Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2003, Page 45
The cognitive approach (Beck, 1979) assumes that people have a limited set of core
assumptions about the world, the self, and others, and that numerous peripheral beliefs
derive from these core assumptions. These beliefs—core and peripheral—have action
consequences. When the beliefs are disordered or out of touch with reality,
psychopathological behavior may ensue. Thus, Alfred Adler, Freud‘s first dissenting disciple
and the first modern cognitive psychologist, talked about the individual‘s ―private logic‖
(Ansbacher &Ansbacher, 1979). Neurotic individuals, according to Adler, are neurotic
because their private logic includes beliefs about the world, self, and others (e.g., ―I must
be perfect in all that I do or I am nothing‖) that cause them to come into conflict with or
withdraw from other people. According to Adler, the individual‘s faulty private logic develops
not from how he or she handled childhood sexuality, as Freud maintained, but from how he
or she handled the inferiority that is the natural condition of all children. To Adler, the key
factor in development is not that children are sexual, but that they are little and weak.
Children‘s fundamental assumptions about world, self, and others develop from how they
and their environments respond to the unavoidable starting condition of weakness and
dependence. In normal development, little, weak children are typically raised in loving,
secure homes that reward their small steps toward maturity, thereby enabling them to
develop a healthy self-esteem and learn how to manage in the social world that all but
hermits inhabit. In neurotic development, children are typically raised in an emotionally
stunted and psychologically unsafe home in which their small steps may be disparaged or
ignored, causing them to develop assumptions about life that may lock them, for example,
in defeatist (e.g., ―I am a loser who will fail in all that I attempt‖) or pretentiously
compensatory (e.g., ―I must be perfect in all that I do‖) patterns of behavior. (Needless to
say, some individuals can respond to deficient childhood environments in ways that lead
them to become healthy adults, despite the environment in which they were raised. But the
odds of healthy development in such an environment are, to say the least, less than in a
loving, secure environment.)
The important point to keep in mind is that our fundamental assumptions about life emerge
in large part from our experience, not from our rational deliberations.
Modern cognitive therapists, though rarely acknowledging Adler, say much the same thing,
only more systematically. Aaron Beck, the father of modern cognitive therapy, calls the
individual‘s core assumptions ―schemas‖ (Beck, 1979) Albert Ellis, founder of Rational
Emotive Therapy, talks about the irrational assumptions that troubled people hold (Ellis &
Harper, 1975). Indeed, psychologists have even developed instruments for assessing the
ways in which a person‘s thinking may be out of whack. One such measure, for example, is
called the ―Dysfunctional Attitude Scale.‖
Cognitive therapists believe that they can more effectively help distressed people by
teaching them how to recognize and challenge the core assumptions that generate conflict,
and how to try out and practice assumptions and behaviors that are likely to have more
desirable consequences. Hence, the perfectionist operating on the assumption that ―I must
be perfect in all that I do‖ is tactfully guided (although in Albert Ellis‘s case, the individual
may be bluntly directed) to the realization that this belief is irrational and produces
unhappiness. Of course, helping a client get to this realization is no easy task to accomplish
and requires much more tact and skill than this summary statement implies. Making such a
fundamental change in one‘s life doesn‘t result only from rational discussion, although this
can be an important factor. The change results in large part from personally experiencing
the consequences of behaviors associated with other fundamental assumptions—however
tentatively and even reluctantly one may have attempted these new behaviors, typically
with the support and encouragement of the therapist, family, and friends.
Now, what does all of this have to do with conversion?
The cognitive approach (Beck, 1979) assumes that people have a limited set of core
assumptions about the world, the self, and others, and that numerous peripheral beliefs
derive from these core assumptions. These beliefs—core and peripheral—have action
consequences. When the beliefs are disordered or out of touch with reality,
psychopathological behavior may ensue. Thus, Alfred Adler, Freud‘s first dissenting disciple
and the first modern cognitive psychologist, talked about the individual‘s ―private logic‖
(Ansbacher &Ansbacher, 1979). Neurotic individuals, according to Adler, are neurotic
because their private logic includes beliefs about the world, self, and others (e.g., ―I must
be perfect in all that I do or I am nothing‖) that cause them to come into conflict with or
withdraw from other people. According to Adler, the individual‘s faulty private logic develops
not from how he or she handled childhood sexuality, as Freud maintained, but from how he
or she handled the inferiority that is the natural condition of all children. To Adler, the key
factor in development is not that children are sexual, but that they are little and weak.
Children‘s fundamental assumptions about world, self, and others develop from how they
and their environments respond to the unavoidable starting condition of weakness and
dependence. In normal development, little, weak children are typically raised in loving,
secure homes that reward their small steps toward maturity, thereby enabling them to
develop a healthy self-esteem and learn how to manage in the social world that all but
hermits inhabit. In neurotic development, children are typically raised in an emotionally
stunted and psychologically unsafe home in which their small steps may be disparaged or
ignored, causing them to develop assumptions about life that may lock them, for example,
in defeatist (e.g., ―I am a loser who will fail in all that I attempt‖) or pretentiously
compensatory (e.g., ―I must be perfect in all that I do‖) patterns of behavior. (Needless to
say, some individuals can respond to deficient childhood environments in ways that lead
them to become healthy adults, despite the environment in which they were raised. But the
odds of healthy development in such an environment are, to say the least, less than in a
loving, secure environment.)
The important point to keep in mind is that our fundamental assumptions about life emerge
in large part from our experience, not from our rational deliberations.
Modern cognitive therapists, though rarely acknowledging Adler, say much the same thing,
only more systematically. Aaron Beck, the father of modern cognitive therapy, calls the
individual‘s core assumptions ―schemas‖ (Beck, 1979) Albert Ellis, founder of Rational
Emotive Therapy, talks about the irrational assumptions that troubled people hold (Ellis &
Harper, 1975). Indeed, psychologists have even developed instruments for assessing the
ways in which a person‘s thinking may be out of whack. One such measure, for example, is
called the ―Dysfunctional Attitude Scale.‖
Cognitive therapists believe that they can more effectively help distressed people by
teaching them how to recognize and challenge the core assumptions that generate conflict,
and how to try out and practice assumptions and behaviors that are likely to have more
desirable consequences. Hence, the perfectionist operating on the assumption that ―I must
be perfect in all that I do‖ is tactfully guided (although in Albert Ellis‘s case, the individual
may be bluntly directed) to the realization that this belief is irrational and produces
unhappiness. Of course, helping a client get to this realization is no easy task to accomplish
and requires much more tact and skill than this summary statement implies. Making such a
fundamental change in one‘s life doesn‘t result only from rational discussion, although this
can be an important factor. The change results in large part from personally experiencing
the consequences of behaviors associated with other fundamental assumptions—however
tentatively and even reluctantly one may have attempted these new behaviors, typically
with the support and encouragement of the therapist, family, and friends.
Now, what does all of this have to do with conversion?
