Margaret Singer

Dr. Margaret Thaler Singer, (1921–2003) was a clinical psychologist and Professor Emeritus of the Department of Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, U.S.

Singer's main areas of research included schizophrenia, family therapy, brainwashing and coercive persuasion. Singer performed research at the University of Colorado’s School of Medicine, Walter Reed Army Medical Center Institute of Research, the National Institute of Mental Health, the United States Air Force and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She received many awards for her work, including the Leo J. Ryan Memorial Award, the Research Scientist Award from the National Institute of Mental Health, and both the Hofheimer Prize and the Stanley R. Dean Award from the American College of Psychiatrists.

In the 1960s she began to study the nature of cults and mind control and served on the board of the American Family Foundation. She is the author of the book Cults in Our Midst. She gave expert testimony in several cult-related trials, including the 1976 trial of Patty Hearst, who had previously been kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army, and the 1977 hearing for five members of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church.

In 1987, as head of the APA taskforce on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control for the American Psychological Association, Singer oversaw the production of a report that was later rejected by the APA's Board of Social and Ethical Responsibility for Psychology. Thereafter, Singer's expert testimony in four subsequent cases was not accepted. In 1992 she sued the APA for "defamation, frauds, aiding and abetting and conspiracy", but in 1994 she lost.

Articles in The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times reported complaints by Singer and her family that she had been enduring harassment and death threats due to her "battles" with the cults.

Education
Singer was born in Denver and received her bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees from the University of Denver.
 * Ph.D., clinical psychology, 1943
 * M.S., speech pathology
 * B.S., speech

Brainwashing
After obtaining her Ph.D., Singer worked at the University of Colorado’s School of Medicine, in their department of psychiatry for eight years.

Singer began to study brainwashing in the 1950s at Walter Reed Army Medical Center Institute of Research in Washington, D.C., where she interviewed U.S. soldiers who had been taken prisoner during the Korean War. Singer's research at Walter Reed has been described as "ground-breaking" within her field. She moved to Berkeley in 1958.

Schizophrenia
Singer's research also focused heavily on the areas of family therapy and schizophrenia. She conducted research with the National Institute of Mental Health, the United States Air Force and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Singer collaborated with Lyman C. Wynne in controversial research which posited that Communication Deviance (confusing pattern of communication) plays a central role in etiological development of schizophrenia.

Cults
Singer began studying cults in the late 1960s. She published in the field of cults, mind control ("psychological coercion") and similar areas, and received a number of honors for her work.

She developed theories about how cults recruit and retain members (such as her Theory of Systematic Manipulation of Social and Psychological Influence) and was on the board of the American Family Foundation, the major anti-cult group in the United States. She chaired the APA taskforce on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control (DIMPAC) in 1987 for the APA, whose report was rejected.

Professor
Singer was a professor of psychology at UC Berkeley from 1964 to 1991.

In addition to UC Berkeley, she also served as a Faculty Member and/or Lecturer at The Albert Einstein College of Medicine, The Washington School of Psychiatry, The Department of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester School of Medicine, the Department of Psychology at The University of California at Los Angeles, the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California at San Francisco, and other institutions.

Expert witness
She testified, with variable success, as an expert witness on mind control in numerous trials in the 1980s. She gave evidence at the 1976 trial of Patty Hearst, who had previously been kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army. Singer interviewed more than 3,000 cult members, and assisted in over 200 court cases. She testified at the 1977 hearing for five young members of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church when their parents requested external help for them.

An article by J. Gordon Melton examines her court testimonies, noting ways these build on and differ from her professional publications and expands from general assertions of social influence within "cults" to a more robust "Singer hypothesis" which leads directly to a "robot theory" of brainwashing, expanded in the 1978 book Snapping: America's Epidemic of Sudden Personality Change.

At one point, Singer interviewed Charles Manson. Singer played a role in the trial of Kenneth Bianchi, in the "Hillside Strangler" case. Singer concluded that Bianchi had faked symptoms of multiple personality disorder, in order to escape responsibility for the murders of several women in Los Angeles. Later, she guested on PBS Frontline, speaking about the trial, in a special show entitled: "The Mind of a Murderer." Singer asserted that Bianchi was a psychopath, and stated: "He may simply be evil."

