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Who Joins Cults & Why

It is sometimes thought that those who join cults are young, idealistic, and gullible people. Ofttimes, they are maladjusted losers who have found a place of security in the controlled environs of the cults. At the same time, it is also asserted ‘that everyone is susceptible to the lure of these masterful manipulators’ (Singer 1995: 17). Research consensus shows there are several generalizations that can be made about the predisposure of people to involvement in cults, sects, and new religious movements (all of which will henceforth be referred to as NRMs).

First, studies of specific groups found that recruitment to NRMs was mostly garnered through pre-existing social affiliations: friends, family, and neighbors. Most recruits to most NRMs come into contact with the groups they join through people they know who are members of the movement (Stark and Bainbridge, 1985; Latkin et al., 1987; Palmer, 1994; Lucas, 1995).

Results of research collected in 1994 of Nichiren Shoshu in Great Britain are characteristic:

Only 6 per cent of those in our sample have encountered the Nicheren Shoshu through the impersonal agencies of the media-through exhibitions, concerts, the movement’s own publicity, or the v

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