Large Group Awareness Training
Encyclopedia
Large-group awareness training (LGAT) refers to activities usually offered by groups linked with the human potential movement
which claim to increase self-awareness
and bring about desirable transformations in individuals' personal lives
. They have been described by Michael Langone
as "new age
trainings" and by Philip Cushman as "mass marathon trainings".
LGAT programs may involve several hundred people at a time.
Though early definitions cited LGATs as featuring unusually long durations, more recent texts describe the trainings as lasting from a few hours to a few days.
In 2004, DuMerton, citing "Langone (1989)", estimated that "[p]erhaps a million Americans have attended LGATs". Forsyth and Corazzini cite Lieberman (1994) as suggesting "that at least 1.3 million Americans have taken part in LGAT sessions".
Rubinstein compared large-group awareness training to certain principles of cognitive therapy
, such as the idea that people can change their lives
by interpreting the way they view external circumstances.
And in Consumer Research: Postcards from the edge, when discussing behavioral and economic studies, the authors contrasted the "enclosed locations" used with Large Group Awareness Trainings with the "relatively open" environment of a "variety store".
The Handbook of Group Psychotherapy described Large Group Awareness Training as focusing on "philosophical, psychological and ethical issues", as related to a desire to increase personal effectiveness in people's lives
.
Psychologist
Dennis Coon's textbook, Psychology: A Journey, defined the term "LGAT" as referring to: "programs that claim to increase self-awareness and facilitate constructive personal change."
Coon further defines Large Group Awareness Training in his book Introduction to Psychology.
as the first of the genre of what psychologists termed "Large Group Awareness Training".
In their self-published book, Navarro and Navarro identify Mind Dynamics
as the major forerunner of large group awareness trainings.
They write that, although Mind Dynamics itself existed only briefly, it sparked an industry
of similar trainings.
Groups and trainings such as Lifespring
, Erhard Seminars Training
, The Forum
, Newfield Consulting, Seres Naturales and Landmark Education
claimed to have worked to improve people's overall level of satisfaction and interpersonal relations
through group interaction.
article published in Annual Review of Psychology, sought to summarize literature on the subject of LGATs and to examine their efficacy and their relationship with more standard psychology
. This academic article describes and analyzes large group awareness training from a psychological perspective. Influenced by the work of humanistic psychologists
such as Carl Rogers
, Abraham Maslow
and Rollo May
and sometimes associated with the human potential movement
,
LGATs as commercial trainings took many techniques from encounter groups. They existed alongside but "outside the domains of academic psychology or psychiatry. Their measure of performance was consumer satisfaction and formal research was seldom pursued."
The article describes an est
training, and discusses the literature on the testimony
of est graduates. It notes minor changes on psychological tests after the training and mentions anecdotal reports of psychiatric casualties among est trainees. The article considers how est compares to more standard psychotherapy techniques such as behavior therapy, group
and existential psychotherapy before concluding with a call for "objective and rigorous research" and stating that unknown variables might have accounted for some of the positive accounts. Psychologists advised borderline
or psychotic
patients not to participate.
Psychological factors cited by academics include emotional "flooding
", catharsis
, universality
(identification with others), the instillation of hope, identification and what Sartre
called "uncontested authorship".
In 1989 researchers from the University of Connecticut
received the "National Consultants to Management Award" from the American Psychological Association
for their study: Evaluating a Large Group Awareness Training
.
The study concluded that participation in the LGAT studied (the Forum
) had very little impact on participants.
Psychologist Chris Mathe has written in the interests of consumer-protection
, encouraging potential attendees of LGATs to discuss such trainings with any current therapist or counselor, to examine the principles underlying the program, and to determine pre-screening methods, the training of facilitators, the full cost of the training and of any suggested follow-up care.
event, noting an authoritarian demeanor of the trainer, physical strains on the participants from a long schedule, and the similarity of many techniques to those used in some group therapy
and encounter groups. The academic textbook, Handbook of Group Psychotherapy regards Large Group Awareness Training organisations as "less open to leader differences", because they follow a "detailed written plan" that does not vary from one training to the next.
