I would like to submit some pertinent info to this topic starting with a 1974 senate report on behavior modification with relation to troubled teen programs. (I originally found this in another conversation on fornits: 1974 U.S. Senate report on Behavior Modification (The Seed)
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=31751 )
I will quote part of the report that emphasizes the evolution of these practices in behavior modification in programs.
“Other forms of behavior modification techniques employ intensive “encounter sessions†in which individuals are required to participate in group therapy discussions where intensive pressure is often placed on the individuals to accept the attitudes of the group. More intensive forms of encounter groups begin first by subjecting the individual to isolation and humiliation in a conscious effort to break down his psychological defenses. Once the individual is submissive, his personality can begin to be reformed around attitudes determined by the program director to be acceptable. Similar to the highly refined “brainwashing†techniques employed by the North Koreans in the early nineteen fifties, the method is used in the treatment of drug abusers. In an article supporting this type of brainwashing as a behavior modification technique published in 1962, Professor Edgar Schein suggested that: “ In order to produce marked change in behavior and/ or attitude, it is necessary to weaken, undermine or remove the supports of the old pattern of behavior and the old attitudes. Because most of these supports are the face to face confirmation of present behavior and attitudes which are provided by those with whom close emotional ties exist, it is often necessary to break those emotional ties. This can be done either by removing the individual physically and preventing any communication with those whom he cares about, or by proving to him that those whom he respects are not worthy of it and, indeed, should e actively mistrusted.†“ --Quoted from : Edgar Schein. “Man Against Man: Brainwashing,†Corrective Psychiatry and Journal of Social Thearapy, Vol. 8, No. 2 (1962).-- Ref: -- Individual Rights and the Federal Role in Behavior modification. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington : 1974
http://thestraights.net/images/seed-Ervin-brainwash.htm full text
http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED103726.pdf --.
…
If I can make a few connections from the study, sensitivity training (or human relations training) is the core influence behind the ‘encounter sessions’. And the quote from Schein describes the ‘Unfreezing’ phase of Kurt Lewins change process. Compare Scheins quote to what he outlines (from the original post) in his 1962 NTL article on influence in human relations training, and more description from Lewin on Unfreezing.
“Unfreezing. This was taken directly from Kurt Lewin’s change theory. It describes the process of disconfirming a person’s former belief system. ‘Motivation for change must be generated before change can occur. One must be helped to re-examine many cherished assumptions about oneself and one’s relations to others’ (op. cit.). Part of the process of the group, then, had to address this. Trainers sought to create an environment in which values and beliefs could be challenged.
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-lewin.htm
The first stage he called "unfreezing". It involved overcoming inertia and dismantling the existing "mind set". Defense mechanisms have to be bypassed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Lewin
For ‘Unfreezing’ to occur Lewin describes “the ‘catharsis’ which seems to be necessary before prejudices can be removed. To break open the shell of complacency and self righteousness it is sometimes necessary to bring about deliberately an emotional stir-up.†And “Sometimes the value system of this face to face group conflicts with the values of the larger cultural setting and it is necessary to separate the group from the larger setting….. The effectiveness of camps or workshops in changing ideology or conduct depends in part on the possibility of creating such “cultural islands†during change. The stronger the accepted subculture of the workshop and the more isolated it is the more it will minimize that type of resistance to change which is based on the relation between the individual and the standards of the larger group.†…
Anyways, I thought this provided more clarity on this topic.
.
