LGAT
LGAT is an acronym for "Large Group Awareness Training."
An LGAT is a mechanism for promoting awareness change and rapid, thorough commitment to a cause or idea. LGATs tend to be brief but intense sessions of a few hours or days in which, ideally, participants adopt the message of the 'training' promptly and enthusiastically.
Some see the classic LGAT as utilizing peer pressure and group dynamics in a high-pressure sales environment that promotes uncritical psycho-babbling togetherness and thus markets nebulous memes, and as fostering a propensity to recruit new participants into a participation-oriented pyramid scheme under the guise of providing useful training.
Others see LGAT as a group mind methodology that can be used to accelerate training in specific skills. Improvisational comedy is an example of a skill that is, typically, taught via group-awareness training.
Historically, LGAT origins trace back, at least in part, to the encounter group movement of the 1960s.
Alleged LGATs include:
- Context Associates
- est/Landmark Education
- Exegesis
- Garden Company
- Insight
- Lifespring
- ManKind Project
- Momentus
- Training Phoenix 2000
- PSI World
- Silva Mind Control/Silva Method
- Sterling Institute of Relationships
- Whole Mind Learning (WML)
- Life Training / Kairos Foundation
See Also
External reference and links
- Fisher, J.D. et al. (1990). Evaluating a Large Group Awareness Training: A Longitudinal Study of Psychosocial Effects. Springer-Verlag.
- http://caic.org.au/psyther/lgat/singer.htm
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