Great info, thanks for posting, and giving me the urge to take all my chipped dishware outside and smash them with a bat.
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 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.”
And I am going to have to plug my thread Training Therapy or Thought Reform in the TTI for further comparison as it directly connects Schein’s coercive application of human relations training in management and re-applies for use in behavior modification facilities tied to the troubled teen industry.
viewtopic.php?f=81&t=31447 All in all the evidence is pretty suggestive.
…added thanks to Ursus for the full text, which has the references.( BTW I would like to get my hands on the article from Scheins quote,- Man Against Man: Brainwashing,” Corrective Psychiatry and Journal of Social Thearapy, Vol. 8, No. 2 (1962,)- but I have searched and could not find a source. If anyone can provide a link, much appreciation.)