Psychological Traits Probably Common After the Apocalypse
So, you’ve been religiously reading my post about post apocalyptic wastelands and you’re ready to play. You’re trying to figure out angles for your character, ways to make him or her unique. You may be asking “How oh great and wonderful Tomcat?” OK, you’re saying that in my mind, but we won’t sweat the details at the moment. Your character is in the post apocalyptic wasteland and you have to figure out they’re like. Here’s a few psychological traits and conditions that may be common. These aren’t specific to PCs either, since many of them can be very dark.
Probably the most common would be PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). The apocalypse is usually traumatic on some level, if not the apocalypse itself then the unrest that follows afterwards sure will be. PTSD is known by many as a condition that effects combat troops, but it’s also known to show up with child abuse and rape victims as well. Any form of trauma can cause this, so this gives you plenty of opportunity to figure out where to plug this into your character’s background.
Multiple personalities often show up in children who are abused, so theoretically a PC who was a child during part of the apocalypse could have multiple personalities in reponse to their mind trying to protect the primary personality from the trauma being inflicted. This shouldn’t be overdone however, since it’s fairly rare in reality so it should be fairly rare in your game as well.
Sociopathic personality disorders are definitely on the agenda for many, many people. This works very well for villains as there are no morals to prevent them from acting in whatever manner they so choose. And, since there are no police, they’re free to rampage and cause hate and discontent and kick small puppies at will.
Of course, there’s tons of others that can be used, and since my training in psychology is limited to one semester of Intro to Psych, I’ll leave it here. However, I’m sure there’s some of you good readers who can think of a few more that are applicable, so go right ahead! I could use the education on this one 
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October 7th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Schizophrenia or schizo affective disorders are also common in children who have suffered severe trauma or abuse. Even though Schizophrenia is more likely to occur naturally in people during their late teens - twenties, it can be brought on in most people from extreme stress as well. Anger problems, Impulse control, kleptomaniac, and any number of mental illnesses can arise. OCD behaviors such as hording can also be the result of something traumatic like say… the Apocalypse.
Basically most mental disorders can be brought on by extreme stress, even bipolarism. The human mind can only handle so much before it “breaks” and develops other means to cope with trauma. Some people are lucky enough to work through it and return to normal, others develop the disorders permanently.
The natural exceptions to what I’ve said before are disorders such as mental retardation and ones that are more physical in nature. Though you could have your character suffer brain trauma to develop many of these as well… an MR character isn’t necessarily an idiot, they can just have some operational issues such as speech impediments, slow learning, delayed reactions etc…
You could really have a lot of fun with this because pretty much any disorder you can find/think of is a potentiality. You can make them as severe as you like and run with it. I would recommend looking up some symptoms for the disorder you want to put on your character, you can find tons of stuff on line in you don’t have a DSM-IV on your book shelf.
I’m not a psychologist/psychiatrist so I am not an expert, but I am a senior majoring in psych, I work in a mental hospital and I am focusing my degree on psychiatric nursing (once I complete my BA.. 6 classes to go… yeah!), so I do have some experience and knowledge. I’m not just making all this up.
October 8th, 2008 at 5:20 am
“They said I was a sociopath with paranoid tendencies, but that was because I threated to kill them because they were all out to get me.”
You’re right, damn near anything potentially could be tied to the apocalypse. Psychological trauma is easy enough to occur today, after an apocalypse it should be far, far to easy.
October 10th, 2008 at 6:48 am
[...] setting, and discusses inspirational sources. In the world, some skills are more useful and several mental issues are more common as well. In the end, he gets down to the nitty gritty of ways to bring about the [...]