Specific techniques used in Large Group Awareness Trainings may include:
LGATs utilize such techniques during long sessions, sometimes called a "marathon
" session. Paglia describes "EST's Large Group Awareness Training": "Marathon, eight-hour sessions, in which [participants] were confined and harassed, supposedly led to the breakdown of conventional ego, after which they were in effect born again."
In his book Life 102
, LGAT participant and former trainer Peter McWilliams
describes the basic technique of marathon trainings as pressure/release and asserts that advertising
uses pressure/release "all the time", as do "good cop/bad cop
" police-interrogations and revival meeting
s. By spending approximately half the time making a person feel bad and then suddenly reversing the feeling through effusive praise, the programs cause participants to experience a stress
-reaction and an "endorphin
high". McWilliams gives examples of various LGAT activities called processes with names such as "love bomb," "lifeboat", "cocktail party" and "cradling" which take place over many hours and days, physically exhausting the participants to make them more susceptible to the trainer's message, whether in the participants' best interests or not.
Although extremely critical of some LGATs, McWilliams found positive value in others, asserting that they varied not in technique but in the application of technique.
Not all profession
al researchers view LGATs favorably. Researchers such as psychologist Philip Cushman,
for example, found that the program he studied "consists of a pre-meditated attack on the self". A 1983 study on Lifespring
found that "although participants often experience a heightened sense of well-being as a consequence of the training, the phenomenon is essentially pathological", meaning that, in the program studied, "the training systematically undermines ego functioning and promotes regression to the extent that reality
testing is significantly impaired". Lieberman's 1987 study,
funded partially by Lifespring
, noted that 5 out of a sample of 289 participants experienced "stress
reactions" including one "transitory psychotic
episode". He commented: "Whether [these five] would have experienced such stress under other conditions cannot be answered. The clinical evidence, however, is that the reactions were directly attributable to the large group awareness training."
In Coon's psychology textbook (Introduction to Psychology) the author references many other studies, which postulate that many of the "claimed benefits" of Large Group Awareness Training actually take the form of "a kind of therapy placebo effect". DuMerton writes that "... there is a lack of scientific evidence to quantify the longer-term positive outcomes and changes objectively ..." Jarvis described Large Group Awareness Training as "educationally dubious" in the 2002 book The Theory & Practice of Teaching.
Tapper mentions that "some large group-awareness training and psychotherapy groups" exemplify non-religious "cults".
Benjamin criticizes LGAT groups for their high prices and spiritual
subtleties.
In an academic research-paper on "Choices", a type of LGAT, researchers credited LGAT programs with having had perhaps a million American attendees, many of whom gave positive testimonials of "healing effects" and "positive outcomes in their lives".
commissioned and subsequently decided not to endorse and strongly criticised a report by the APA Task Force on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control
, in which the so-called "anti-cult
" psychologist Margaret Singer
included large group awareness trainings as one example of what she called "coercive persuasion". The APA characterized Singer's hypotheses as "uninformed speculations based on skewed data" [The quoted text does not appear in the reference given.]
and stated that the report "[i]n general" lacked "the scientific rigor and evenhanded critical approach necessary for APA imprimatur."
The APA also claimed that "the specific methods by which Drs. Singer and Benson have arrived at their conclusions have also been rejected by all serious scholars in the field."
Singer sued the APA, and lost on June 17, 1994
After the APA spurned the report, Singer remained in good standing in the psychological research community.
Singer reworked much of the report material into the book Cults in our Midst: The Hidden Menace in Our Everyday Lives
(1995, second edition: 2003), which she co-authored with Janja Lalich
.
Singer and Lalich stated that "large group awareness trainings" tend to last at least four days and usually five. Their book mentions Erhard Seminars Training
and its derivatives such as the Forum, "Lifespring
, Actualizations, MSIA
/Insight and PSI Seminars
.
In her book, Singer differentiated between the usage of the terms cult and Large Group Awareness Training. while pointing out some commonalities.
