How Cults Work 7 - Disorganized Attachment and Dissociation

This is the seventh post in a series dedicated to the book Terror, Love and Brainwashing by Alexandra Stein.

In this post we take on two crucial ideas regarding the model Alexandra Stein has proposed in her book namely disorganized attachment and dissociation.

Stein wrote "The classification of disorganized attachment was developed by Mary Main and Judith Solomon when they noticed behaviors in a set of children who had been unpredictably frightened by their caregivers - whether directly as a result of frightening behavior by the caregivers, or indirectly resulting from the caregivers themselves being frightened. These children sometimes showed the typical secure and insecure (preoccupied, dismissing) strategies described above, but they also displayed brief but disorganized and disoriented behaviors including signs of confusion, fear, freezing and strange movements. This resulted in the addition of a new classification, disorganized." Page 32 - 33

I found the description Stein gives to be completely spot on regarding how I felt while in Scientology for twenty five years. This is to me the essence of the trap of an abusive relationship or cult or totalist system. It really is a fresh look at it and explains aspects of being in a cult, Scientology in my case, that no other model or subject I have seen addresses and adds a scientific basis with elements that are empirical in a way nothing else has.

Stein wrote "These responses occur when a child has been in a situation of fright without solution. Their caregiver is at once the safe haven and also the source of threat or alarm. So, when the child feels threatened by the caregiver, he or she is caught in an impossible situation: both comfort and threat are represented by the same person - the caregiver. The child experiences the unresolvable paradox of seeking to simultaneously flee from and approach the caregiver. This happens at a biological level, not thought out or conscious, but as evolved behavior to fear. The child attempts to run TO and flee FROM the caregiver at one and the same time.
    In the face of this impossible situation the child's attachment strategies collapse, hence the term disorganized. He or she makes movements to approach the frightening or frightened parent at the same time as trying to avoid the fearful stimuli coming from the parent. Freezing, confusion and a variety of other behaviors are the result. These may be very brief episodes, and are usually combined with one or (often) more of the other types of attachment behaviors discussed above, sometimes, for example, rapidly switching between preoccupied approach and dismissing withdrawal. However, in most cases the need for proximity - for physical closeness - tends to override attempts to avoid the fear-arousing caregiver. So usually the child stays close to the frightening parent while internally both their withdrawal and approach systems are simultaneously activated, and in conflict. "Page 33

This feeling of having to both approach AND escape is exactly how I felt in Scientology. I for years felt that I needed to submit to Scientology and apply Scientology practices and ideas to my life but also knew it would destroy my life if I did. It was terror without solution.

Stein wrote "Similarly, the environment of fright without solution is no longer one that allows a coherent response: withdrawal to safety becomes paradoxically an approach to threat and results in dissociation and confusion. " Page 33

"This explanation has started with children, but the need for attachments and attachment behaviors persists into adulthood, becoming the basis for close relationships with spouses, partners and very close friends, and for caregiving behavior towards children and other loved ones. As adults we seek comfort, help or reassurance from our close others when we are stressed or fearful, but otherwise we may operate more independently, checking in once in a while. Similarly, disorganized attachment does not only occur with children and their caregivers. It can also happen later in life in abusive, frightening or dangerous relationships, such as in situations of controlling domestic violence." Page 34

 "Disorganized attachment results in dissociation and it is this that makes it a powerful and dangerous control mechanism. We can say that dissociation in a situation of trauma with no means of escape means we can no longer think about what we are feeling regarding the frightening relationship. What happens in dissociation is that cognitive processing in the more recently evolved areas of the brain, including the frontal cortex and language areas, ceases to function while at the same time the older areas of the brain - the brain stem and central nervous system - continue to record the sensory information of that situation. The sensory, emotional system becomes dissociated from the cognitive system. Or, to put it another way, the right, emotional, feeling side of the brain, cannot communicate effectively with the left, thinking, speaking side of the brain. In a dissociated state, thought and feeling become disconnected. But this does not happen globally - rather it is dissociation in regards to the traumatic, disorganized relationship. " Page 34 - 35

Okay, this is a lot to take in. This is a really new look at both psychology and cultic relationships for me to examine. I have read a few books on neuroscience and neuroendocrinology but Stein has integrated ideas on brain function and trauma in a way I have never seen before.  It is not inconsistent with the ideas I have seen but develops connections far more than earlier works.

