THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SATANIC CULT INVOLVEMENT: AN ...

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spiritual intervention; (4) psychological explanations are available, and serious
psychological disturbances are apparent in most 'possession' cases.
The absence of traditionally defined possession syndromes in current psychiatric patients
has been noted by other authors. Pfeifer (1994) conducted an investigation of demonic
attribution in 343 Swiss Protestant psychiatric out-patients, all claiming to be religious.
Of these, 38% identified the possible cause of their dysfunction as the influence of evil
spirits, either through'occult bondage' or 'possession'. A diagnostic breakdown ofthese
patients revealed the following statistics: 25% psychotic/schizophrenia, 22% mood
disorders, 21 % anxiety disorders, 19% personality disorders, and 13% adjustment
disorders. 53% of the schizophrenics expressed possession beliefs, attributing their
delusions or hallucinations to the work of demonic forces. The author was surprised by
the high percentage (48%) of anxiety disorders who held demonic influence beliefs. He
attributes this to the high frequency ofego-dystonic features in anxiety disorders:
It is understandable that ego-dystonic, even blasphemous obsessional
thoughts are very distressing to the afflicted individual and are thus
interpreted as demonic attacks. The same holds true for panic attacks with
intense somatic symptoms, experienced by the individual as foreign,
uncontrollable and life threatening (Pfeifer, 1994, p. 253).
The depressive patients frequently reported loss of religious faith and, especially among
those belonging to charismatic churches, the dissonance between the patients' emotional
condition and the church's expectations led to patients attributing their dysphoria to
'spiritual warfare' or demonic influence.
Among patients with personality disorders, demonic attributions were especially common
in those patients with cluster B disorders (antisocial, borderline, narcissistic, and
histrionic personality disorders) (56%). Pfeifer, employing a psychodynamic explanation,
relates this to the high incidence of sexual conflict present in these disorders, resulting in
sexual impulses being disowned, and subsequently experienced as an alien influence.
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