History Main / SingleIssuePsychology

** Inverted with Gaara. DefeatEqualsFriendship and sanity is in play after his fights with Sasuke and Naruto brought his issue to the fore, but while he's cured surprisingly easily of being a deranged and psychotic SerialKiller, and is now closer to his family and has friends, he is still emotionally withdrawn and obviously has some progress to make.

** It's explored further in Persona 4 Arena, as the heroes doubt doubt themselves and continue to wrestle with their old issues. [[spoiler: This is the basis of the Malevolent Entity's plan to steal their personas]]. They ultimately decide that they will likely never be able to resolve their issues completely, but they'll continue to work against them with the help of their friends.

* Averted in {{Persona 4}}. While the party members does realize and accept their inner flaws after meeting their [[ShadowArchetype shadows]] they still need help from the main character, through their social links, to fully embraze them and work them out.

* Half the cast of ''{{Naruto}}'' fit this trope pretty well. Not so much in the "one trauma" thing- that is there, but they are usually well aware of it. Rather, in the DefeatMeansFriendship way, in that their trauma tends to inform their philosophy of life and fighting, which is why Naruto (or whoever they are facing) can't defeat or understand them. Its more like they are shocked that people can have as bad or worse lives than they had, but ''not'' be a psychological trainwreck.

* Used in ''Literature/TheSevenPerCentSolution'', where SigmundFreud's psychoanalysis of SherlockHolmes traces his misogyny, his hatred of the innocent Professor Moriarty, and his constant search for justice, to one event: when Holmes witnessed his father kill his mother and her lover. Moriarty comes to be hated by Holmes either as the bearer of bad news (Freud's version) or because he played some deeper but unknown role in the affair (Watson's version, based on observations of Mycroft Holmes). Subverted slightly: Freud helped Holmes through his cocaine addiction in another way entirely.
* Played straight and subverted in ''HouseOfLeaves'', where one of the several narrators relates to the reader a period of several months where he lived with a kind doctor friend and his loving wife, who helped him get his life back together mostly by prescribing him one medication. The subversion comes [[spoiler:at the end of the chapter, where the narrator tells you he made the whole thing up and then ''laughs at you for believing such a ridiculous story''.]]

* Flashbacks in ''{{Awkward}}'' reveal Alex's [[StalkerWithACrush stalkerish]] tendencies are rooted in [[spoiler: a series of bad dates and harsh rejections]]. Possibly justified in that the straw that broke the camel's back was him [[spoiler: being rejected for not being enough like [[Literature/{{Twilight}} Edward Cullen]].]]

** Right before [[TheReveal the most-graphic portrayal of her mother's suicide]], we see the little girl running toward Mom shouting ItsAllAboutMe in classic-Asuka fashion; presumably, some of her [[AttentionWhore self-absorption]] dates further back.
*** All kids are like that at that age. A lot of memories at that age are not set in stone, as well. One's attitude to and impressions of what happened are important in how one remembers them, perhaps even more important than what really happened. In the end it doesn't matter, though, because she certainly remembers her (early) childhood to be fairly... not conducive to a healthy and balanced personality.

* Subverted in ''TheConversation''. Main character Harry Caul avoids his terror over having others harmed by his surveillance work by completely ignoring the consequences of what he does. At first, it seems like this is due to a vague job he did some years earlier involving a union dispute, but a DreamSequence has him narrate his early childhood to an unconcerned female passerby [[spoiler: including how he accidentally killed a friend of his father's]]. In the end, this isn't even the worst of his problems.

* AlanMoore (of ''The Killing Joke'', above) actually deeply dislikes this trope, believing instead that characters should be complex enough that their personalities can't easily be encompassed by short blanket summaries. He mocked the concept in Writing for Comics: "I was just standing there, looking at my stamp album and the priceless collection that it had taken me years to build, [[SeriousBusiness when all of a sudden I realized that since I had foolishly pasted all of them directly into the album using an industrial-strength adhesive, they were completely worthless. I understood then that the universe was just a cruel joke upon mankind, and that life was pointless. I became completely cynical about human existence and saw the essential stupidity of all effort and human striving.]] At this point I decided to join the police force."

* Subverted in ''Franchise/{{Batman}}: TheKillingJoke'', where the Joker tries to prove that going through one bad experience can change someone into a maniac like him, in this case Commissioner Gordon by kidnapping him, abusing him, and crippling his daughter. It doesn't work. At the end of the story Batman tells Joker that his "one bad day" theory is bunk, and he is a mentally ill man who needs help and should take it when it's offered- the Joker, saddened by the revelation that he was the one with the problem and there is more to his madness than just a traumatic experience, tells Batman that it's probably too late for him.

* Is, however, somewhat TruthInTelevision in regard to two things.

*** BTAS also clearly established that he had a second personality ''before'' being scarred "that developed since childhood when he mistakenly believed he seriously wounded a bully in fit of anger, when in fact he was hospitalized for an unrelated case of appendicitis".

Compare with CynicismCatalyst or FreudianExcuse, when a DarkAndTroubledPast is used to explain why a villain is/became evil. See also BoredWithInsanity.

