This definition is not meant to be evaluative in the sense of implying that a group is good, bad, benign, or harmful. Rather it is meant to convey a systemic view of such a group, which is comprised of a charismatic relationship, a promise of fulfillment, and a methodology by which to achieve it.

Cults differ in their specific ruling ideologies and in their specific requirements, practices, and behaviors; a single group may even differ over its lifetime or across different locations. These groups exist on a continuum of influence (regarding a particular group’s effect on its members and on society, and vice versa) and a continuum of control (from less invasive to all-encompassing).

Cults can be distinguished from other non-mainstream groups—for example, religious or political sects, fringe or alternative groups or movements, communes and intentional communities—because of their intense ideologies and their demand for total commitment from at least some of the members. Each group must be observed and judged on its own merits and its own practices and behaviors as to whether it falls within this category type, which is not meant to be dismissive or one-sided.

Cults are frequently totalistic and separatist. Some cults are totalistic when they are exclusive in their ideology (sacred, the only way) and impose upon their members systems of social control that are confining and all-inclusive (encompassing all aspects of life). Some cults are separatist when they promote withdrawal from the larger society.

People in such cults tend to

1. Espouse an all-encompassing belief system
2. Exhibit excessive devotion to and dependency on their “perfect” leader
3. Avoid criticism of the group, its leader(s), and its practices
4. Have an attitude of disdain for non-members

Frequently, the totalistic and separatist features of some cults makes them appear alien and threatening, and those features have attracted great attention in the mass media.

This is drawn from Bounded Choice: True Believers and Charismatic Cults by Janja Lalich (University of California Press, 2004). Copyright 2004

In present-day thought-reform programs, there is an attack on the core self, the person’s central self-image. Attacking the inner person, the self, makes the person feel defective at his or her very core. In groups that use such methods, the motto is, Alter the self or perish. The purpose of this assault is to get the person to merge with and identify with the group or leader. The effect is that members become extremely anxious about self-worth and, at times, about their very existence. In such an environment, it is easy to bring on feelings of personal disintegration, or variations of an anxiety attack or identity crisis.

The central elements of a person that are threatened during this process are those that developed over the course of a person’s lifetime. In other words, each person’s “me,” which has been shaped since childhood. In life, a person learns to react to and cope with a variety of emotions, relationships, and events. Through this developmental process, a person adopts psychological defense mechanisms which she or he continues to use in perceiving and interpreting reality, and in dealing with life’s interactions. A systematic attack on the central self tears apart that person’s inner equilibrium and perception of reality. For some, the easiest way to reconstitute the self and obtain a new equilibrium is to identify with the aggressor and accept the ideology of the authority figure who has reduced the person to a state of profound confusion. In effect, the new ideology (psychological theory, spiritual system, political worldview, etc.) functions as a defense mechanism and protects the individual from having to further directly inspect emotions from the past which now appear to be overwhelming.

Recognizing this process of stripping a person's psychological stability and defense mechanisms becomes crucial to understanding why some cults are able to cause such a rapid and dramatic acceptance of their ideology, as well as why membership in cults may produce psychological difficulties and other adjustment problems. The goal of a thought-reform program, then, is to change a human being at the very core so that she or he will believe in a certain ideology, doctrine, or leader and behave in a certain way. Once that is accomplished, compliance or obedience on the part of the group member (or intimate partner in the case of one-on-one cultic relationships) is usually guaranteed.
Conditions Needed to Create a Thought-Reform Environment

1. Keep the person unaware that there is an agenda to control or change the person.
2. Control time and physical environment (contacts, information).
3. Create a sense of powerlessness, fear, and dependency.
4. Suppress old behavior and attitudes.
5. Instill new behavior and attitudes.
6. Put forth a closed system of logic.

Tactics
Destabilize a person’s sense of self.Get the person to drastically reinterpret his or her life’s history and radically alter his or her worldview and accept a new version of reality and causality.
Develop in the person a dependence on the organization, and thereby turn the person into a deployable agent of the organization.

Many people who have been subjected to psychological manipulation and control selectively deny aspects of their experience. Some become angry and resistant at the mention of mind control, thought reform, or brainwashing, thinking these things could not possibly have been done to them. It is very threatening to a person’s sense of self to contemplate having been controlled or taken over. The terms themselves sound harsh and unreal. Yet only by confronting the reality of psychological manipulation can someone who has had such an experience overcome its effects.

Deceptive psychological and social manipulation are part and parcel of the totalist experience. Over the years various labels have been used to describe this systematic process. Psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton first used the term thought reform in the 1950s to describe the behavioral change processes he observed and studied at the revolutionary universities in Communist China and in prisoners of war during the Korean War. Lifton outlined the psychological techniques used to impose what he calls a state of Aideological totalism the process of the coming together of the individual self and certain ideas, or the melding of the individual with a particular set of beliefs. Through his research, Lifton came to the conclusion that within each person there is the potential for a all-or-nothing emotional alignment. The process of combining this human tendency with an all-or-nothing ideology (usually about one’s relationship to the world and sometimes to the spiritual realm) results in totalism. It’s a rather surefire formula: immoderate individual character traits plus an immoderate ideology equals totalism a world of extremes. And, says Lifton, Awhere totalism exists, a religion, a political movement, or even a scientific organization becomes little more than an exclusive cult.

Lifton identified eight psychological themes , now widely used as the criteria for evaluating whether or not a particular group uses thought reform. The more these themes are present, the more restrictive the group or system and the more effective the thought-reform program. Each theme requires central control and sets off a predictable cycle:

1. The theme sets the stage.
2. The rationale for the theme is based on an absolute belief or philosophy.
3. Because of the extreme belief system, a person within this setting has a conflicting and polarized reaction, and is forced to make a choice.
4. Enveloped in such a totalistic environment, most individuals will make totalistic choices.

The outcome of this psychological interplay is thought reform – that is, the person is changed.