Her expert testimony was no longer accepted after the report of the APA taskforce on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control, of which she was chair, was rejected by the Board of Social and Ethical Responsibility for Psychology (BSERP) of the  American Psychological Association. Thereafter, courts shifted to accepting the position or the great majority of scholars studying new religious movements, moving away from the perspective of Singer and others sympathetic to her brainwashing thesis. This had significant consequences later on, since it meant that brainwashing could no longer be used a defence for the practice of deprogramming.

Professional associations
Margaret Singer was a leading researcher in the field of psychosomatic medicine, and was made President of the American Psychosomatic Society in 1974. She was the first female and first psychologist president of the Society

She also served as a board member of the Kaiser Foundation Research Institute Review Board and the American Family Foundation.

Singer served on President Gerald Ford’s Biomedical Research Panel.

Singer was very active in the fields of communication and family therapy and for eight years; a member of the Board of Directors of Family Process.

She was also co-creator of FACTNet and served on their advisory board.

In 2001, Singer appeared on a panel on pseudoscientific therapies organized by Scott O. Lilienfeld of Emory University. The panel discussion was held in San Francisco, California, at the 2001 Conference of the American Psychological Association.

Honors and awards
In 2004, the International Cultic Studies Association created the "Margaret Singer Award" in her honor. Philip Elberg, Esq. received the award in 2004 for "his work in advancing the understanding of coercive persuasion and undue influence". Arnold Markowitz, M.S.W. received the award in 2006, for "26 Years of Helping Families and Ex-members".
 * She was reported to have been nominated twice for a Nobel Prize, for her work in schizophrenia.
 * Leo J. Ryan Memorial Award, for research on cults, from Citizen's Freedom Foundation
 * Research Scientist Award from the National Institute of Mental Health
 * Hofheimer Prize, American College of Psychiatrists, 1966
 * Stanley R. Dean Award from the American College of Psychiatrists, Research in Schizophrenia, 1976
 * Achievement Awards – Mental Health Association of the United States
 * McAlpine Award for Achievement in Research from the Mental Health Association of the United States
 * American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy Award for Cumulative Contributions to Research in Family Therapy
 * "Margaret Singer Award"

DIMPAC task force
In the early 1980s, some U.S. mental health professionals became well-known figures due to their involvement as expert witnesses in court cases against groups they considered to be cults. In their testimony they presented theories of brainwashing, mind control, or coercive persuasion to support the legal positions of former group members against their former groups.

The American Psychological Association (APA) in 1983 asked Singer, who was one of the leading proponents of coercive persuasion theories, to chair a taskforce to investigate whether brainwashing or "coercive persuasion" did indeed play a role in recruitment by such groups. The task force was titled APA Task Force on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control (DIMPAC).

The final report of the Task Force was completed in November 1986. The APA Board of Social and Ethical Responsibility for Psychology (BSERP) rejected the report, stating that it lacked scientific rigor and an evenhanded approach, but also stating that it did not have sufficient information to take a position. There is dispute about whether the rejection of the report constituted a rejection of Singer's theories by the APA.

Singer and her professional associate, sociologist Richard Ofshe, subsequently sued the APA, and a group of scholars and lawyers. in 1992 for "defamation, frauds, aiding and abetting and conspiracy" and lost in 1994. In a further ruling, James R. Lambden ordered Ofshe and Singer to pay $80,000 in attorneys' fees under California's SLAPP suit law. At that time, Singer and Ofshe declared their intention to sue Michael Flomenhaft, the lawyer that represented them in the case, for malpractice.

Singer was subsequently not accepted by judges as an expert witness in four cases alleging brainwashing and mind control.

After the report was rejected, Singer reworked much of the rejected material into the book Cults in Our Midst: The Hidden Menace in Our Everyday Lives, which she co-authored with Janja Lalich.

Landmark Education legal dispute (1996)
In 1996, Landmark Education sued Singer for defamation. Singer mentioned Landmark Education in Cults in our Midst; it was unclear whether she labeled Landmark Education as a cult or not. Singer issued a statement pursuant to a settlement agreement stating that she did not intend to call Landmark a cult, nor did she consider it a cult. Singer removed the references to Landmark Education from subsequent editions of the book. She also stated at deposition that she had "no personal, firsthand knowledge of Landmark or its programs."

