Un modello di persuasione nei gruppi totalitari

Abstract

The literature on mental manipulation is often spoiled by a specious use of the "brainwashing" metaphor. This is sometimes done as a pretext to emphasize its irrationality and its being outside the scientific field. Instead, this paper aims to demonstrate how the knowledge acquired by experimental psychology and behavioural economics leads to the identification of a process of modification of thought and behaviour that can be described in scientific terms. This process is carried out with a slow self-selection of recruits and an equally gradual increase in demands. The classic Milgram experiment is a suitable tool to explain this. The framing effect identified by Tversky and Khaneman, and which is so important in marketing, is perfectly capable of inducing counterproductive choices in a context that makes them reasonable for those w+B6ho act them. It is intended to demonstrate that there is nothing magical or metaphysical about mind control, as long as it is interpreted as a process of conditioning operating through a progressive selection and that leads to an increase of conformism in a closed environment. Instead, what is thrown out of the scientific field is the idea of Rational Choice on which the defense of manipulative cults is based.