STILISTIKA e-ISSN daring: 2528-4940

Journal of Indonesian Language and Literature Vol. 02, No.02: April 2023, 126-132

REVEALING PTSD SYMPTOMS EXPERIENCED BY KAT BAKER

USING INTERNAL CONFLICTS IN SPINNING OUT TV SERIES

Putu Agnatya Mahadi Putri1*, I Nyoman Aryawibawa2, dan I Nengah Sudipa3

Universitas Udayana,
*)surel korespondensi: agnaid890@gmail.com

doi: https://doi.org/10.24843/STIL.2023.v02.i02.p12
Artikel dikirim: 17 Mei 2022; diterima: 17 Juni 2022

REVEALING PTSD SYMPTOMS EXPERIENCED BY KAT BAKER USING

INTERNAL CONFLICTS IN SPINNING OUT TV SERIES

Abstract. This article presents a qualitative psychoanalysis study on the main character
named Kat Baker in TV Series titled "Spinning Out". The main character of this series is vividly
clear to correlate with PTSD symptoms, which makes it very interesting to analyze the internal
conflict that experienced by Kat Baker. Therefore, following article analyze Kat Baker’s PTSD
symptoms with Internal conflict theory and identify the cause of Kat Baker’s PTSD in the
Spinning Out TV series. The methodology applied was descriptive qualitative where the
writer analyzed the non-numerical data from Spinning Out TV series in video form. The
results of this study reveals two Interpersonal conflict identification that reveals Intrusion,
Avoidance, Negative Alterations in Cognitions and Mood, and Arousal and Reactivity PTSD
symptoms. Kat Baker’s PTSD symptoms can be explained with internal conflict theory that
considers the character's mental state and her battle to overcome her trauma.

Keywords: internal conflic, PTSD, trauma, TV series

INTRODUCTION
This paper correlate literary works with a character's psychological state—
many literary works concern the characters' psychological conditions. Literary works
are one of human psychological state in guise. Discovering man's psychological state
by analyzing and observing the character behavior's activity is possible to do.
According to Hardjana (1994:6), a literary study that uses psychology as an approach
is a study to search and find the same concept or perception of psychological aspect
in characterizations of the characters in the literary work with certain theories of
psychology through the help of psychological approach and knowledge.
American TV Serial titled Spinning Out, created by Samantha Stratton,
premiered in 2020 on one of the biggest streaming service platforms, Netflix. This
series told a story about a young ice skater named Kat Baker who just experienced a
terrifying incident at her competition that left a serious injury. The series takes setting
in Sun Valley at the Pinecrest Winter resort in the town of Hawkley. Spinning out
mostly focuses on Kat Baker’s struggle to overcome her trauma, but at the same time,

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this series also portrays the struggle and many main problems that every ice skater
athlete has to face.
The main character of this series is vividly clear to correlate with PTSD
symptoms, which makes it very interesting to analyze the internal conflict that
experienced by Kat Baker. PTSD stands for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, one of the
mental disorder categorizations which result from traumatic events, mostly life-
threatening events. One particular traumatic event can make one person feel
frightened and hopeless. Kat's incident is considered traumatic because, after that
incident, Kat is struggling to face her trauma and showing the essential symptoms of
PTSD.
Several works correlates PTSD symptoms with literary works have been done
before. They mostly focused on the character’s act and expression in. One study by
Fadillah (2021) tells a story about Anna, who experienced a deadly car crash that killed
her husband and daughter and got stuck in a blizzard for two days straight in the
process. Fadilla (2021) focusing on finding the differences and affinities of PTSD
portrayed through the characters of both novels, on revealing the portrayed PTSD
through the character, the author used PTSD symptoms theory based on the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder (DSM-5) explanation. The
theory used in this study to reveal the PTSD symptoms (DSM-5) is the main source of
the current study's theory. Despite immensely different causes of trauma and each
character's background, the symptoms found are similar: intrusive thought, avoiding
reminders of traumatic events and having negative thoughts and feelings. This
similarity is proved the statement that PTSD can happen to anyone; it could be from
extreme life-threatening events to changing life events. Another study by Nugraha
(2020) is focusing in reveal the PTSD symptoms experienced by a character named
Ruth Weber and how it has affected her psychological state. Within the process of the
main purpose, the author also reveals the causes of her PTSD. The data source of this
study is a novel titled “The Huntress” by Kate Quinn that set time in World War II,
which is highly well-chosen according to the latest study about PTSD that revealing
the percentage of people that experienced PTSD are war victims (71%) It aimed to
identify the self-defense mechanisms and core issues evidence of the character named
Hazel Lancaster. In revealing the symptoms and effects of PTSD, the author used a
theory of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder by Gerald C. Davison. According to his
theory, the author found three categories of PTSD symptoms in this study: avoidance,
re-experiencing, and arousal. Lastly, a study by Azis (2019) Focusing on the main
character named Dawson Scott that suffering from PTSD after finished his work in
Afghanistan as journalist in war situations, this study widely explore the portrayal of

