Jay Van Bavel - Groupthink, Social Identity, and Cult Psychology

Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation

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True Crime, Talk Radio, Comedy, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.9K Ratings

🗓️ 4 January 2023

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Groups!... I did it again. Jay Van Bavel, NYU Associate Professor of Psychology and Neural Science, Director of the Social Identity and Morality Lab, and co-author of The Power Of Us, discusses how our social identities change depending on our environment and context, how the groups we identify with affect our decisions and perception, and the importance of instilling healthy hierarchy in a group to prevent unhealthy leadership. They also discuss how emotionally charged situations can forge shared identities, how cults replace individual identities with group identities, what to do when someone has fallen prey to groupthink, and whether groups are even... good? Trust Me is brought to you by Progressive! Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 29 million drivers who trust Progressive! Learn more about Jay's work here! https://www.powerofus.online Got your own story about cults, extreme belief, or abuse of power? Leave a voicemail or text us at 347-86-TRUST (347-868-7878) OR shoot us an email at [email protected] INSTAGRAM: @TrustMePodcast @oohlalola @meaganelizabeth11 TWITTER: @TrustMeCultPod @ohlalola @baberahamhicks TIKTOK: @TrustMeCultPodcast

Transcript

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0:00.0	If you have your own story of being in a cult or a high control group or if you've had
0:04.1	experience with manipulation or abuse the power that you'd like to share, leave us a message
0:08.4	on our hotline number at 347-86 trust. That's 347-868-7878 or shoot us an e-mail at TrustMePod
0:18.2	at gmail.com. Trust me, do you trust me? Trust me, I'm like a smart person. Yeah, I've never
0:25.6	lied to you. I never have lied. If you think that one person has all the answers, don't!
0:32.5	Welcome to TrustMe, the podcast about cult, extreme belief and manipulation from two groupies who
0:38.3	have actually experienced it. I'm Lola Blanc, and I'm Megan Elizabeth. And today, our guest is
0:43.2	Jay Van Beval. He's associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at NYU, where he's also the
0:48.9	director of the social identity and morality lab, and he's the co-author of an excellent book called
0:53.5	The Power of Us. He's going to talk to us about social identity and how we have many of them
0:57.8	that can morph and change depending on our circumstances. How the group we identify with can
1:01.7	affect not just our decisions, but also our perception and how groups will inevitably form
1:06.1	leaders, so it's important to implement hierarchy in a healthy way and not just leave it to the
1:10.3	charismatic people. Indeed, we'll also discuss how emotionally charged situations create shared
1:16.4	identity and how cult systematically replace individual identities with the group identity, which
1:22.1	then makes it even harder to penetrate their belief system. Plus, ways to intervene when someone
1:26.7	has fallen prey to group think, whether groups can be good and lots more. Lots more. I love this
1:32.1	conversation. He's great. Yeah, I could talk to him for hours. Before we get in with Jay, tell me
1:38.1	please, what your cultiest thing this week is. Mine's sad, but I know. I guess this happened in
1:44.7	May, but I'm just reading about it now. A Scientologist, this beautiful 40-year-old woman in Florida
1:51.5	recently shot herself and then let herself on fire because she wanted to drop the body and go
1:58.7	to a new one because she had Lyme's disease. Lots of stuff coming out of the church saying,
	...

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