#but learning about the hallmarks and types of unethical influence can help people protect and guard themselves against people--

[xiexiecaptain]

Been listening to a lot of Dr. Steven Hassan (expert on cults/authoritarian control tactics and licensed mental health practitioner) talk about coercive influence lately.

And a huge thing is sleep deprivation. Sleep deprivation is a key factor in influencing peoples minds because when you are sleep deprived, your prefrontal cortex is highly impaired. This is important because this part of your brain is responsible for functions related to critical thinking, logical reasoning & reality testing, decision making, and emotional & behavioral regulation, among other things. This makes you much more suggestable to others' whole-cloth agendas and potentially coercive ideas.

According to the CDC, nearly 1/3 of American adults are chronically sleep deprived and the NIH reports nearly 40% of American adults have reported falling asleep during the day without meaning to. Roughly the same amounts (1 out of 3 and 1 out of 4 depending on the age group) of Canadian adults are chronically sleep deprived.

Getting enough sleep FOR YOU is a HUGE protective factor against people and groups influencing your thought patterns. (Sleep needs DO vary among individuals due to a number of factors but the average adult needs between 7-9 hours while teenagers ages 13-18 need 8-10 hours, again according to the CDC.) This "influence" could be something as intense and insidious as cult recruiters, but also something as "minor" as non-straightforward advertising, reactionary politics, or black-and-white thinking.

Getting enough sleep (as well as enough food and non-sleep rest) helps you think for yourself and practice critical thinking to your full potential! This protective factor cannot be understated. If a group/religious organization/company/etc you are in is consistently pushing to deny you adequate sleep, that is a RED FLAG.

For people interested in learning more I highly recommend Dr. Hassan's books including and his landmark Combatting Cult Mind Control: Guide to Protection, Rescue, and Recovery from Destructive Cults.

For people more multimedia-oriented, he has many many wonderful interviews he's done (found easily by searching his name on Youtube) about his personal experience being coerced into and rescued from a cult in his early 20s, and the analytical tool he developed called the BITE Model to help assess any kind of group or movement for various types of unethical/coercive influence factors! He also has a wonderful podcast that interviews people who have left cults/high control groups called "The Influence Continuum" that you can find pretty much anywhere you get your podcasts!

There's tons of free resources including his BITE Model and his Influence Continuum Model (which helps people place influencing factors on a scale from ethical to unethical) which can be found on his website freedomofmind.com)