Brainwashing: The Science of Thought Control
Encyclopedia
Brainwashing: The Science of Thought Control is a non-fiction
book analyzing brainwashing, thought reform and mind control
, by neuroscientist
and physiologist Kathleen Taylor
. It was first published in hardcover on December 16, 2004 by Oxford University Press
. Taylor reviews the history of the term brainwashing, from its usage in 1950 by journalist
Edward Hunter
to its application to cult
s, marketing
, influence
, thought reform, torture
and reeducation. She references the book Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism
by psychiatrist
Robert Jay Lifton
and cites his research on indoctrination
techniques experienced by prisoners of war
during the Korean War
.
Taylor explains the neurological basis for reasoning and cognition
in the brain
, and proposes that the self is changeable while describing the physiology of neurological pathways. She utilizes case studies including Patty Hearst
, the Manson Family, and the mass murder
/suicide
of members of Peoples Temple
at Jonestown
, and compares the techniques of influence used by cults to those of totalitarian and communist societies. She lays out a model FACET - Freedom, Agency, Complexity, Ends-not-means, and Thinking - which she believes can be used to negate the influence of brainwashing techniques.
The book was "highly commended" and runner-up in the 2005 Times Higher Education Supplement Young Academic Author Award, and was shortlisted for the 2005 MIND "Book of the Year Award". It received positive reviews in The Guardian
and Skeptical Inquirer
, critical reviews in The Daily Telegraph
and Financial Times
, and has been used as a resource in books including Marketing Dictatorship and Democracy, Lifelong Learning and the Learning Society.
and studied physiology
and philosophy
. She obtained a Masters degree in psychology
from Stirling University, and received her doctorate in computational neuroscience
from the University of Oxford. Her postdoctoral research was in neuroimmunology
and cognitive neuroscience
. She is a neuroscientist
at the University of Oxford's Department of Physiology
, Anatomy
and Genetics
, researching physiology
, psychology
and the neuroscience of belief. In 2003 Taylor won first prize in both the Times Higher Education/Oxford University Press
Science Essay competition and the THES Humanities and Social Sciences Writing Prize. She presented her research on brainwashing at the Edinburgh International Science Festival
in 2005.
Edward Hunter
and its later usage as applied to the spheres of cult
s, marketing
, influence
, thought reform, torture
and reeducation. She references psychiatrist
Robert J. Lifton's work Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism
as a resource throughout the book. Lifton based his research on interviews he conducted with prisoners of war
who had been subjected to indoctrination and torture during the Korean War
. Taylor argues that the term brainwashing is useful to when used to refer to a more coercive form of persuasion.
She explains the neurological basis for reasoning and cognition
in the brain
, and brings the point across that the self is changeable. She describes the physiology behind neurological pathways which include webs of neuron
s containing dendrite
s, axon
s, and synapse
s; and explains that certain brains with more rigid pathways will be less susceptible to new information or creative stimili. Taylor utilizes neurological science to show that brainwashed individuals have more rigid pathways, and that rigidity can make it unlikely that the individual will rethink situations or be able to later reorganize these pathways. She explains that repetition is an integral part of brainwashing techniques because connections between neurons become stronger when exposed to incoming signals of frequency and intensity. She argues that people in their teenage years and early twenties are more susceptible to persuasion. Taylor explains that brain activity in the temporal lobe
, the region responsible for artistic creativity, also causes spiritual experiences in a process known as lability
.
In the Part I of the book, titled: "Torture and seduction", Taylor analyzes how various parties have used certain techniques in influencing and brainwashing others, including a restriction of individual freedoms, deception, and methods that conflict with one's decision-making processes. She utilizes case studies including Patty Hearst
, the Manson Family, and the mass murder
/suicide
of members of Peoples Temple
at Jonestown
to illustrate the neurology she explains in Part II, "The traitor in your skull". In the case of the Manson Family followers of Charles Manson
carried out multiple murders in 1969, and with Peoples Temple over 900 followers of charismatic leader Jim Jones
died in 1978 in Jonestown, Guyana after consuming cyanide
. Taylor asserts that the techniques used by cults to influence others are similar to those used by other social groups, and compares similar totalitarian aspects of cults and communist societies. These techniques include isolating the individual and controlling their access to information, challenging their belief structure and creating doubt, and repeating messages in a pressurized environment.