I am going to include a bit of my own two cents on references to examine the science behind her ideas and references she has in her own bibliography as well for anyone looking to dig deep into the evidence and theory behind this. I have a feeling as fMRI scan studies continue the conversation will develop further on this important issue. The idea that someday people who are under undue influence may sit in a scanner and be asked questions and a technician may realize that certain brain areas ONLY fail to function when certain topics are brought up is intriguing. The implications for this in therapy, interventions and law enforcement are exciting.


Stein wrote "There is a two-fold effect that results from this. On one hand, the person cannot think clearly about the frightening relationship. The thinking part of the brain is not operating well. It is not able to think: "This is a dangerous situation, get out of here!" There is no escape, so no solution, no "get out" is available. On the other hand, the person - feeling frightened - tends to stay in close proximity to their remaining attachment, even when it is that attachment causing the threat. Panic is followed by giving up: giving up both independent thinking and emotional independence. The combination of isolation and fear is therefore, in many cases, able to create a dissociated follower with an anxiously dependent attachment bond to the group.
   Why is all this important ? Because totalist groups rely on disorganizing followers as the fundamental means of control. Given the dramatic effect on interpersonal relationships that we see in cults and totalitarian systems it is perhaps surprising that attachment theory is only now beginning to be applied to understanding the dynamics of these extreme social systems.
  The concept of what we can call coerced disorganized attachment can help us to explain why Masoud left the family he loved so much. It is why parents in the Children of God cult allowed the sexual abuse of their children. It can help to untangle the emotional and cognitive processes that led Marina to a state where she became ready to "take a bullet" for Fred Newman. And it can help us understand how so many ordinary young people can be turned into executioners at the service of terrorist organizations. The answer to these seemingly incomprehensible behaviors lies in understanding this powerful combination of terror and love. Remember, though, that followers do not have to start with disorganized attachment, but that this is created through different elements of the totalist system "Page 35

I have to say that this fits my experience in Scientology. I was stuck in a state of panic and no escape. I felt like I absolutely had to reach towards Scientology to be safe and also had to get away from Scientology at the same exact time and could not resolve this for decades. I was in a state where I couldn't articulate my feelings and often felt like I was" certain " I needed to fully commit to Scientology intellectually but emotionally felt devastated and crushed and that my life was ruined whether I joined Scientology or left but couldn't articulate the idea. I couldn't think straight regarding Scientology and the negative effects it had and would have on my life. It was beyond my comprehension but should have been obvious.

I knew that my wife and children were far more stable, loving and true than Scientology but somehow could not see the threat Scientology posed to them, our family or me. It should have been obvious almost immediately and especially after a few months in Scientology but I was in a state where I couldn't think straight regarding so many obvious things. I was confused and anxious and overwhelmed by it and of course Scientology has alleged reasons for this that all involve staying in Scientology, never leaving, and doing more Scientology indoctrination, always more and deeper.

I sometimes felt like I was drawn to Scientology by an almost superhuman force and seeking fulfillment through Scientology but that nothing was ever good enough for the group or to be a sustained and stable condition. It is like a constant fight to not be overwhelmingly burdened with negative emotions and I wanted to be both myself and independent but also who Scientology required and that was a totally different person and one that is completely submissive and dependent.


Stein's model of the traumatic relationship with alternating terror and love resulting in dissociation and the inability to integrate the two parts or functions of the brain as emotional and thinking in concepts is consistent with the experience I had. I am not saying I understood some process of brain impairment while I experienced it - I am saying my experience matches her description in terms of the result.

If you have never been in a cult or highly abusive relationship it may seem difficult to comprehend. The feeling of not quite getting the ideas in Scientology and then not understanding your own feelings is crippling. I didn't know if staying in Scientology or running away was right and felt hopelessly conflicted.



