Adolescent attraction to cults

Adolescence, Fall, 1998 by Eagan Hunter

In the absence of authentic, stabilizing standards upon which youth can depend and trust, self-destructive tendencies quickly emerge. Adolescents become vulnerable to academic failure, suicide, drug and alcohol abuse, pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, risk-taking behavior, violence, and gang and cult membership.

Zimbardo and Hartley (1985) reported that approximately 50% of the high school students included in their survey had been approached to join a cult. Wright and Piper (1986) have indicated that cults are most successful in recruiting individuals between 18 and 23 years of age, when persons are most likely to be seeking "perfect" answers to life's questions and problems. Because of their immaturity, they fail to take into account the long-term consequences of cult membership.

Rudin (1990) defines cults as "groups or movements exhibiting an excessive devotion or dedication to some person, idea, or thing. Such cults employ unethically manipulative techniques of persuasion and control designed to advance the goals of the group's leaders to the determent of members, their families, or the community." Cults attract youths experiencing psychological stress, rootlessness, feelings of emptiness and of being disenfranchised, and identity diffusion and confusion. Such youths come from all walks of life and from all classes of society. Cults seem to offer confused and isolated adolescents a moratorium - a period of dropping-out, or a "time-out" - as well as a highly structured sense of belonging and a means of escape from being "normless."

The terms "church," "sect," and "cult" should be distinguished. Church usually is applied to specific religious organizations. A sect is an offshoot of a particular religious body, whose members prefer to follow doctrines or teachings that differ from the parent group. A cult exhibits many of the characteristics of a sect. However, it represents a major and abrupt break with the past. A cult is viewed by its members as the climax of history, and often emphasizes devotion to a single person. Legitimate movements withstand the test of time to prove their authenticity.

A distinguishing characteristic of cults is that they prey upon a person's fears through a systematic process of "brainwashing" and "programming." They recruit aggressively. Strong efforts are made to separate members from family and former associates - to cut them off from their past - in order to establish new values and standards requiring total dependence on, and devotion to, the cult itself. There is usually an all-powerful authoritarian leader. Members may be psychologically, physically, or sexually abused, with discipline maintained through fear. Rudin (1990) states that "what makes a group a cult is the deception and manipulation of its members and the harm done to them and to society, not its ideals or theology." Notable examples have been the mass suicide of the followers of Jim Jones in Guyana (1978), the holocaustic climax of the disciples o David Koresh in Waco, Texas (1993), and most recently the group suicide of the Heaven's Gate believers in San Diego (1997).