According to Taylor, cults emphasize positive aspects of the group over negative aspects of outsiders, endlessly repeat simple ideas in "highly reductive, definitive - sounding phrases", and refer to "abstract and ambiguous" ideas associated with "huge emotional baggage
". Taylor writes that brainwashing involves a more intense version of the way the brain traditionally learns. In the final portion of the book, Part III: "Freedom and Control", Taylor describes an individual's susceptibility to brainwashing and lays out an acronym "FACET", a tool to combat influence and a totalist mindset. FACET stands for Freedom, Agency, Complexity, Ends-not-means, and Thinking. The FACET model is based on Lifton's eight criteria for thought reform, and Taylor emphasizes education and freedom of thought as a way to negate some of these criteria.
, and again in paperback format on August 24, 2006. The book was "highly commended" and runner-up in the 2005 Times Higher Education Supplement Young Academic Author Award, and also made it to the shortlist for the 2005 MIND "Book of the Year Award". The book also made it to the longlist of the 2005 Aventis
"Science Book Prize", where it was described as containing "elegant and accessible prose".
PD Smith gave the book a positive review in The Guardian
, and concluded: "Her ambitious and well-written study celebrates human freedom through a history of attempts to destroy it." Joseph Szimhart reviewed the book for Skeptical Inquirer
, and wrote: "I enjoyed the book as a challenge to think about a sorely neglected topic." Szimhart concluded: "Taylor's concern is with any human venture (be it science, religion, or politics) that restricts brain function from creative 'stop and think' activity, and which becomes little more than another exclusive cult."
In a review of the book for The Daily Telegraph
, British doctor and science writer James Le Fanu was critical, and commented that Taylor did not acknowledge "the explanatory gap" between current understanding of the brain's structure and "what it does, how we think, feel and emote". Le Fanu concluded, "The paradox of Brainwashing is that it would have been a much more interesting book if Dr Taylor had pursued the contrarian view of seeking to explain why that 'explanatory gap' is not merely unbridged but, with the advance of the neurosciences, now seems to be unbridgeable. A brain that was simple enough to be fully known would be too simple to contain conscious observers who might know it." Nigel Hawkes of The Times
criticized what he saw as Taylor's conclusion that "we are all a little bit brainwashed by our culture and experience" and noted that this assessment places Jim Jones of the Peoples Temple group in the same classification as the tabloid press. A review in Financial Times
by Jerome Burne was also critical, and he commented that Taylor does not convey "a clear enough message" in the work.
In the conclusion of the chapter "Regimenting the Public Mind: The Methods of Control in the Propaganda System" in her 2007 book Marketing Dictatorship, Anne-Marie Brady recommended readers refer to Taylor's book for more material on the subject. In his 2008 book Democracy, Lifelong Learning and the Learning Society, author Peter Jarvis referenced Taylor's work, and quoted from the book in a section "Indoctrination, brainwashing and thought reform".
Non-fiction
Non-fiction is the form of any narrative, account, or other communicative work whose assertions and descriptions are understood to be fact...
book analyzing brainwashing, thought reform and mind control
Mind control
Mind control refers to a process in which a group or individual "systematically uses unethically manipulative methods to persuade others to conform to the wishes of the manipulator, often to the detriment of the person being manipulated"...
, by neuroscientist
Neuroscientist
A neuroscientist is an individual who studies the scientific field of neuroscience or any of its related sub-fields...
and physiologist Kathleen Taylor
Kathleen Taylor
Kathleen Taylor is a research scientist in the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics at the University of Oxford.-Education:Taylor attended the University of Oxford where she studied physiology and philosophy...
