluded that he is a small ‘evil genius’ struggling to figure himself out in the process of gaining control. His questionable sexuality and superiority complex are obstacles that he constantly struggles through while trying to rule the world. Being such a small child and having such a large understanding of the world probably contributes to his need for authority. Stewie is way past the mind capacity of a one year old, so for him to not gain the respect and recognition he deserves is frustrating to him and he turns towards violence to gain the power through fear and violence instead. I believe that if a psychologist were to sit down with Stewie, most would agree that he has mental issues, or as Allport would put it, high in the neuroticism trait of his personality. It is not typical or normal for a small child to want to assert power over adults and already be confused about their sexuality. Seth MacFarlane takes advantage of these odd traits that Stewie contains to make him the most popular member of the Griffin Family.

**References** About the Show: Family Guy. In //Fox .//Retrieved from []. 4/20/2011 Best Family Guy Characters. In //The Top Tens.// Retrieved from [] 4/20/2011 Episode List for Family Guy. In //The Internet Movie Database//. Retrieved from [|http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0182576/episodes] 4/20/2011 Family Guy: Episode Guide. //Wikia//. Retrieved from []. 4/20/2011