Amanda Scioscia reported in the Phoenix New Times that Singer never called Landmark a cult, but that she described it as a "a controversial New Age training course". She also stated that she would not recommend the group to anyone, and would not comment on whether Landmark uses coercive persuasion for fear of legal recrimination from Landmark.

Harassment and death threat complaints
An obituary in The New York Times described harassment, death threats against Singer, and dead animals found on her doorstep, due to her "battles" involving cults and brainwashing. A biography of Singer published by Thomson Gale states that her "enemies among cults" were responsible for harassing her.

Another obituary that appeared in The Los Angeles Times claims that cult "operatives" went through Singer's trash and mail, picketed her lectures, hacked into her computer and released live rats in her house. Statements made by her family to the San Francisco Chronicle, include allegations that one "cultist" worked her way into Singer's office, stole students' term papers and sent notes to Singer's students, and that groups harassed her family as well. .

A Time Magazine article described Singer as an outspoken Scientology critic who traveled under an assumed name to avoid harassment. .

Death
Margaret Singer died of pneumonia on November 23, 2003 in Berkeley, California, at the Alta Bates Medical Center. She was 82. Singer was survived by her husband, two children, and five grandchildren.

Books

 * Author
 * Cults in our Midst, 1995, ISBN 0-7879-0051-6
 * Crazy Therapies: What Are They? Do They Work?, 1996, ISBN 0-7879-0278-0
 * ''Las Sectas Entre Nosotros/Cults in our Midst,1997, Language:Spanish, ISBN 84-7432-605-2
 * Contributor
 * Recovery from Cults, Contributor: Preface, as Margaret Thaler Singer, Ph.D., 1995, ISBN 0-393-31321-2
 * Science and Pseudoscience in Clinical Psychology, Contributor: "New Age Therapies", as Margaret Thaler Singer and Abraham Nievod, pgs. 176–205. 2004, ISBN 1-59385-070-0, ISBN 978-1-59385-070-8
 * The Anatomy of Suicide: Silence of the Heart, by Louis Everstine, With a Foreword by Margaret Thaler Singer, PhD, 1998, ISBN 0-398-06803-8 ISBN 978-0-398-06803-5
 * Personality Measurements in the Aged, In Birren et at., ed. 1963

Articles

 * Report of the Task Force on Deceptive and Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control (DIMPAC Report), Singer, M., Goldstein, H, Langone, H., Miller, J.S., Temerlin, M.K., and West, L.J. (1986)
 * The "Not Me" Myth: Orwell and the Mind, January 19, 1996, Vol.2, no.2, Idea Journal
 * Undue Influence and Written Documents: Psychological Aspects, Cultic Studies Journal, Volume 10, Number 1 1993
 * Post-Cult After Effects,
 * How the United States Marine Corps Differs from Cults
 * Psychotherapy Cults
 * Coming Out of the Cults, Psychology Today, January, 1979
 * Cults, Coercion, and Contumely, Cultic Studies Journal, Psychological Manipulation and Society, Vol. 9, No. 2, 1992
 * Thought Reform Exists: Organized, Programmatic Influence, The Cult Observer, Vol.11, No.6 (1994): 3–4
 * Mistakes Families Make, Cults, Psychological Manipulation: Arlington, Virginia, 1992
 * Coercive Mind Control Tactics
 * Thought Reform Programs and the Production of Psychiatric Casualties, by Margaret Thaler Singer, Ph.D., and Richard Ofshe, Ph.D., Psychiatric Annals, 20:4, April, 1990

Presentations

 * Conferences
 * Featured Speaker, 2000: Cults and the New Millennium, "Getting Help Program"
 * Presenter, Biographies of all Psychological Manipulation: The Abuse of Women Conference, "Keynote Address- Psychological Manipulation: How it Works and Why Women are Vulnerable", 1997
 * Media
 * "Cults: Saying No Under Pressure", American Family Foundation, InService Videotape Network of the National Association of Secondary School Principals, Instructivision Inc., Narrated by Charlton Heston
 * "After the Cult: Recovering Together", American Family Foundation
 * ["Mind Manipulation, Cults and Domestic Violence"], Cults, Psychological Manipulation: The Abuse of Women, 1997, Margaret Singer,  Janja Lalich, Evelyn Ortner