Summary: Psychological Manipulation And Cultic Relationships

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Article 2: Psychological Manipulation, Cults and Cultic Relationships: A Workshop for Mental Health Professionals. The article by Henry discusses psychological manipulation in relation to cults and cultic relationships. The author agrees with Langone’s definition of a destructive cults and highlights some of the characteristics of destructive cults. According to this article, a destructive cultic group exploits members and harms them members psychologically, introduces members to psychological dependency ad applies though reform to persuade members. According to Henry (2013), people join cultic groups for enlightenment, salvation, freedom, love, friendship, idealism or to be spiritually high. Most people join cults without knowing because they only get involved with groups that promise to provide the mentioned high ideals only to find themselves in a cultic …show more content…

Cult leaders have persuasive skills and this makes it easy for them to psychologically manipulate their current and potential members. Some of the major reasons why some people become vulnerable to cults include susceptibility to trance states, dependency, low tolerance for ambiguity, tendency to use religious frameworks to conceptualize problems, dissatisfaction with daily life and cultural disillusionment (Henry, 2013). According to clinical observations, most people are vulnerable to joining cults when are stressed or in a period of transition. Research studies show that people are open to cultic ideas when going through stressful situations and are looking for solutions. When compared to the other two articles, this article focuses more on recruitment aspects of cultism. A recent survey indicates that most people join cults after pre-cult psychotherapy and cult leaders find them when they are psychologically distressed (Henry, 2013). Therefore, psychological manipulation becomes much easier when one is

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