Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China is a psychology non-fiction book on brainwashing and mind control by Robert Jay Lifton. The book was published in multiple editions, in 1956 , 1961, 1962 , 1963 , and 1989 . The 1989 reprint edition was published by University of North Carolina Press. Lifton is a Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York. In the book, Lifton outlines the "Eight Criteria for Thought Reform": Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism popularized the term... "thought-terminating cliché". A thought-terminating cliché is a commonly used phrase, sometimes passing as folk wisdom, used to quell cognitive dissonance. Though the phrase in and of itself may be valid in certain contexts, its application as a means of dismissing dissent or justifying fallacious logic is what makes it thought-terminating. Lifton said: The language of the totalist environment is characterized by the thought-terminating cliché.
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