. It was first published in hardcover on December 16, 2004 by Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
. Taylor reviews the history of the term brainwashing, from its usage in 1950 by journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
Edward Hunter
Edward Hunter (U.S. journalist)
Edward Hunter was an American journalist, author and intelligence agent. He is credited with popularizing the use of the term "brainwashing" in English, and collected a large number of examples of Chinese Communist propaganda targeted at the population in the immediate post-revolution...
to its application to cult
Cult
The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...
s, marketing
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...
, influence
Social influence
Social influence occurs when an individual's thoughts, feelings or actions are affected by other people. Social influence takes many forms and can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience, leadership, persuasion, sales, and marketing...
, thought reform, torture
Torture
Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion...
and reeducation. She references the book Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism
Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism
Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China is a psychology non-fiction book on brainwashing and mind control by Robert Jay Lifton. The book was published in multiple editions, in 1956 , 1961, 1962 , 1963 , and 1989 . The 1989 reprint edition was published by...
by psychiatrist
Psychiatrist
A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
Robert Jay Lifton
Robert Jay Lifton
Robert Jay Lifton is an American psychiatrist and author, chiefly known for his studies of the psychological causes and effects of war and political violence and for his theory of thought reform...
and cites his research on indoctrination
Indoctrination
Indoctrination is the process of inculcating ideas, attitudes, cognitive strategies or a professional methodology . It is often distinguished from education by the fact that the indoctrinated person is expected not to question or critically examine the doctrine they have learned...
techniques experienced by prisoners of war
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...
during the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
.
Taylor explains the neurological basis for reasoning and cognition
Cognition
In science, cognition refers to mental processes. These processes include attention, remembering, producing and understanding language, solving problems, and making decisions. Cognition is studied in various disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science...
in the brain
Brain
The brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals—only a few primitive invertebrates such as sponges, jellyfish, sea squirts and starfishes do not have one. It is located in the head, usually close to primary sensory apparatus such as vision, hearing,...
, and proposes that the self is changeable while describing the physiology of neurological pathways. She utilizes case studies including Patty Hearst
Patty Hearst
Patricia Campbell Hearst , now known as Patricia Campbell Hearst Shaw, is an American newspaper heiress, socialite, actress, kidnap victim, and convicted bank robber....
, the Manson Family, and the mass murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
/suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
of members of Peoples Temple
Peoples Temple
Peoples Temple was a religious organization founded in 1955 by Jim Jones that, by the mid-1970s, included over a dozen locations in California including its headquarters in San Francisco...
at Jonestown
Jonestown
Jonestown was the informal name for the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project, an intentional community in northwestern Guyana formed by the Peoples Temple led by Jim Jones. It became internationally notorious when, on November 18, 1978, 918 people died in the settlement as well as in a nearby...
, and compares the techniques of influence used by cults to those of totalitarian and communist societies. She lays out a model FACET - Freedom, Agency, Complexity, Ends-not-means, and Thinking - which she believes can be used to negate the influence of brainwashing techniques.
The book was "highly commended" and runner-up in the 2005 Times Higher Education Supplement Young Academic Author Award, and was shortlisted for the 2005 MIND "Book of the Year Award". It received positive reviews in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
and Skeptical Inquirer
Skeptical Inquirer
The Skeptical Inquirer is a bimonthly American magazine published by the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry with the subtitle: The magazine for science and reason....
, critical reviews in The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
and Financial Times
Financial Times
The Financial Times is an international business newspaper. It is a morning daily newspaper published in London and printed in 24 cities around the world. Its primary rival is the Wall Street Journal, published in New York City....
, and has been used as a resource in books including Marketing Dictatorship and Democracy, Lifelong Learning and the Learning Society.