Elsewhere she groups the two phenomena together in that they both use a shared set of thought-reform techniques.
Singer also writes that employees taking part in a company-wide Large Group Awareness Training program not only complained about attempted religious conversion
, but also objected to the specific techniques used.
by Michael Langone
Ph.D.
analysed Large Group Awareness Training.
Langone noted comparisons between Large Group Awareness Training and "brainwashing" and "cult
s"; and posited that many LGAT groups have an implied or even explicit religious nature.
Langone concluded by stating that he knew of no specific academic research which showed that Large Group Awareness Trainings have positive behavioral effects. Langone cited a study which showed no difference between the Large Group Awareness Training test-subjects and the control group.
has grouped some Large Group Awareness Training organizations together with research about them.
Human Potential Movement
The Human Potential Movement arose out of the social and intellectual milieu of the 1960s and formed around the concept of cultivating extraordinary potential that its advocates believed to lie largely untapped in all people...
which claim to increase self-awareness
Self-awareness
Self-awareness is the capacity for introspection and the ability to reconcile oneself as an individual separate from the environment and other individuals...
and bring about desirable transformations in individuals' personal lives
Personal life
Personal life is the course of an individual's life, especially when viewed as the sum of personal choices contributing to one's personal identity. It is a common notion in modern existence—although more so in more prosperous parts of the world such as Western Europe and North America...
. They have been described by Michael Langone
Michael Langone
Michael D. Langone, is an American counseling psychologist who specialises in research about "cultic groups" and alleged psychological manipulation. He is executive director of the International Cultic Studies Association, editor of the journal Cultic Studies Review.Langone is author and co-author...
as "new age
New Age
The New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century. Its central precepts have been described as "drawing on both Eastern and Western spiritual and metaphysical traditions and then infusing them with influences from self-help and motivational...
trainings" and by Philip Cushman as "mass marathon trainings".
LGAT programs may involve several hundred people at a time.
Though early definitions cited LGATs as featuring unusually long durations, more recent texts describe the trainings as lasting from a few hours to a few days.
In 2004, DuMerton, citing "Langone (1989)", estimated that "[p]erhaps a million Americans have attended LGATs". Forsyth and Corazzini cite Lieberman (1994) as suggesting "that at least 1.3 million Americans have taken part in LGAT sessions".
Definitions of LGAT
DuMerton described Large Group Awareness Training as "teaching simple, but often overlooked wisdom, which takes place over the period of a few days, in which individuals receive intense, emotionally-focused instruction."Rubinstein compared large-group awareness training to certain principles of cognitive therapy
Cognitive therapy
Cognitive behavioral therapy is a psychotherapeutic approach: a talking therapy. CBT aims to solve problems concerning dysfunctional emotions, behaviors and cognitions through a goal-oriented, systematic procedure in the present...
, such as the idea that people can change their lives
Personal life
Personal life is the course of an individual's life, especially when viewed as the sum of personal choices contributing to one's personal identity. It is a common notion in modern existence—although more so in more prosperous parts of the world such as Western Europe and North America...
by interpreting the way they view external circumstances.
And in Consumer Research: Postcards from the edge, when discussing behavioral and economic studies, the authors contrasted the "enclosed locations" used with Large Group Awareness Trainings with the "relatively open" environment of a "variety store".
The Handbook of Group Psychotherapy described Large Group Awareness Training as focusing on "philosophical, psychological and ethical issues", as related to a desire to increase personal effectiveness in people's lives
Personal life
Personal life is the course of an individual's life, especially when viewed as the sum of personal choices contributing to one's personal identity. It is a common notion in modern existence—although more so in more prosperous parts of the world such as Western Europe and North America...
.
Psychologist
Psychologist
Psychologist is a professional or academic title used by individuals who are either:* Clinical professionals who work with patients in a variety of therapeutic contexts .* Scientists conducting psychological research or teaching psychology in a college...
Dennis Coon's textbook, Psychology: A Journey, defined the term "LGAT" as referring to: "programs that claim to increase self-awareness and facilitate constructive personal change."