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PTSD within the main character. Reveling the symptoms of PTSD this study used the
theory based on DSM-5 which is also the source of theory on current study.
All the studies above and our study similarly correlate the Literary works with
PTSD symptoms.However, the previous study only analyzing the character from
literary work that portraying the victim of PTSD. Particular event can stimulate
character’s PTSD come from many story backgrounds, mostly related to war, violent,
extreme grieve, and traffic incident, but rarely related to character having a
background in sporty environment or athletes life. Based on study, the number of
young athletes that experience PTSD is high, and the symptoms beyond fear of re-
injuring, including trouble sleeping, poor concentration, numbness, and avoidance of
speaking about the injury (Orthop J Sports Med [OJSM], 2018). Therefore, this study
chose to analyze the internal conflict and then reveal the PTSD symptoms experienced
by Kat Baker in Spinning Out TV series.
This paper reported a qualitative study which according to Creswell (1994:32),
a qualitative approach is used to put objective ideas or theories to the test by looking
at the interrelationships between data sets. Therefore, in this article, the researcher
analyzed will be analyzing the non-numerical data from Spinning Out TV series in
video form. First, the data were categorized based on concept of Intrapersonal conflict
proposed by Kurt lewin (1948). Second, the categorized data explained with conflict
theory by Kenny, W.P (1933). Then the last step is revealing the PTSD symptoms
according to Blake (1995) and Weis (1997) based on the data that have analyzed to
reveal the symptoms shown by the main character of this TV series.

Result and Discussion

This chapter is presented in two central parts. First is the identification based
on internal conflicts in particular ones related to the intrapersonal concepts (i.e.
approach-avoidance, approach-approach,approach-avoidance), followed by the
second part reveals the PTSD symptoms experienced by Kat Baker based on internal
conflicts.
1. Internal Conflict based on Intrapersonal Conflict Concepts and PTSD
Symptoms experienced by Kat Baker
1.1 Approach-Avoidance Conflict
This concept occurs when a person has to choose an option that puts
them in a situation that possesses both positive and negative aspects (Lewin,
1948).
Approach-Avoidance conflict happens when Kat practices on the ice rink
for her senior test. Kat tries to do her jumps routine even though she is still

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scared. According to Lewis (1948) on Approach-Avoidance conflict, this conflict

puts Kat in a situation where she has to choose between two options that can
result in positive or negative outcomes. On that account, she still considered
herself a figure skater Kat still wants to try out her jump routine, but she is aware
of her trauma and afraid of doing it
Mick: Does your sister always jumps like that ?
Selena: Yes, she always chicken out at the last seconds.
Mick: Pity, she’s beautiful skater.
Following to the dialogue above, Unfortunately, Kat’s effort ended up
with a negative result (i.e. by negative result it refers to Kat failing doing her
jump routine). After the traumatic incident, doing the jumps in her routine is
very traumatic for her. Since then, whenever she tried the jumps routine, Kat
conflicted with herself because her confidence in doing the jump decreases
significantly, despite being a talented skater which can be proof by Mick’s
opinion about Kat’s skill. Therefore the Internal conflict is about the conflict
between Kat’ as a figure skater and her trauma.
Regarding the second research question about the PTSD symptoms that
showed by Kat Baker, the concept of the Intrusion symptom reveals. Theory by
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (2013) supports This
criteria refers to symptoms where the sufferer feels the sudden recollection of
the traumatic event involuntary, experiencing such a flashback and nightmare
that related to the trauma and showing Psychological distress and reaction
towards the exposure of the slight mark of the traumatic event. After her
disastrous fall that caused her trauma in doing the jump routine, she felt a
sudden recollection of the traumatic event involuntary whenever she tried to
jump.This sudden feeling is also supported by Kat's constant failure to do the
jump routine, which is proof of how her skill decreases constantly.
Not only affect her skill as an athlete, Kat’s trauma also affected her as a
human being. After her disastrous fall took her over, Kat had difficulty opening
herself. After deciding to be a pair figure skater with Justin, Kat has trouble
gaining trust with him, resulting in a lack of chemistry, which is terrible for a
pair figure skater. This situation put Kat in a situation where she should open
herself to Justin and trust him, but it put her in a difficult place because her
PTSD affected her to trust other people. This can be seen between Kat and Justin
on the following dialogue:
Justin: 'Cause usually, I connect with everyone.
Kat Baker: Everyone you fuck?