Author
Kathleen Taylor attended the University of OxfordUniversity of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
and studied physiology
Physiology
Physiology is the science of the function of living systems. This includes how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells, and bio-molecules carry out the chemical or physical functions that exist in a living system. The highest honor awarded in physiology is the Nobel Prize in Physiology or...
and philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
. She obtained a Masters degree in psychology
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
from Stirling University, and received her doctorate in computational neuroscience
Computational neuroscience
Computational neuroscience is the study of brain function in terms of the information processing properties of the structures that make up the nervous system...
from the University of Oxford. Her postdoctoral research was in neuroimmunology
Neuroimmunology
Neuroimmunology is a field combining neuroscience, the study of the nervous system, and immunology, the study of the immune system. Neuroimmunologists seek to better understand the interactions of these two complex systems during development, homeostasis, and response to injuries...
and cognitive neuroscience
Cognitive neuroscience
Cognitive neuroscience is an academic field concerned with the scientific study of biological substrates underlying cognition, with a specific focus on the neural substrates of mental processes. It addresses the questions of how psychological/cognitive functions are produced by the brain...
. She is a neuroscientist
Neuroscientist
A neuroscientist is an individual who studies the scientific field of neuroscience or any of its related sub-fields...
at the University of Oxford's Department of Physiology
Physiology
Physiology is the science of the function of living systems. This includes how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells, and bio-molecules carry out the chemical or physical functions that exist in a living system. The highest honor awarded in physiology is the Nobel Prize in Physiology or...
, Anatomy
Anatomy
Anatomy is a branch of biology and medicine that is the consideration of the structure of living things. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy , and plant anatomy...
and Genetics
Genetics
Genetics , a discipline of biology, is the science of genes, heredity, and variation in living organisms....
, researching physiology
Physiology
Physiology is the science of the function of living systems. This includes how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells, and bio-molecules carry out the chemical or physical functions that exist in a living system. The highest honor awarded in physiology is the Nobel Prize in Physiology or...
, psychology
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
and the neuroscience of belief. In 2003 Taylor won first prize in both the Times Higher Education/Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
Science Essay competition and the THES Humanities and Social Sciences Writing Prize. She presented her research on brainwashing at the Edinburgh International Science Festival
Edinburgh International Science Festival
The Edinburgh International Science Festival is a science festival which takes place each April in Edinburgh, Scotland. The festival features hundreds of talks, tours and exhibitions for children, families and adults in locations around the city...
in 2005.
Contents
Taylor provides background on the development of the term brainwashing, from its use in 1950 by journalistJournalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
Edward Hunter
Edward Hunter (U.S. journalist)
Edward Hunter was an American journalist, author and intelligence agent. He is credited with popularizing the use of the term "brainwashing" in English, and collected a large number of examples of Chinese Communist propaganda targeted at the population in the immediate post-revolution...
and its later usage as applied to the spheres of cult
Cult
The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...
s, marketing
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...
, influence
Social influence
Social influence occurs when an individual's thoughts, feelings or actions are affected by other people. Social influence takes many forms and can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience, leadership, persuasion, sales, and marketing...
, thought reform, torture
Torture
Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion...
and reeducation. She references psychiatrist
Psychiatrist
A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
Robert J. Lifton's work Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism
Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism
Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China is a psychology non-fiction book on brainwashing and mind control by Robert Jay Lifton. The book was published in multiple editions, in 1956 , 1961, 1962 , 1963 , and 1989 . The 1989 reprint edition was published by...
as a resource throughout the book. Lifton based his research on interviews he conducted with prisoners of war
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...
who had been subjected to indoctrination and torture during the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
. Taylor argues that the term brainwashing is useful to when used to refer to a more coercive form of persuasion.
She explains the neurological basis for reasoning and cognition
Cognition
In science, cognition refers to mental processes. These processes include attention, remembering, producing and understanding language, solving problems, and making decisions. Cognition is studied in various disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science...
in the brain
Brain
The brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals—only a few primitive invertebrates such as sponges, jellyfish, sea squirts and starfishes do not have one. It is located in the head, usually close to primary sensory apparatus such as vision, hearing,...