Coon further defines Large Group Awareness Training in his book Introduction to Psychology.
The evolution of LGAT-providers
Lou Kilzer, in The Rocky Mountain News, identified Leadership DynamicsLeadership Dynamics
Leadership Dynamics, also known as Leadership Dynamics Institute , was a private, for-profit company, owned by William Penn Patrick. The company focused on executive training, personal development and self-improvement...
as the first of the genre of what psychologists termed "Large Group Awareness Training".
In their self-published book, Navarro and Navarro identify Mind Dynamics
Mind Dynamics
Mind Dynamics was a seminar company, founded by Alexander Everett in Texas in 1968. Mind Dynamics later led to two other companies, est and Lifespring....
as the major forerunner of large group awareness trainings.
They write that, although Mind Dynamics itself existed only briefly, it sparked an industry
Industry
Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...
of similar trainings.
Groups and trainings such as Lifespring
Lifespring
Lifespring was a for-profit private company, founded in 1974. The company promoted itself through books and word of mouth advertising. By 1989, officials stated that over 300,000 people had enrolled in the company's seminars...
, Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training, an organization founded by Werner H. Erhard, offered a two-weekend course known officially as "The est Standard Training"...
, The Forum
Werner Erhard and Associates
Werner Erhard and Associates, also known as WE&A or as WEA, operated as a commercial entity from February 1981 until early 1991. It replaced Erhard Seminars Training, Inc. as the vehicle for marketing, selling and imparting the content of the est training, and offered what some people refer to as...
, Newfield Consulting, Seres Naturales and Landmark Education
Landmark Education
Landmark Education LLC is a personal training and development company which offers educational programs in approximately 115 locations in more than 20 countries worldwide....
claimed to have worked to improve people's overall level of satisfaction and interpersonal relations
Interpersonal relationship
An interpersonal relationship is an association between two or more people that may range from fleeting to enduring. This association may be based on limerence, love, solidarity, regular business interactions, or some other type of social commitment. Interpersonal relationships are formed in the...
through group interaction.
Academic analyses, studies
"Large Group Awareness Training", a 1982 peer-reviewedPeer review
Peer review is a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance and provide credibility...
article published in Annual Review of Psychology, sought to summarize literature on the subject of LGATs and to examine their efficacy and their relationship with more standard 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...
. This academic article describes and analyzes large group awareness training from a psychological perspective. Influenced by the work of humanistic psychologists
Humanistic psychology
Humanistic psychology is a psychological perspective which rose to prominence in the mid-20th century, drawing on the work of early pioneers like Carl Rogers and the philosophies of existentialism and phenomenology...
such as Carl Rogers
Carl Rogers
Carl Ransom Rogers was an influential American psychologist and among the founders of the humanistic approach to psychology...
, Abraham Maslow
Abraham Maslow
Abraham Harold Maslow was an American professor of psychology at Brandeis University, Brooklyn College, New School for Social Research and Columbia University who created Maslow's hierarchy of needs...
and Rollo May
Rollo May
Rollo May was an American existential psychologist. He authored the influential book Love and Will during 1969. He is often associated with both humanistic psychology and existentialist philosophy. May was a close friend of the theologian Paul Tillich...
and sometimes associated with the human potential movement
Human Potential Movement
The Human Potential Movement arose out of the social and intellectual milieu of the 1960s and formed around the concept of cultivating extraordinary potential that its advocates believed to lie largely untapped in all people...
,
LGATs as commercial trainings took many techniques from encounter groups. They existed alongside but "outside the domains of academic psychology or psychiatry. Their measure of performance was consumer satisfaction and formal research was seldom pursued."
