The field of cults and their relation to psychological and psychiatric disorder is reft with rhetoric and opinion. There has been a particular dearth of documentation and substantiated data supporting psychiatric opinion.
As a result of considerable research, clinical work, and an extensive literature review, certain conclusions or strongly suggested positions are enunciated. An attempt is made to substantiate each of the ten assertions based on existing data, in the hope that they will clarify the muddy area, make clinical positions and interventions more soundly based, and inspire debate and heuristic efforts.
References
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ClarkJG. Problems in referral of cult members. National Association of Private Psychiatric Hospitals Journal1978; 9: 27.
2.
Council on Mind Abuse.Toronto, 1980.
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SingerMT. Coming out of the cults. Psychology Today, January 1979.
4.
BaumG.Presentation to Clarke Institute of Psychiatry, Toronto, 1977.
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CoxH.Turning East. New York: Simon and Shuster, 1977.
6.
RichardsonH.Personal communication.
7.
GalanterM, RabkinR, RabkinJ, DeutschA.The Moonies: a psychological study of conversion and membership in a contemporary religious sect. Am J Psychiatry1979; 136 (2): 165-70.
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LevineSV. Fringe religions: data and dilemmas. Annals of the American Society for Adolescent Psychiatry1978; VI: 75-89.
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LevineSV. Draft dodgers: coping with stress, adapting to exile. Am J Orthopsychiatry1972; 42 (3): 431-40.
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PattisonEM. Religious youth cults: alternative healing social networks. Paper presented to 56th Annual Meeting of the American Orthopsychiatry Association.
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Government of Ontario.Study of Mind Development Groups, Sects, and Cults in Ontario. HillDG, Special Advisor. Report to the Attorney-General's Office, June 1980.
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LeightonD.The empirical status of the integration-disintegration hypothesis. In: KaplanB, ed. Psychiatric disorder and the urban environment. New York: Behavioural Publications, 1973.
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MastersonJF. The psychiatric dilemma of adolescence. New York: Arm-Hill, 1967.
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PasamanickB.A survey of mental disease in an urban population. In: Epidemiology of mental disorders. American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1959.
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KenistonK.The uncommitted: alienated youth in America. New York: Harcourt, Brace, World, 1965.
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LevineSV. Adolescents, believing and belonging. Annals of the American Society for Adolescent Psychiatry1979; VII: 41-53.
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SeamanN.On the meaning of alienation. Am Soc Rev1959; 24(6): 783.
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FrankJ.Stimulus/response: the demoralized mind. Psychology Today, April 1973, p. 24.
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RosenbergM.The dissonant context and the adolescent self-concept. In: DragastinS, ElderG, eds. Adolescence in the life cycle. New York: John Wiley, 1976.
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LevineSV. The role of psychiatry in the phenomenon of cults. Can J Psychiatry1979; 24 (7): 593-603.
26.
HofferE.The true believer. New York: Harper and Row, 1951.
27.
BlumR, et al. Society and drugs. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1970.
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LevineSV. Alienation as an affect. In: Adolescent mood disorders. (in press).
29.
BraungartR.Youth and social movements. In: DragastinS, ElderG, eds. Adolescents in the life cycle. New York: John Wiley, 1976.
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31.
AndrewGreeley. Ecstasy, a way of knowing. Englewood, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1974.
