Research
Key and recent research on coercive control and cults
A curated reading list — a starting point, not a full literature review. Papers are grouped by theme. External links open on publisher, PubMed, ResearchGate, or Google Scholar pages where available.
Naming a researcher or paper does not imply that author endorses After. See Sources for a broader bibliography and Legacies for tributes to foundational scholars.
Key archives and research organizations
These two organizations maintain large, searchable libraries of articles, conference recordings, clinical guidance, and survivor-informed research — a trove of information for anyone studying or recovering from high-control groups and relationships.
- ICSA — International Cultic Studies Association
Publisher of the International Journal of Cultic Studies and the Cultic Studies Review archive. ICSA hosts conferences, clinician workshops, and an extensive e-library covering recruitment, coercive control, exit, family support, and recovery.
ICSA Online Library → - Info-Cult / Info-Secte — Centre for Assistance and for the Study of Cultic Phenomena
A Montreal-based non-profit founded in 1980 that offers help, information, and research on group dynamics, ideologies, and how they operate. Their site includes resources in English and French for survivors, families, and professionals.
Recent papers
Newer peer-reviewed and scholarly work extending the research on psychological abuse in groups, exit, and after-effects.
- Cults: Recruitment, Abuse, the Struggle to Leave, and After Effects
Youngjin Choi, Kyung-Eun Kim, Seungyeon Lee · 2026 · Eye on Psi Chi Magazine
Overview of psychological processes across four stages: recruitment, internal control and abuse, barriers to exit, and long-term aftereffects.
- Examination of the Mediating Effect of Traumatized Self-System in the Relationship between Psychological Abuse Experienced in Group and the Impact of Traumatic Events (abusive religious group ex-members)
Kyung-Eun Kim, Youngjin Choi · 2022 · The Korean Journal of Counseling and Psychotherapy
Evidence that a traumatized self-system mediates the link between in-group psychological abuse and later trauma impact.
- Validation of the Korean Version of the Psychological Abuse Experienced in Group Scale (K-PAEGS)
Youngjin Choi, Kyung-Eun Kim · 2022 · Korean Association for Learner-Centered Curriculum and Instruction
Cross-cultural validation of the PAEGS measure of group-based psychological abuse.
- Development of the Psychological Abuse Experienced in Groups Scale (PAEGS)
Omar Saldaña, Álvaro Rodríguez-Carballeira, Carmen Almendros, Jordi Escartín · 2017 · Frontiers in Psychology
The original PAEGS instrument; a standard measure of psychological abuse in high-control groups.
- Coercive Control and the Limits of Criminal Law (and related work on non-physical abuse)
Evan Stark and colleagues · 2007–present · Various law and social-science journals
Stark's foundational reframing of intimate partner abuse as a liberty crime; directly relevant to high-control relationships.
Post-cult trauma, exit, and identity
Research on what happens after leaving — dissociation, identity disturbance, and complex trauma.
- Post-cult recovery: Assessment and rehabilitation (and related clinical writing)
Gillie Jenkinson · 2016 and later · Cultic Studies Review; International Journal of Cultic Studies
Empirical and clinical work on post-cult counselling and the 'pseudo-identity' problem.
- Terror, Love and Brainwashing: Attachment in Cults and Totalitarian Systems
Alexandra Stein · 2017 · Routledge
Attachment-theory account of disorganised attachment to charismatic leaders and closed systems.
- Traumatic Narcissism: Relational Systems of Subjugation
Daniel Shaw · 2014 · Routledge
Relational model of the narcissistic leader–follower dynamic in cults and cult-like families.
- Bounded Choice: True Believers and Charismatic Cults
Janja Lalich · 2004 · University of California Press
How members can act as agents while their choices are structurally bounded by group ideology and control.
- Cult formation and the cultic experience (and 'The Six Conditions of Thought Reform')
Margaret Thaler Singer · 1979–2003 · Cults in Our Midst; scholarly articles
Foundational empirical and clinical work on coercive persuasion and its psychological effects.
Coercive persuasion, thought reform, and undue influence
Core theoretical frameworks the field still builds on.
- Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of 'Brainwashing' in China
Robert Jay Lifton · 1961 · W. W. Norton
The eight criteria of thought reform (milieu control, mystical manipulation, demand for purity, and so on).
- Communist Attempts to Elicit False Confessions from Air Force Prisoners of War (Chart of Coercion)
Albert D. Biderman · 1957 · Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine
Biderman's chart of coercion; later adopted in domestic-violence and cult literature.
- Combatting Cult Mind Control (and the BITE model papers)
Steven Hassan · 1988–present · Freedom of Mind Press; scholarly and clinical publications
The BITE model: Behavior, Information, Thought, and Emotional control.
- Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life
Evan Stark · 2007 · Oxford University Press
Reframes intimate partner abuse as coercive control; directly transferable to high-control groups.
- Trance on Trial and later work on undue influence and unethical hypnosis
Alan W. Scheflin · 1989 and later · Guilford Press; law reviews
Legal and clinical scholarship on undue influence, coercive persuasion, and forensic hypnosis.
Neuroscience, dissociation, and complex trauma
Research relevant to the body-and-brain side of coercive control and recovery.
- The Complexity of Complex Trauma: An Evolutionary Perspective (and related work)
Bessel van der Kolk and colleagues · 1996–present · Various trauma journals
Empirical foundation for treating post-cult presentations as complex trauma, not simple PTSD.
- Complex PTSD: A syndrome in survivors of prolonged and repeated trauma
Judith Herman · 1992 · Journal of Traumatic Stress
The original C-PTSD paper; the frame most clinicians now use for prolonged coercive control.
- The Haunted Self: Structural Dissociation and the Treatment of Chronic Traumatization
Onno van der Hart, Ellert Nijenhuis, Kathy Steele · 2006 · W. W. Norton
The structural-dissociation model behind much modern parts-based trauma work.
- Ego states, IFS, and parts-based approaches for post-coercive-control clients
Various (Watkins & Watkins; Schwartz; Fisher) · 1997–present · Clinical psychology literature
Clinical evidence base for the parts-based therapies described on our Therapy page.
Second-generation adults (SGAs) and children in high-control groups
Research on people raised inside high-control groups.
- The Second Generation: Growing up in and leaving cultic groups
Various (ICSA researchers; Jenkinson; Matthews; Kendall) · 2000s–present · International Journal of Cultic Studies; Cultic Studies Review
Body of work distinguishing SGA experiences from first-generation converts.
- Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study and related trauma-exposure research
Felitti, Anda, and colleagues · 1998–present · American Journal of Preventive Medicine
General ACE evidence base that informs how high-control childhoods shape adult health.
Where to search for more
- ICSA Online Library — International Cultic Studies Association archive.
- Google Scholar — search terms like "coercive control", "psychological abuse in groups", "post-cult".
- PubMed — clinical and trauma-science literature.