Stein went on to introduce another important idea "Patterns set in childhood are important, they provide a kind of template for future attachment relationships -Bowlby called this template the " internal working model. " But Bowlby and other researchers noted that attachment statuses are not set in stone and can change in life. For example, someone with a dismissing attachment status from a rejecting childhood background can become secure later in life as a result of a secure relationship. And generally people tend to become more secure as they get older. Even those with early disorganized attachment, with the help of a later secure attachment -perhaps in a close relationship, or with a reliable and skilled therapist - can become what is termed "earned secure." Through understanding their prior disorganized or insecure relationships, and developing new, secure relationships, security of attachment can be "earned" along with a new secure internal working model of attachment relationships. Thus, a childhood attachment status is not a life sentence. " Page 35 -36

Stein described how attachment status can also be negatively changed as well and crucially focused on how this happens in cults "A person of any preexisting attachment status - from secure to good-enough attachment, or even to disorganized - runs into a charismatic and authoritarian figure, or a group led by such a figure. The totalist leader sets in place an isolating structure, a fictitious and deceptive ideology, and processes of coercive persuasion. They can then isolate followers from any prior attachments, control attachments that exist within the group, set up the group as the new - and only - "safe haven," and generate stress, threat or fear in some from to create the disorganized attachment bond. " Page 36

Stein described how Masoud went through the experience of being isolated, criticized and made to feel terror without a solution. It is extremely similar in results to my own experience in Scientology.

Stein calls this "fright without solution."

She described it "In this situation the follower is stressed by the group yet has no access to resources outside the control of the group. A state of chronic trauma in relation to the group is created. The first response to this is likely to be a state of hyperarousal or "frantic distress." However , as a general rule, the soon-to-be follower does not attribute this distress to the group, but instead may attribute it to any number of other causes, causes that will be handily suggested by the group.  In fact, as is typical of totalist groups, in Masoud's case his distress was attributed to his own faults. The group, if he would just accept it, would show him the way forward. " Page 37

 "In the first phase of a person's reaction to threat, their alarm response is activated, with increased heart rate, blood pressure and other signs of distress. We can perhaps imagine Masoud's feelings of fear and panic at being threatened in that meeting - was he going to be expelled ? imprisoned ? executed ? (The MEK already had a history of violence; many had been killed in the so-called struggle for democracy.) But if there is no useful action that can be taken using the physiological arousal that is now in play - if the struggle to escape the fear is unsuccessful - then eventually the body shuts down in order to conserve resources. Thus, if neither fight nor flight is effective, the only option is to freeze. Masoud's shutting down of thoughts and doubts was a result of this process.
      The second phase of a trauma response is dissociation: "detachment from an unbearable situation." As previously described, in this state, both physiological states of hyperarousal and dissociation are activated: internal energy-consuming resources are simultaneously on full alert at the same time as the person is dissociating to try to shut down and conserve these resources. Imagine the toll on the body that this two-fold unresolvable process must take. Eventually, dissociation - freezing and giving up the failed effort to escape - comes to dominate. Along with giving up the struggle to fight against the group and the fear it has generated, the dissociated follower comes to accept the group as the safe haven and thus forms a trauma bond. This moment of submission, of giving up the struggle, can be experienced as a moment of great relief, and even happiness, or a spiritual awakening. " Page 38

I had the phenomenon that Stein has described here exactly happen in my own experience in Scientology. I gave in and thought I had achieved profound enlightenment. The relief of no longer holding Scientology ideas as separate from my own was awe inspiring. It created a euphoric trance that erased all my doubts, concerns, questions and worries. I have written about this moment of submission to Scientology in the past but never knew others have understood the experience so intimately and profoundly before. You could call it the sweet surrender.

Stein wrote " At this moment of giving up it appears that not only is the ability to think diminished, but also the effort to escape the source of the fear - the traumatic relationship - ceases. Like the disorganized child, the adult then also tends to seek proximity with the only remaining attachment that is, the fear-inducing relationship - rather than continue to make efforts to avoid it. Recall that this disorganized attachment results with a double effect. In the emotional realm, the person ceases to struggle and the movement TO the source of fear dominates, creating a trauma bond. And in the cognitive realm the dissociated freezing impairs higher brain activity preventing normal complex processing of both the social world in which the dissociation is occurring as well as the cognitive processing of the person's internal world." Page 38 - 39

   "Giving in - dissociating and ceasing to think - is experienced as relief. In my own experience I remember well this sensation: overwhelmed with confusion and exhaustion, the thoughts that were trying to enter the cognitive part of my brain just could not make it there and they fell back out of my consciousness. Simultaneously I stopped struggling and decided to commit myself more fully to the group even though I disagreed with it. That too felt like relief - I didn't have to fight anymore. In fact, as we shall see later in more detail, key regions of the brain that connect emotional (largely right brain) and cognitive processing (largely left brain) are shut down in the disorganized and dissociated state. " Page 39

Now I want to to emphasize some categories of information. I am well qualified to describe my opinion on the experience of being in Scientology and becoming a devoted and zealous and even fanatical cult member in terms of what it felt like. That is something I am comfortable speaking on with certainty. I can tell you Stein definitely gets that part very clearly correct.

