The+Doctor(Doctor+Who)



By Nick Kornitzer

The Doctor is the main character on the long-running, since 1963, BBC science-fiction show Doctor Who. The Doctor, who doesn’t give anyone his real name, is a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey, whom despite being alien takes on the appearance of a human in every way except for having two hearts. The Doctor functions as a Batman like superhero as he goes around saving the world but at the same time doesn’t have any natural super powers, just a couple of tools that he has picked up along the way (Moffat, 2005-2011). His two main tools, both of which are alien in nature, are his TARDIS and a sonic screwdriver. The TARDIS, which stands for Time And Relative Dimension(s) In Space, operates as both his time machine and mode of transportation. It originally changed its appearance to match the time period and place that it was in however it is now permanently disguised as a 1950’s London police box after its chameleon circuit became faulty. One of the main features that makes the TARDIS amazing, besides the fact that it can go anywhere at any time, forward or backwards, it is also much bigger on the inside than it is on the outside, as it looks like a rather large house once inside the small box. The Doctor is not the only Time Lord who has a TARDIS as they are actually grown on his home planet and are a living thing that feeds off of time energy (Moffat, 2005-2011). His other major tool, the sonic screwdriver, is a device that looks like a flashlight but has many uses, one of which is not as a flashlight. It is primarily used as a lock picking device but can also be used to track alien life and occasionally even to make things explode. Funnily enough one of the few things the Doctor can’t do with this tool is open a wooden lock (Moffat, 2005-2011). The Doctor is a Time Lord which means he comes from the planet Gallifrey. The one important thing this provides for the show is that Time Lords live a lot longer than humans and they also have the ability to completely change their appearance when close to death, called regeneration. The Doctor is currently on his 11th form and has regenerated 10 times. There is supposedly a regeneration limit of 13 but there are supposed to be ways that the Doctor can get around this and live forever. Because of this ability the Doctor is actually 907 years old but has been played by people ranging from 58 to the current and youngest 27. This also makes for a very interesting journey into the personality of the Doctor because he has been 11 completely different people throughout the shows history and has thusly had 11 completely different personalities. Because he is the current one and the one you can watch new episodes of I am going to focus on the 11th doctor, played by Matt Smith, but will mix in a little of the previous Doctor, played by David Tennant, for comparisons as well (Moffat, 2005-2011). Trait approach at its most basic is the “use of a limited set of adjectives or adjective dimensions to describe and scale individuals (Friedman, 2009, p. 257).” One of the most modern and accepted ways of going about using the trait approach involves using “The Big Five” personality traits: Extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism and openness. The theories that are based around the big five personality traits say that you can nearly map a person’s entire personality based on these five personality traits alone (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). The Doctor is a very interesting character when it comes to his personality. The 11th Doctor is very alien in nature compared to the others and because of this is fascinated with every little detail of things on Earth and any other place they visit. He show’s a childlike enthusiasm towards everything from a fly to a crack in a bedroom wall. He is very protective of the people he truly cares for, which are few and far between, but he wouldn’t do any harm to anything unless there was an immediate physical threat to one of the people he cares for most, choosing instead to try to talk through his problems (Moffat, 2005-2011). The current version of the Doctor is one of the most extroverted people I have ever seen (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). He is constantly talking, even if it is only to himself. He loves talking his way through his problems and will go up to just about anyone and start a conversation with them. A perfect example of this is from the episode entitled “The Eleventh Hour”. In this episode he meets the young version of the girl who will become his newest companion on his journeys through space, Amelia (Amy) Pond. The first words the Doctor ever speaks to another creature is to Ms. Pond when he says “Can I have an apple?” The Doctor proceeds to raid the little girl’s refrigerator in search of some sort of food that his new body likes, finally settling for a combination of “fish fingers and custard (Moffat, 2010).” Two other aspects of extroversion that the Doctor shows are being energetic and enthusiastic. The Doctor is always literally running around from place to place trying to figure out what makes it tick or act the way it does. He never seems uninterested in anything no matter how minute and never tires of a new journey. I would also say the Doctor rates high in agreeableness as he is both friendly and cooperative (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). The Doctor is absolutely fascinated with humans and tries to get to know them as much as he can. He tries to make friends with all of them because there are none of his people left as they all died in a war with the Daleks, his sworn enemy, on his home planet. He is also fairly cooperative throughout his journeys. Part of this is because as a Time Lord he is a sort of time policeman making sure other species don’t go back and change time catastrophically and thus has to stop people who try to do this. He therefore makes people, and himself, follow a strict set of rules, called the Shadow Proclamation (also the name of the group who set it up), that restricts the time travel of none Time Lords and the changing of time, as well as many other things. To be able to operate in his role the Doctor has to be cooperative with the shadow proclamation to be able to stop people from destroying the universe. The Doctor also always has a companion of some sort, almost exclusively women, who he also has to cooperate with in order to stop whatever catastrophe they have to prevent in each episode (Moffat, 2005-2011). The final personality trait the Doctor is high in is Openness (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). There