The article describes an est
Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training, an organization founded by Werner H. Erhard, offered a two-weekend course known officially as "The est Standard Training"...
training, and discusses the literature on the testimony
Testimony
In law and in religion, testimony is a solemn attestation as to the truth of a matter. All testimonies should be well thought out and truthful. It was the custom in Ancient Rome for the men to place their right hand on a Bible when taking an oath...
of est graduates. It notes minor changes on psychological tests after the training and mentions anecdotal reports of psychiatric casualties among est trainees. The article considers how est compares to more standard psychotherapy techniques such as behavior therapy, group
Group psychotherapy
Group psychotherapy or group therapy is a form of psychotherapy in which one or more therapists treat a small group of clients together as a group...
and existential psychotherapy before concluding with a call for "objective and rigorous research" and stating that unknown variables might have accounted for some of the positive accounts. Psychologists advised borderline
Borderline personality disorder
Borderline personality disorder is a personality disorder described as a prolonged disturbance of personality function in a person , characterized by depth and variability of moods.The disorder typically involves unusual levels of instability in mood; black and white thinking, or splitting; the...
or psychotic
Psychosis
Psychosis means abnormal condition of the mind, and is a generic psychiatric term for a mental state often described as involving a "loss of contact with reality"...
patients not to participate.
Psychological factors cited by academics include emotional "flooding
Flooding (psychology)
Flooding is a form of behavior therapy and based on the principles of respondent conditioning. It is sometimes referred to as exposure therapy or prolonged exposure therapy. As a psychotherapeutic technique, it is used to treat phobia and anxiety disorders including post-traumatic stress disorder...
", catharsis
Catharsis
Catharsis or katharsis is a Greek word meaning "cleansing" or "purging". It is derived from the verb καθαίρειν, kathairein, "to purify, purge," and it is related to the adjective καθαρός, katharos, "pure or clean."-Dramatic uses:...
, universality
Universality (philosophy)
In philosophy, universalism is a doctrine or school claiming universal facts can be discovered and is therefore understood as being in opposition to relativism. In certain religions, universality is the quality ascribed to an entity whose existence is consistent throughout the universe...
(identification with others), the instillation of hope, identification and what Sartre
Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He was one of the leading figures in 20th century French philosophy, particularly Marxism, and was one of the key figures in literary...
called "uncontested authorship".
In 1989 researchers from the University of Connecticut
University of Connecticut
The admission rate to the University of Connecticut is about 50% and has been steadily decreasing, with about 28,000 prospective students applying for admission to the freshman class in recent years. Approximately 40,000 prospective students tour the main campus in Storrs annually...
received the "National Consultants to Management Award" from the American Psychological Association
American Psychological Association
The American Psychological Association is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States. It is the world's largest association of psychologists with around 154,000 members including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. The APA...
for their study: Evaluating a Large Group Awareness Training
Evaluating a Large Group Awareness Training
Evaluating a Large Group Awareness Training: A Longitudinal Study of Psychosocial Effects is a non-fiction psychology book on Large Group Awareness Training, published in 1990 by Springer-Verlag. The book was co-authored by psychologists Jeffrey D. Fisher, Roxane Cohen Silver, Jack M. Chinsky,...
.
The study concluded that participation in the LGAT studied (the Forum
Werner Erhard and Associates
Werner Erhard and Associates, also known as WE&A or as WEA, operated as a commercial entity from February 1981 until early 1991. It replaced Erhard Seminars Training, Inc. as the vehicle for marketing, selling and imparting the content of the est training, and offered what some people refer to as...
) had very little impact on participants.
Psychologist Chris Mathe has written in the interests of consumer-protection
Consumer protection
Consumer protection laws designed to ensure fair trade competition and the free flow of truthful information in the marketplace. The laws are designed to prevent businesses that engage in fraud or specified unfair practices from gaining an advantage over competitors and may provide additional...
, encouraging potential attendees of LGATs to discuss such trainings with any current therapist or counselor, to examine the principles underlying the program, and to determine pre-screening methods, the training of facilitators, the full cost of the training and of any suggested follow-up care.
