Group items tagged

men with higher degrees of symmetry enjoy more sexual partners than men of lower symmetry.

Both men and women rated symmetrical members of the opposite sex as more attractive and in better health than their less symmetrical counterparts. The differences can be just a few percent—perceivable though not necessarily noticeable.

"It makes sense to use symmetry variation in mate choice," said evolutionary biologist Randy Thornhill of the University of New Mexico. "If you choose a perfectly symmetrical partner and reproduce with them, your offspring will have a better chance of being symmetric and able to deal with perturbations."

Psychologist Devendra Singh of the University of Texas studied people's waist-to-hip ratio (WHR).

Women with a WHR of 0.7—indicating a waist significantly narrower than the hips—are most desirable to men.

0.8 to 1.0 WHR in men is attractive to women, although having broad shoulders is more of a turn-on.

Where fat is deposited on the body is determined by sex hormones; testosterone in men and estrogen in women. If a woman produces the proper amount and mixture of estrogen, then her WHR will naturally fall into the desired range. The same goes for a male's testosterone.

"The idea is that beauty is conveying information about health and fertility, and we admire that,

Men's faces are shaped by testosterone, which helps develop a larger lower face and jaw and a prominent brow.

Research reported last month found women both smell and look more attractive to men at certain times of the month.

The rules of attraction, it turns out, seem sometimes to play out in our subconscious.

A 2002 study found women prefer the scent of men with genes somewhat similar to their own over the scent of nearly genetically identical or totally dissimilar men.

They consisted of two people sitting opposite each other silently looking at the other person’s eye and the recipient in session was able to have a look at the experiences and emotions and things in their life that they had not fully come to terms with, and that were unconsciously stopping them from being who they wanted to be. It was very emotional.

new pathway

ideas as much as the man that I found attractive.

Klowning was based on the idea that we are not who we think we are.

ble to find out the really human part of us.

here’s a whole language that goes with this group, isn’t there, and processing is one thing that you would go through

charismatic, he did have that capacity to have a group of people in front of him and hold their attention.

nudity has no significance other than what you give it, and if you think that this is in any way inappropriate that’s your dirty mind.

ut of research done by the CIA and the KGB after the Second World War in trying to understand how Hitler was able to persuade a whole population to a particular way of thinking and particular behaviour, and that research got out into the wider community

on Hubbard used a lot of these techniques in his organisation and then a lot of people who had been in Scientology

ocial animals,

emotional right-brain

Hypnotic states are nothing magical but in fact natural hypnotic states occur on a regular basis if we allow them to, about every two hours during the day. There’s a natural down time when our left-brain sort of quietens and our right-brain and our body is able to do a bit of a tune-up of physical processes like blood-pressure and heart-rate and cortisol levels.

dissociative state

driving somewhere

ay-dreamy

ocus their attention

charismatic leader,

behaviour was right or wrong

It’s very interesting studying some of the gurus or the charismatic figures you say you often find that they are often people who have actually started out with very good intentions and just find they have this natural ability to attract people to them, or because they may be good listeners, people feel that they’ve got something to offer

hallucinate. I

en Dyers, was facing 22 charges of sexual assault on two 12-year-old girls

Before they were heard in court he took his own life.

ersonality definitely changed

almost layered by the group norm

staying as connected

learn all they can about the group and continue to just ask questions to try and find our more

But there are some positive things about some groups and it’s likely that some people live happier lives being part of some groups than they would on their own.

groups are often filling desperate needs in people that are not being filled by the way we now live. The way we are now is very isolating, people are often expected to work very long hours, or have very long commutes. More and more families are living apart, so we do not live in a community that is kind to people or respects people. So anybody really is vulnerable, it’s not just, you know, the weak-willed, it’s anybody at a particular time in their life, and particularly if they’re isolated from family and friends.

Some of the factors that are most important in human wellbeing are a sense of connectedness and a sense of control over your life now and in the future. So what often these organisations do is offer a whole list of very simple rules, if you just follow these rules then you’ll feel okay. If you just remove yourself from that world and you just mix with us everything will be okay. So they often offer a sort of a way of getting back some feeling of control.

describe some of the techniques, not necessarily the abuse that may have occurred, and then to help them understand that they were involved in quite a deliberate psychological process.

validate their humanity

what was missing before and helping them create a life now that is healthier and more balanced and does meet all their needs as a human being.

people who grow up in these organisations and really are trapped, and for those that grow up and then start to rebel as teenagers or as young adults and leave, it is very, very difficult because that’s been their reality.

recognition by the courts and by particularly the Family Law Court and we need education of the legal profession and I think the professional organisations, particularly the professional health organisations need to be more pro-active in first of all educating themselves about what these issues are and then making it very clear in their code of ethics of these different professional groups how the codes of ethics dovetail with belief systems.