is almost no one who is more imaginative in his thinking than the Doctor. In every episode he faces some sort of problem that he has to think through. Typically, the answer does not come easily to him and he has to think of some creative way to get through it, which takes an excellent imagination. He is also quite a witty person always making jokes on small things he observes that are wrong with something (Moffat, 2005-2011). Despite being high in three of the traits in the big five the Doctor is low in both conscientiousness and neuroticism (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). In conscientiousness the main evidence for the Doctor not being high in this is the entire show (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). In each episode he typically sets of for some random place to see if anything interesting is going on there. He usually has no rhyme or reason for choosing the places he does and while he is at these places he will impulsively go off in all directions if he gets a sense that something is a little suspicious. Considering that conscientiousness is also known as lack of impulsivity it is safe to assume the Doctor is lacking in this trait (Moffat, 2005-2011). The other trait that the Doctor is lacking in is neuroticism or emotionally instability (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). The Doctor is a very emotionally stable and calm person no matter the situation he is in. The only time he changes from his personality is if there is a real threat to somebody he cares for and they have no plans to change from that course of action. He is always his impulsive, enthusiastic self and he very rarely if ever varies from this (Moffat, 2005-2011). Humanism is “a philosophical movement that emphasizes the personal worth and the importance of human values (Friedman, 2009, p. 296).” One of the major aspects of humanism is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs which seems to work quite well with the Doctor. At the bottom of Maslow’s hierarchy are physiological needs (Friedman, 2009, p. 311). These needs if not met will make it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for survival. The Doctor obviously has these needs as he does things like eat food, drink and have clothes and shelter. The next step on Maslow’s hierarchy is safety needs (Friedman, 2009, p. 311). The Doctor pretty well has these covered based upon being a Time Lord. Since he is a Time Lord he is able to regenerate his form if he is about to die which provides for a tremendous amount of both personal and health security. His TARDIS can only be opened with a key he and his companion have so is therefore his fortress. Love and belonging needs, the next set for Maslow, are the first time we really see the Doctor have to seek out something to find (Friedman, 2009, p. 311). This current Doctor hasn’t had to do this too much because he immediately found himself a new companion right after he regenerated, as he crash landed in her backyard. However, if we go to the previous Doctor’s it becomes apparently obvious that when he is without a companion he doesn’t operate nearly as well. He is never even close to as happy when he doesn’t have a companion and seems to just wander aimlessly around the universe without any sense of direction. He actively seeks out a companion after the other one decides to leave him and usually finds one pretty quickly, because who wouldn’t want to hang out with a guy with a TARDIS. A lot of his lack of love and belongingness when he doesn’t have a companion comes from the fact that he is the last of his species and therefore has no other Time Lords to talk to. If he were to even have the ability to talk to other Time Lords I am sure this need would be easily filled like the previous two are. As long as he has his companion the Esteem need comes pretty easily to the Doctor (Friedman, 2009, p. 311). As someone who travels throughout the universe fixing problems and saving lives he is built to fulfill this need with his work alone. His favorite place to safe lives is on Earth. On Earth he looks just like all the people and it isn’t too difficult for him to fit in with all the humans. Because of this he feels like he belongs amongst the people of Earth and they feel a great attachment to him as he has saved them from catastrophic disaster on numerous occasions. The final aspect of Maslow’s hierarchy is self-actualization moves; this is by far the hardest step to achieve even for someone who easily moves through the other steps of the hierarchy (Friedman, 2009, p. 311). This step involves a person realizing what their full potential is and achieving that potential. Although this current version of the Doctor did not achieve self-actualization the Doctor himself is self-actualized. The previous version of the doctor became self-actualized and since the Doctor still carries over the memories from his previous version it is safe to assume that the current version of the Doctor is self-actualized as well. The Doctor has proven himself to reach and finish every aspect of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and has thusly proved himself to be not only self-actualized but at the top of the chain when it comes to humanism (Moffat, 2005-2011). Using the trait perspective to first figure out the Doctor’s personality made all of the following work a lot easier. We were able to see how the Doctor didn’t fall in the middle ground of any the big five and was high in more of the traits than he was low (Friedman, 2009, p. 267). The Doctor is loved by almost everyone who meets him or even who watches the show and this comes through in his big five breakdown as he seems to have the positive end of all five personality traits. This got us to see just how complex a person the Doctor is and how people are constantly drawn to him (Moffat, 2005-2011). It was pretty interesting to break down the Doctor using Maslow’s hierarchy of needs as well as we got to find out that not only did he have all of his needs met but he was self-actualized as well which says as many positive things about his personality as does how he broke down with the big five traits (Friedman, 2009, p. 311). Friedman, H. S. & Schustack, M. W. (2009). Personality: Classic theories and modern research (4th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson. Moffat, S. (Producer). (2005-2011). //Doctor Who// [Television series]. London, UK: British Broadcasting Company. Moffat, S. (Producer). (3 April 2010). The Eleventh Hour [Television series]. London: British Broadcasting Company.
 * Biography**
 * The Trait and Skill Approach**
 * Humanistic Approach**
 * Discussion**
 * References**