How we change what others think, feel, believe and do

Conversion techniques

Techniques > Conversion > Conversion techniques

Conversion to a different way of thinking and different beliefs appears in many different situations. Although the techniques here are drawn from studies of brainwashing and cult conversion, they are surprisingly common, at least in more acceptable forms, in many other groups and organizations.

Breaking sessions: that pressure a person until they crack.
Changing values: to change what is right and wrong.
Confession: to leave behind the undesirable past.
Dietary control: that weakens the person's thinking.
Entrancement: open the mind and limit rational reflection.
Engagement: that draws a person in.
Exhaustion: so they are less able to resist persuasion.
Guilt: about the past that they can leave behind.
Higher purpose: associate desirability with a higher purpose.
Identity destruction: to make space for the new identity.
Information control: that blocks out dissuading thoughts.
Incremental conversion: shifting the person one step at a time.
Isolation: separating people from dissuasive messages.
Love Bomb: to hook in the lonely and vulnerable.
Persistence: never giving up, wearing you down.
Progressive Demands: Add increasingly stronger requests.
Radicalization: Creating more extremists.
Special language: that offers the allure of power and new meaning.
Thought-stopping: block out distracting or dissuading thoughts.

Conversion techniques

See also