LGAT techniques
Finkelstein's 1982 article provides a detailed description of the structure and techniques of an Erhard Seminars TrainingErhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training, an organization founded by Werner H. Erhard, offered a two-weekend course known officially as "The est Standard Training"...
event, noting an authoritarian demeanor of the trainer, physical strains on the participants from a long schedule, and the similarity of many techniques to those used in some group therapy
Group therapy
Group psychotherapy or group therapy is a form of psychotherapy in which one or more therapists treat a small group of clients together as a group...
and encounter groups. The academic textbook, Handbook of Group Psychotherapy regards Large Group Awareness Training organisations as "less open to leader differences", because they follow a "detailed written plan" that does not vary from one training to the next.
Specific techniques used in Large Group Awareness Trainings may include:
- meditationMeditationMeditation is any form of a family of practices in which practitioners train their minds or self-induce a mode of consciousness to realize some benefit....
- biofeedbackBiofeedbackBiofeedback is the process of becoming aware of various physiological functions using instruments that provide information on the activity of those same systems, with a goal of being able to manipulate them at will...
- self-hypnosisSelf-hypnosisSelf-hypnosis is a form of hypnosis which is self-induced, and normally makes use of self-suggestion . Listening to pre-recorded audio or other media is often mistaken for self-hypnosis, but is just another form of hypnosis....
- relaxation techniqueRelaxation techniqueA relaxation technique is any method, process, procedure, or activity that helps a person to relax; to attain a state of increased calmness; or otherwise reduce levels of anxiety, stress or anger...
s - visualizationCreative VisualizationCreative visualization refers to the practice of seeking to affect the outer world via changing one's thoughts. Creative Visualization is the basic technique underlying positive thinking and is frequently used by athletes to enhance their performance. The concept originally arose in the US with...
- neuro-linguistic programmingNeuro-linguistic programmingNeuro-linguistic programming is an approach to psychotherapy, self-help and organizational change. Founders Richard Bandler and John Grinder say that NLP is a model of interpersonal communication and a system of alternative therapy which seeks to educate people in self-awareness and effective...
- mind-controlMind controlMind 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"...
- yogaYogaYoga is a physical, mental, and spiritual discipline, originating in ancient India. The goal of yoga, or of the person practicing yoga, is the attainment of a state of perfect spiritual insight and tranquility while meditating on Supersoul...
LGATs utilize such techniques during long sessions, sometimes called a "marathon
Marathon
The marathon is a long-distance running event with an official distance of 42.195 kilometres , that is usually run as a road race...
" session. Paglia describes "EST's Large Group Awareness Training": "Marathon, eight-hour sessions, in which [participants] were confined and harassed, supposedly led to the breakdown of conventional ego, after which they were in effect born again."
In his book Life 102
Life 102 (book)
Life 102: What to Do When Your Guru Sues You is a controversial book by the best-selling self-help author Peter McWilliams. Couched in the tone of the author's Life 101 manuals, it levels a series of personal allegations against John-Roger , founder of the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness and...
, LGAT participant and former trainer Peter McWilliams
Peter McWilliams
Peter Alexander McWilliams was a writer and self-publisher of best-selling self-help books. He was an advocate for those suffering from depression. And, in his later years, he was a cannabis activist. Terminally ill with AIDS and cancer, he became a vocal campaigner for the legalization of medical...
describes the basic technique of marathon trainings as pressure/release and asserts that advertising
Advertising
Advertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...
uses pressure/release "all the time", as do "good cop/bad cop
Good cop/Bad cop
Good cop/bad cop, known in British military circles as Mutt and Jeff and also called joint questioning and friend and foe, is a psychological tactic used for interrogation....
" police-interrogations and revival meeting
Revival meeting
A revival meeting is a series of Christian religious services held in order to inspire active members of a church body, to raise funds and to gain new converts...
s. By spending approximately half the time making a person feel bad and then suddenly reversing the feeling through effusive praise, the programs cause participants to experience a stress
Stress (medicine)
Stress is a term in psychology and biology, borrowed from physics and engineering and first used in the biological context in the 1930s, which has in more recent decades become commonly used in popular parlance...
