''"Crazy" Therapies: What Are They? Do They Work?'' is a book by the psychologist

Margaret Singer Margaret Thaler Singer (July 29, 1921 – November 23, 2003) was an American clinical psychologist and researcher with her colleague Lyman Wynne on family communication. She was a prominent figure in the study of undue influence in social and ...

and the sociologist

Janja Lalich Janja Lalich (b. 1945) is an American sociologist and writer. Lalich is best known as a foremost expert on cults and coercion, charismatic authority, power relations, ideology and social control. She is a professor emerita of sociology at the ...

. It was published by

Jossey-Bass John Wiley & Sons, Inc., commonly known as Wiley (), is an American multinational publishing company founded in 1807 that focuses on academic publishing and instructional materials. The company produces books, journals, and encyclopedias, in ...

in 1996.

Content

Singer and Lalich's intended audience is

psychiatric Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of mental disorders. These include various maladaptations related to mood, behaviour, cognition, and perceptions. See glossary of psychiatry. Initial psy ...

and psychotherapy patients. They discuss a list of severe warning signs that psychotherapy patients should pay attention to, regardless of the psychotherapist's credentials or reputation. They discuss these in detail and quantify them into ten classic behaviour patterns. These include potential

sexual abuse Sexual abuse or sex abuse, also referred to as molestation, is abusive sexual behavior by one person upon another. It is often perpetrated using force or by taking advantage of another. Molestation often refers to an instance of sexual assa ...

; asking the patient to perform menial chores; discussing the psychotherapist's own problems in detail; asking the patient to cut off relations with friends and family; diagnosing the patient's condition before thoroughly discussing the issue; claiming the patient must be

hypnotized Hypnosis is a human condition involving focused attention (the selective attention/selective inattention hypothesis, SASI), reduced peripheral awareness, and an enhanced capacity to respond to suggestion.In 2015, the American Psychologica ...

in order to sort through past memories; treating patients as if they all have the same psychological root cause of illness; claiming to have a magical miracle technique; utilizing a checklist to find out if the patient suffers from an illness that the psychotherapist specializes in; and finally, demanding that the patient accept certain

religious Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatur ...

metaphysical Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...

or pseudoscientific beliefs in order to continue psychotherapy. Specific therapies include those that espouse beliefs in "possession by spirit entities, past-life regression,

alien abduction Alien abduction (also called abduction phenomenon, alien abduction syndrome, or UFO abduction) refers to the phenomenon of people reporting their experience of being kidnapped by extraterrestrial beings and subjected to physical and psychologica ...

Primal therapy Primal therapy is a trauma-based psychotherapy created by Arthur Janov, who argues that neurosis is caused by the repressed pain of childhood trauma. Janov argues that repressed pain can be sequentially brought to conscious awareness for resoluti ...

and other unverified cathartic therapies, reparenting, rebirthing, neurolinguistic programming (NLP), facilitated communication (FC), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (

EMDR Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) is a form of psychotherapy developed by Francine Shapiro in the 1980s that was originally designed to alleviate the distress associated with traumatic memories such as post-traumatic stress ...

), Neural Organization Technique (NOT) and a host of other unscientific notions".Review
''Crazy Therapies'', May 29, 1997, Robert Carroll. According to Singer and Lalich (1997:167), "crazy therapies" are promoted using several techniques. "One is to start a certification program soon after conjuring up a new procedure" and "another is to seduce customers with rash promises and endorsements from acolytes and sycophants." Singer and Lalich (1997:195) advise that if a therapist is saying "I don't understand it but it sure does work", that could be a red flag. "Or if he's answering your questions with a lot of

jargon Jargon is the specialized terminology associated with a particular field or area of activity. Jargon is normally employed in a particular communicative context and may not be well understood outside that context. The context is usually a partic ...

you don't understand, insist on straightforward explanations. Or if he's telling you that its tried and true, do some independent research and find out what the critics are saying". "In many cases such fad therapies are promoted by people who are (1) imposing an agenda that may not fit your needs and (2) abandoning testing and science. Well meaning as they may be, remember, its your emotions and your pocketbook that are being played with".Singer, Margaret & Janja Lalich (1997). Crazy Therapies: What Are They? Do They Work?. Jossey Bass, p167-195. .

Reception

The book was reviewed by Philip Zimbardo, who wrote in ''Behavioral Interventions'' that the book revealed situations in which therapists can become "persuasive agents of destructive influence". Zimbardo, Philip, ''Behavioral Interventions'', April 2001, Carroll stated that the book describes "surreal pseudoscience at its worst". He added that Singer and Lalich had helped to expose "some of the worst psychotherapy has to offer".

References

External links

longer book review
skepdic.com

ICSA {{Anti-psychiatry 1996 non-fiction books American non-fiction books Books by Janja Lalich Books by Margaret Singer English-language books Psychology books

Content

Reception

See also

References

External links