, and brings the point across that the self is changeable. She describes the physiology behind neurological pathways which include webs of neuron
Neuron
A neuron is an electrically excitable cell that processes and transmits information by electrical and chemical signaling. Chemical signaling occurs via synapses, specialized connections with other cells. Neurons connect to each other to form networks. Neurons are the core components of the nervous...
s containing dendrite
Dendrite
Dendrites are the branched projections of a neuron that act to conduct the electrochemical stimulation received from other neural cells to the cell body, or soma, of the neuron from which the dendrites project...
s, axon
Axon
An axon is a long, slender projection of a nerve cell, or neuron, that conducts electrical impulses away from the neuron's cell body or soma....
s, and synapse
Synapse
In the nervous system, a synapse is a structure that permits a neuron to pass an electrical or chemical signal to another cell...
s; and explains that certain brains with more rigid pathways will be less susceptible to new information or creative stimili. Taylor utilizes neurological science to show that brainwashed individuals have more rigid pathways, and that rigidity can make it unlikely that the individual will rethink situations or be able to later reorganize these pathways. She explains that repetition is an integral part of brainwashing techniques because connections between neurons become stronger when exposed to incoming signals of frequency and intensity. She argues that people in their teenage years and early twenties are more susceptible to persuasion. Taylor explains that brain activity in the temporal lobe
Temporal lobe
The temporal lobe is a region of the cerebral cortex that is located beneath the Sylvian fissure on both cerebral hemispheres of the mammalian brain....
, the region responsible for artistic creativity, also causes spiritual experiences in a process known as lability
Lability
Lability refers to something that is constantly undergoing change or something that is likely to undergo change.-Chemistry:The term is used to describe a relatively unstable and transient chemical species...
.
In the Part I of the book, titled: "Torture and seduction", Taylor analyzes how various parties have used certain techniques in influencing and brainwashing others, including a restriction of individual freedoms, deception, and methods that conflict with one's decision-making processes. She utilizes case studies including Patty Hearst
Patty Hearst
Patricia Campbell Hearst , now known as Patricia Campbell Hearst Shaw, is an American newspaper heiress, socialite, actress, kidnap victim, and convicted bank robber....
, the Manson Family, and the mass murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
/suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
of members of Peoples Temple
Peoples Temple
Peoples Temple was a religious organization founded in 1955 by Jim Jones that, by the mid-1970s, included over a dozen locations in California including its headquarters in San Francisco...
at Jonestown
Jonestown
Jonestown was the informal name for the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project, an intentional community in northwestern Guyana formed by the Peoples Temple led by Jim Jones. It became internationally notorious when, on November 18, 1978, 918 people died in the settlement as well as in a nearby...
to illustrate the neurology she explains in Part II, "The traitor in your skull". In the case of the Manson Family followers of Charles Manson
Charles Manson
Charles Milles Manson is an American criminal who led what became known as the Manson Family, a quasi-commune that arose in California in the late 1960s. He was found guilty of conspiracy to commit the Tate/LaBianca murders carried out by members of the group at his instruction...
carried out multiple murders in 1969, and with Peoples Temple over 900 followers of charismatic leader Jim Jones
Jim Jones
James Warren "Jim" Jones was the founder and leader of the Peoples Temple, which is best known for the November 18, 1978 mass suicide of 909 Temple members in Jonestown, Guyana along with the killings of five other people at a nearby airstrip.Jones was born in Indiana and started the Temple in...
died in 1978 in Jonestown, Guyana after consuming cyanide
Cyanide
A cyanide is a chemical compound that contains the cyano group, -C≡N, which consists of a carbon atom triple-bonded to a nitrogen atom. Cyanides most commonly refer to salts of the anion CN−. Most cyanides are highly toxic....
. Taylor asserts that the techniques used by cults to influence others are similar to those used by other social groups, and compares similar totalitarian aspects of cults and communist societies. These techniques include isolating the individual and controlling their access to information, challenging their belief structure and creating doubt, and repeating messages in a pressurized environment.
According to Taylor, cults emphasize positive aspects of the group over negative aspects of outsiders, endlessly repeat simple ideas in "highly reductive, definitive - sounding phrases", and refer to "abstract and ambiguous" ideas associated with "huge emotional baggage
Emotional baggage
Emotional baggage can be defined as 'Painful memories, mistrust and hurt carried around from past sexual or emotional rejection'.It is an image of 'a big sack that you carry around with you at all times...[with] every disappointment, trauma, and wrong that you've ever experienced....This image, the...