-reaction and an "endorphin
Endorphin
Endorphins are endogenous opioid peptides that function as neurotransmitters. They are produced by the pituitary gland and the hypothalamus in vertebrates during exercise, excitement, pain, consumption of spicy food, love and orgasm, and they resemble the opiates in their abilities to produce...
high". McWilliams gives examples of various LGAT activities called processes with names such as "love bomb," "lifeboat", "cocktail party" and "cradling" which take place over many hours and days, physically exhausting the participants to make them more susceptible to the trainer's message, whether in the participants' best interests or not.
Although extremely critical of some LGATs, McWilliams found positive value in others, asserting that they varied not in technique but in the application of technique.
Evaluations of LGATs
Finkelstein noted the many difficulties in evaluating LGATs, from proponents' explicit rejection of certain study models to difficulty in establishing a rigorous control group. In some cases, organizations under study have partially funded research into themselves.Not all profession
Profession
A profession is a vocation founded upon specialized educational training, the purpose of which is to supply disinterested counsel and service to others, for a direct and definite compensation, wholly apart from expectation of other business gain....
al researchers view LGATs favorably. Researchers such as psychologist Philip Cushman,
for example, found that the program he studied "consists of a pre-meditated attack on the self". A 1983 study on Lifespring
Lifespring
Lifespring was a for-profit private company, founded in 1974. The company promoted itself through books and word of mouth advertising. By 1989, officials stated that over 300,000 people had enrolled in the company's seminars...
found that "although participants often experience a heightened sense of well-being as a consequence of the training, the phenomenon is essentially pathological", meaning that, in the program studied, "the training systematically undermines ego functioning and promotes regression to the extent that reality
Reality
In philosophy, reality is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined. In a wider definition, reality includes everything that is and has been, whether or not it is observable or comprehensible...
testing is significantly impaired". Lieberman's 1987 study,
funded partially by Lifespring
Lifespring
Lifespring was a for-profit private company, founded in 1974. The company promoted itself through books and word of mouth advertising. By 1989, officials stated that over 300,000 people had enrolled in the company's seminars...
, noted that 5 out of a sample of 289 participants experienced "stress
Stress (medicine)
Stress is a term in psychology and biology, borrowed from physics and engineering and first used in the biological context in the 1930s, which has in more recent decades become commonly used in popular parlance...
reactions" including one "transitory psychotic
Psychosis
Psychosis means abnormal condition of the mind, and is a generic psychiatric term for a mental state often described as involving a "loss of contact with reality"...
episode". He commented: "Whether [these five] would have experienced such stress under other conditions cannot be answered. The clinical evidence, however, is that the reactions were directly attributable to the large group awareness training."
In Coon's psychology textbook (Introduction to Psychology) the author references many other studies, which postulate that many of the "claimed benefits" of Large Group Awareness Training actually take the form of "a kind of therapy placebo effect". DuMerton writes that "... there is a lack of scientific evidence to quantify the longer-term positive outcomes and changes objectively ..." Jarvis described Large Group Awareness Training as "educationally dubious" in the 2002 book The Theory & Practice of Teaching.
Tapper mentions that "some large group-awareness training and psychotherapy groups" exemplify non-religious "cults".
Benjamin criticizes LGAT groups for their high prices and spiritual
Spirituality
Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or an alleged immaterial reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of his/her being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.” Spiritual practices, including meditation, prayer and contemplation, are intended to develop...
subtleties.
In an academic research-paper on "Choices", a type of LGAT, researchers credited LGAT programs with having had perhaps a million American attendees, many of whom gave positive testimonials of "healing effects" and "positive outcomes in their lives".
Singer
The American Psychological AssociationAmerican Psychological Association
The American Psychological Association is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States. It is the world's largest association of psychologists with around 154,000 members including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. The APA...
commissioned and subsequently decided not to endorse and strongly criticised a report by the APA Task Force on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control
APA Task Force on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control
The APA Task Force on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control formed at the request of the American Psychological Association in 1983. The APA asked Margaret Singer, one of the leading proponents of theories of coercive persuasion, to chair a task force to:1...
, in which the so-called "anti-cult
Anti-cult movement
The anti-cult movement is a term used by academics and others to refer to groups and individuals who oppose cults and new religious movements. Sociologists David G...