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Justin : Everyone except you, apparently. Uh, okay. Maybe this would
work better if you tried not to be so...
Kat Baker: So what?
Justin: Like you're being right now. Shutting me out, like you do with
everybody. Like...
Kat Baker: Like I'm a lone wolf? Fuck my mother. Fuck you!
Justin: What the fuck are you talking about?
Kat Baker: You're right. This is stupid.
As mentioned above, this data concerns Kat’s PTSD and her relationship
with other people. As seen in the dialogue above, Justin shared his thought
about how Kat is always shutting herself toward him and other people.
According to DSM-5, this data can be identified as Negative Alterations in
Cognition and Mood symptom, this symptom can be seen when Kat suddenly
shows sudden outbursts of anger resulting from her PTSD, which makes her
overly think pessimistic about Justin. This situation makes Kat feel distant from
others and have difficulty opening herself to people.
1.2 Avoidance-Avoidance Conflict
This concept occurs when each of the competing alternatives possesses
negative consequences; that is, they are equally repulsive (Lewin, 1948).
Facing her trauma and try to get over it in the edge where she might lose
her career is very stressful for Kat Baker. Biting her shoulder is the bad way for
Kat to let out her frustration, by not doing that, her frustration will be pilled up
but, in the same time biting her shoulder is bad habit and can be labeled as self-
harm. This situation can be identified as Avoidance-Avoidance conflict, where
the two outcomes are equally undesirable for Kat Baker. Kat knows that this is
the wrong way to let out her frustration; this can be seen where doubt and quilt
show on her face before she bit her shoulder. Therefore, Internal conflict
between her frustration and her acknowledge of doing a bad thing is portrayed
in this scene.
Focusing on Kat's self-destructive, Kat was showing Arousal and
Reactivity symptoms of PTSD in this scene. The Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders (2013) states that Arousal and Reactivity symptom is when the sufferer
shows reckless or self-destructive behavior. After failing her senior test, Kat
went to the restroom. Kat developed a bad habit where she tended to hurting
herself by biting her shoulder so hard that it bled and left some teeth marks,
which can be identified as self-destructive behavior.

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CONCLUSION
Regarding on the discussion, there are three data with each data analyzed the
internal conflict based on Interpersonal conflict concepts also reveals the PTSD
symptoms of Kat Baker. Within Interpersonal conflict concepts, there are Approach-
Avoidance conflict concepts, Avoidance-Avoidance conflict concepts, and Approach-
Approach conflict concepts. Revealing the PTSD symptoms, there are Intrusion,
Avoidance, Negative Alterations in Cognitions and Mood, and Arousal and
Reactivity.
The data source of this study is the TV series: Spinning Out, only focusing on
the main character named Kat Baker. The identified conflict concepts are Approach-
Avoidance and Avoidance-Avoidance only. This result is apprehensible and reflects
on the main character's mental state and struggle to overcome her trauma; therefore,
no single situation put her in the Approach-Approach conflict concept that resulted in
desirable outcomes. The number of founded concepts are two Approach-Avoidance
and one Avoidance-Avoidance conflict concepts. The study also reveals the three
PTSD symptoms that Kat Baker experienced: Intrusion, Cognition, Mood, and Arousal
and Reactivity.

DAFTAR PUSTAKA
Azis, A. 2019. The Portrayal Of Dawson Scott’s Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder In
Deadline By Sandra Brown. DIPONEGORO UNIVERSITY.
Creswell, J. W. 1994. Research Design: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches .
California: Sage Publication Ine.
Nugraha, D. P. 2020. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Experienced by Ruth Weber in Kate
Quinn's The Huntress.
Scott, M. J., & Stradling, S. G. 2006. Conselling for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
SAGE Publications Ltd.
Fadillah, A. 2021. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as Potrayed in A.J. Finn's The Women in
the Window and Haruki Murakami's Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of
Pilgrimage : A Comperative Literature Analysis.
Weathers, F. W., Marx, B. P., Friedman, M. J., & Schnurr, P. P. 2014. Post-traumatic
Stress Disorder in DSM-5: New Criteria, New Measures, and Implications for
Assessment. Psychological Injury and Law.

AUTHOR PROFILE
Putu Agnatya Mahadi Putri is a student of English Literature Program at University
of Udayana batch 2018. In 2018, she participated in many committees, work on PKM
twice that organized by faculties and study programs.

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I Nyoman Arya Wibawa, S.S., M.A., Ph.D. is a lecturer and deputy dean at the English
Department, Faculty of Humanities Udayana University. He was graduated from
Udayana University and obtained a Bachelor of Linguistics. His studies on the topic
in Rongga, Balinese, Indonesian, and Kata Kolok (a sign language spoken in Bengkala
village, Buleleng Regency) revealed that language indeed affects the way humans
think have been published in a Scopus-indexed Journal (i.e, Lingua).
I Nengah Sudipa, M.A. has been a professor in Linguistics since 1 Nov 2006 having
supervised a number of undergraduate, magister as well Ph.D students. I entered the
English Department, Faculty of Letters Udayana University in 1974, continued to take
Magister program in Linguistics Department, Monash University Melbourne
Australia (1985-1987). I graduated from the Doctoral Program of Linguistics in
Udayana University (2004).

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