". Taylor writes that brainwashing involves a more intense version of the way the brain traditionally learns. In the final portion of the book, Part III: "Freedom and Control", Taylor describes an individual's susceptibility to brainwashing and lays out an acronym "FACET", a tool to combat influence and a totalist mindset. FACET stands for Freedom, Agency, Complexity, Ends-not-means, and Thinking. The FACET model is based on Lifton's eight criteria for thought reform, and Taylor emphasizes education and freedom of thought as a way to negate some of these criteria.
Reception
Brainwashing was first published in hardcover format on December 16, 2004 by Oxford University PressOxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
, and again in paperback format on August 24, 2006. The book was "highly commended" and runner-up in the 2005 Times Higher Education Supplement Young Academic Author Award, and also made it to the shortlist for the 2005 MIND "Book of the Year Award". The book also made it to the longlist of the 2005 Aventis
Aventis
Aventis was a pharmaceutical and lab assay testing company. It was formed in 1999 when Rhône-Poulenc S.A. merged with Hoechst AG. The merged company was based in Strasbourg, France. With its headquarters in Strasbourg, Aventis was the product of the first transnational merger to combine large...
"Science Book Prize", where it was described as containing "elegant and accessible prose".
PD Smith gave the book a positive review in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, and concluded: "Her ambitious and well-written study celebrates human freedom through a history of attempts to destroy it." Joseph Szimhart reviewed the book for Skeptical Inquirer
Skeptical Inquirer
The Skeptical Inquirer is a bimonthly American magazine published by the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry with the subtitle: The magazine for science and reason....
, and wrote: "I enjoyed the book as a challenge to think about a sorely neglected topic." Szimhart concluded: "Taylor's concern is with any human venture (be it science, religion, or politics) that restricts brain function from creative 'stop and think' activity, and which becomes little more than another exclusive cult."
In a review of the book for The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, British doctor and science writer James Le Fanu was critical, and commented that Taylor did not acknowledge "the explanatory gap" between current understanding of the brain's structure and "what it does, how we think, feel and emote". Le Fanu concluded, "The paradox of Brainwashing is that it would have been a much more interesting book if Dr Taylor had pursued the contrarian view of seeking to explain why that 'explanatory gap' is not merely unbridged but, with the advance of the neurosciences, now seems to be unbridgeable. A brain that was simple enough to be fully known would be too simple to contain conscious observers who might know it." Nigel Hawkes of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
criticized what he saw as Taylor's conclusion that "we are all a little bit brainwashed by our culture and experience" and noted that this assessment places Jim Jones of the Peoples Temple group in the same classification as the tabloid press. A review in Financial Times
Financial Times
The Financial Times is an international business newspaper. It is a morning daily newspaper published in London and printed in 24 cities around the world. Its primary rival is the Wall Street Journal, published in New York City....
by Jerome Burne was also critical, and he commented that Taylor does not convey "a clear enough message" in the work.
In the conclusion of the chapter "Regimenting the Public Mind: The Methods of Control in the Propaganda System" in her 2007 book Marketing Dictatorship, Anne-Marie Brady recommended readers refer to Taylor's book for more material on the subject. In his 2008 book Democracy, Lifelong Learning and the Learning Society, author Peter Jarvis referenced Taylor's work, and quoted from the book in a section "Indoctrination, brainwashing and thought reform".
See also
- Thought Reform and the Psychology of TotalismThought Reform and the Psychology of TotalismThought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China is a psychology non-fiction book on brainwashing and mind control by Robert Jay Lifton. The book was published in multiple editions, in 1956 , 1961, 1962 , 1963 , and 1989 . The 1989 reprint edition was published by...
, by Robert Jay LiftonRobert Jay LiftonRobert Jay Lifton is an American psychiatrist and author, chiefly known for his studies of the psychological causes and effects of war and political violence and for his theory of thought reform...