" psychologist Margaret Singer
Margaret Singer
Dr. Margaret Thaler Singer, was a clinical psychologist and a part-time Adjunct Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, U.S....
included large group awareness trainings as one example of what she called "coercive persuasion". The APA characterized Singer's hypotheses as "uninformed speculations based on skewed data" [The quoted text does not appear in the reference given.]
and stated that the report "[i]n general" lacked "the scientific rigor and evenhanded critical approach necessary for APA imprimatur."
The APA also claimed that "the specific methods by which Drs. Singer and Benson have arrived at their conclusions have also been rejected by all serious scholars in the field."
Singer sued the APA, and lost on June 17, 1994
After the APA spurned the report, Singer remained in good standing in the psychological research community.
Singer reworked much of the report material into the book Cults in our Midst: The Hidden Menace in Our Everyday Lives
Cults in Our Midst (book)
Cults in Our Midst: The Hidden Menace in Our Everyday Lives is a nonfiction psychology book on cults, by Margaret Singer and Janja Lalich, Ph.D., with a foreword by Robert Jay Lifton. The book was published by Jossey-Bass in 1996 in hardcover format...
(1995, second edition: 2003), which she co-authored with Janja Lalich
Janja Lalich
Janja Lalich is Professor of Sociology at California State University, Chico, known for her study of the inner workings of cults.She was a member of the radical "Democratic Workers Party" for 11 years, a group she now considers a cult...
.
Singer and Lalich stated that "large group awareness trainings" tend to last at least four days and usually five. Their book mentions Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training, an organization founded by Werner H. Erhard, offered a two-weekend course known officially as "The est Standard Training"...
and its derivatives such as the Forum, "Lifespring
Lifespring
Lifespring was a for-profit private company, founded in 1974. The company promoted itself through books and word of mouth advertising. By 1989, officials stated that over 300,000 people had enrolled in the company's seminars...
, Actualizations, MSIA
Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness
The Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness is a 501 non-profit religious corporation, incorporated in California on June 25, 1971. Before incorporation, the group was founded in California in 1968 by John-Roger...
/Insight and PSI Seminars
PSI Seminars
PSI Seminars is a for-profit private company which offers Large Group Awareness Training courses. PSI was founded in 1973 by Thomas Willhite and Jane Willhite and the company is presently based out of Clearlake Oaks, California-Courses:...
.
In her book, Singer differentiated between the usage of the terms cult and Large Group Awareness Training. while pointing out some commonalities.
Elsewhere she groups the two phenomena together in that they both use a shared set of thought-reform techniques.
Singer also writes that employees taking part in a company-wide Large Group Awareness Training program not only complained about attempted religious conversion
Religious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
, but also objected to the specific techniques used.
Langone
An article in Cult ObserverCultic Studies Review
International Journal of Cultic Studies is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the International Cultic Studies Association.- External links :* , Don Lattin, San Francisco Chronicle, Religion Writer, February 13, 2001...
by Michael Langone
Michael Langone
Michael D. Langone, is an American counseling psychologist who specialises in research about "cultic groups" and alleged psychological manipulation. He is executive director of the International Cultic Studies Association, editor of the journal Cultic Studies Review.Langone is author and co-author...
Ph.D.
Ph.D.
A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
analysed Large Group Awareness Training.
Langone noted comparisons between Large Group Awareness Training and "brainwashing" and "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"; and posited that many LGAT groups have an implied or even explicit religious nature.
Langone concluded by stating that he knew of no specific academic research which showed that Large Group Awareness Trainings have positive behavioral effects. Langone cited a study which showed no difference between the Large Group Awareness Training test-subjects and the control group.
ICSA
The International Cultic Studies AssociationInternational Cultic Studies Association
The International Cultic Studies Association , formerly the American Family Foundation, describes itself as an "interdisciplinary network of academicians, professionals, former group members, and families who study and educate the public about social-psychological influence and control,...
has grouped some Large Group Awareness Training organizations together with research about them.