I am not an expert on brain science and must look for the evidence and education I lack to put her ideas on that aspect into proper perspective and even form an educated opinion on the hard science of her hypothesis. I have read a few books on neuroscience and neuroendocrinology but not given it the longer and more rigorous study I have given psychology and hypnosis and other subjects. I looked at lots of studies in psychology and then later studies to see if ideas are well supported or not. I just have not given the very specific claims Stein makes such scrutiny - yet.

I can say her hypothesis is plausible, not inconsistent with the ideas I do understand from neuroscience and compatible with my experience of being in Scientology regarding the phenomena she describes. That is compelling in my opinion.  I believe hearing out her hypothesis in full and taking a long and deep look at the information that is relevant to her claims is called for.

Stein summed up the chapter "Totalist leaders - either directly or through their organizations - create a relationship of disorganized attachment by isolating people from their prior sources of support and replacing those with a new, and frightening, "safe haven." We know from attachment research that disorganized attachment, which involves seeking proximity with the frightening attachment figure when there is no other attachment figure or escape available, causes a dissociative response. Dissociation separates thinking from feeling. It dis-integrates the left, logical, verbal, thinking side of brain from right, emotional, non-verbal side of the brain. The dissociated person's ability to think clearly about the relationship is impaired and so they are now in a position to accept the group's views its ideology. This ideology is in place to further bolster the elements of isolation, terror and "love" and to explain away the feelings of fear induced in the follower. Emotionally the dissociated person tends to draw closer to the group as it is now their only remaining "safe haven." " Page 40

Okay, I quoted a lot from Stein because I felt that it was vital to get THIS material conveyed. Obviously I left out far more than I quoted and absolutely recommend her book for everyone to really get everything she has available and for consideration including her extensive bibliography that really backs up  much of what she says.

Here I will give some of the references she used along with some works for a general introduction to neuroscience.

Regarding disorganized attachment - The Developing Mind: Toward a Neurobiology of Interpersonal Experience by Daniel J. Siegel

Regarding cults using dissociation and trauma and disorganized attachment to  control people - Trauma and Recovery by Judith Herman

Attachment Theory: Eighteen Points with Suggestions for Future Studies in Handbook of Attachment: Theory, Research and Clinical Applications 2001 pages 845-887

Protea: Democratic Health and the Lessons of Authoritarianism - masters, liberal studies University of Minneapolis, Minneapolis; Stein, Alexandra 2007

Attachment,  Networks and Discourse in Extremist Political Organizations: A Comparitive Case Study - Doctoral Dissertation, Sociology, University of Minneapolis, Minneapolis; Zablocki, Benjamin D  2001

Toward a Demystified and Disinterested Scientific Concept of Brainwashing in Misunderstanding Cults: Searching for Objectivity in a Controversial Field pages 159-214

Regarding brain function and attachment - Dysregulation of the Right Brain: A Fundamental Mechanism of Traumatic Attachment and the Psychopathogenesis of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry 36:9-30 by Shore, Allan N 2002

Attachment Trauma and the Developing Right Brain: Origins of Pathological Dissociation in Dissociation and the Dissociative Disorders: DSM-V and Beyond pages 107-41

Wow, that is a lot for the serious student who wants to really dig into the theory and evidence. I would at least read a few  books on neuroscience to supplement this if you never have before. A very easy one is The Brain by David Eagleman. A step up is Subliminal by Leonard Mlodinow. Finally a huge step up is Behave by Robert Sapolsky. All three also have several YouTube videos available. David Eagleman did an excellent T.V. series on PBS and Robert Sapolsky has many short videos on Big Think and a long series of his lectures available that dig deep into his work.

This covers the first two chapters in Terror, Love and Brainwashing and I really focused on getting as much as possible in this series of blog posts because they need to cover so much vital information.