* Used in ''The Seven Percent Solution'', where Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis of SherlockHolmes traces his misogyny, his hatred of the innocent Professor Moriarty, and his constant search for justice, to one event: when Holmes witnessed his father kill his mother and her lover. Moriarty comes to be hated by Holmes either as the bearer of bad news (Freud's version) or because he played some deeper but unknown role in the affair (Watson's version, based on observations of Mycroft Holmes). Subverted slightly: Freud helped Holmes through his cocaine addiction in another way entirely.

In real life psychological issues stem from many sources - some biological, some cognitive, and some related to experiences and memories - and overcoming them often takes lots of time, effort, and sometimes medication. While finding the source of the problem is important to helping a mentally ill patient, it is only part of the process, seeing as it simply allows the psychiatrist to get an understanding of just what ''is'' wrong. Once the source of the problem is found and they understand how the mind has been affected by whatever causes, it makes it easier to work out the proper methods and/or medication neccessary to help the patient overcome it.

However, this is a little too complicated for fiction. It's much easier when all a person's problems stem from a single traumatic incident, and working through that single incident will instantly cure them, so fiction tends to represent psychology this way.

* The patient-of-the-week in any ''Series/{{Mash}}'' episode that includes Dr. Sidney Freedman. And that Single Issue is almost always The War. There is at least one exception: the patient was Hawkeye, and the problem was rooted in a childhood experience in which his cousin pushed him off a boat. It was still a single issue, though. Possibly justified in the cases of most 'victims of the week', since Sidney was mostly just charged with getting a diagnosis so they could get a handle on what to do with the kid in question. Usually the diagnosis was "Send him home, he needs a lot more therapy than we can give him in the middle of a war zone."

* {{Deconstructed}} by Mulder in ''{{The X-Files}}'' episode "Oubliette". When Scully suggests that Mulder's willingness to protect the potential suspect was due to the fact that she was a kidnapping victim (like Mulder's own sister), he argues that not everything he does goes back to his sister and states that "sometimes motivations for behavior can be more complex and mysterious than tracing them back to one single childhood experience". Despite that, though, it is beyond doubt that Mulder's obvious BigBrotherInstinct is a consequence of his sister's abduction.

* In ''{{Monk}}'', while the title character has had his OCD and phobias since he was born, when he met his wife Trudy he began to suppress them and live a fairly normal life. When she was killed by a car bomb, they came back worse than ever, rendering Monk unable to leave his apartment for three years and barely able to function on his own even after he did. He's implied to get better again when he finally solves Trudy's murder [[spoiler: and meet her daughter Molly]] in the series finale.

* ''DieAnstalt'' is a Flash game based entirely on this trope; every toy so far has one, singular psychological issue and once you get them to face it and accept it, they are cured. The process of treating each of the insane plush toys is incredibly complex and risky, though, and a mis-treatment can cause them to completely revert to their original state, so at least the game subverts EpiphanyTherapy. That said, the RidiculouslyCuteCritter and KickTheDog factor alone makes the headaches worth it.

* Averted as much as logistically possible with Jack in ''MassEffect2''. She's a big bundle of crazy, caused by the fact that she grew up tortured and experimented on. Blowing up the facility she grew up in is a big step, but talking to her before and after is what really helps her get a hold of her sanity.

* The patient-of-the-week in any ''[[{{MASH}} M*A*S*H]]'' episode that includes Dr. Sidney Freedman. And that Single Issue is almost always The War. There is at least one exception: the patient was Hawkeye, and the problem was rooted in a childhood experience in which his cousin pushed him off a boat. It was still a single issue, though. Possibly justified in the cases of most 'victims of the week', since Sidney was mostly just charged with getting a diagnosis so they could get a handle on what to do with the kid in question. Usually the diagnosis was "Send him home, he needs a lot more therapy than we can give him in the middle of a war zone."

Compare FreudianExcuse, when a DarkAndTroubledPast is used to explain why a villain is/became evil. See also BoredWithInsanity.

* Batman's entire life, obsession, and psyche hinges on the night his parents were killed in front of him. Later events (the death of the second Robin, nearly shooting Alexander Luthor, being cast through time by a mad god) merely add nuance to his behavior.

* Subverted in ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}: TheKillingJoke'', where the Joker tries to prove that going through one bad experience can change someone into a maniac like him, in this case Commissioner Gordon by kidnapping him, abusing him, and crippling his daughter. It doesn't work. At the end of the story Batman tells Joker that his "one bad day" theory is bunk, and he is a mentally ill man who needs help and should take it when it's offered- the Joker, saddened by the revelation that he was the one with the problem and there is more to his madness than just a traumatic experience, tells Batman that it's probably too late for him.

* Despite the page quote, the situation with [[NeonGenesisEvangelion Asuka]] is a bit more complicated. Most of her mental issues reach back to her mother going insane and subsequently killing herself, fact, but it does seem as if she had problems beyond that. It's mentioned that her mother neglected Asuka even before her illness, and the rest of her childhood was apparently pretty bad too: her relationships with her father and stepmother seem to be horrible (in the flashback to the hanging scene, she mentions that she 'doesn't have a papa') and completely loveless respectively. She lumps them both in as people she ''hates''. Hearing her father and future stepmother going at it at the hospital probably contributed to her unhealthy attitude toward sex as well.