Why Neuro-Linguistic Programmers are apt to ignore "scientists" and skeptics

[Andy Bradbury]

Please note: This post is neither a sales pitch for NLP, nor even a defence of NLP-related techniques or ideas.

Some years ago (2003, to be precise), The Skeptic magazine (Vol. 16, Nos 3 and 4) carried two articles by someone called Martin Parkinson which severely criticised Neuro-Linguistic Programming.

Only problem: The research behind the articles was appalling, thus making the articles so inaccurate as to be useless.

For example, Mr Parkinson made the very basic mistake of criticising the concept of the PRS (preferred representational system). Indeed, he referred to the sidebar where he described the PRS concept as: "my summary of NLP theory derived from all materials read, especially Bandler and Grinder (1976 & 1979) and O'Connor and Seymour(1995)."

Error 1: Even when it was current, the PRS concept was just one small part of the range of NLP-related techniques and ideas. The notion that the PRS concept is essentially all there is to "NLP" was a misunderstanding that seems to have originated in Sharpley's first article (1984).

Error 2: The PRS concept was actually dropped by the co-creators of the field of NLP in the late 1970s. So it was already past its sellby date several years before Sharpley's first article was published, and more than 20 years out-of-date by the time Mr Parkinson wrote his articles.
Not that this has stopped NLP critics from citing it in claims that "NLP has been disproved", etc. from Sharpley onwards.

Which is why I raise the matter of Mr Parkinson's articles - because they are so typical of the misinformation that skeptics happily, and uncritically accept as fact when this subject comes up.

This attitude was again demonstrated in a thread on this forum in 2006 when someone asked if anyone knew anything about NLP. It turned out that nobody did know anything of any significance - but that didn't stiop several people giving out misinformation on the subject. Indeed, one contributor went so far as to recommended the relevant article in the so-called Skeptic's Dictionary - which probably contains as much misinformation per paragraph as any material I've come across in my own study of criticisms of NLP.

Speaking of which, since roughly a year ago I've been working on a project to read up on and report online, articles critical of what the authors think NLP is, written by academics.

(Since I'm not selling anything I won't post the website address where you can find the articles, but they are out there.)

To put it bluntly, not a single critic I've read so far has shown any understanding of the subject matter they are allegedly evaluating. On the contrary, many of them simply regurgitate selected highlights from Sharpley and Heap's reviews, published in the 1980s. Both of which were themselves based on an extensive body of misinformation.

If skeptics aren't just talking amongst themselves, and if they ever expect to have their criticisms taken seriously by Neuro-Linguistic Programmers, then it is about time they started doing at least a modicum of research into what the field of NLP is about instead of just uncritically recycling 25 year old misinformation.

JMO



Andy Bradbury

[Matt]

Please note: This post is neither a sales pitch for NLP, nor even a defence of NLP-related techniques or ideas.

But it clearly is... Just because you say it's not a defense doesn't make it so.

I'm unfamiliar the the articles you refer to. If they criticise PRS and the NLPer's abandonded PRS then might we suggest that the NLPers and the authors are in some respects agreeing that PRS is rubbish.

Also I wonder if PRS was abandoned in spirit or in name only.

The criticisms of NLP I've read in Derren Brown's Trick of the Mind describe and incoherrent philosophy based origninally on some true but unoriginal observations and then inflated by a cultish expansion of messy nomleclature and ideas.

Have you read those criticisms?

[Graham Lappin]

... if they [skeptics] ever expect to have their criticisms taken seriously by Neuro-Linguistic Programmers ...

This is just a tad confused. Critical thinking is a method, a skeptic is an individual. The same way that sceince and scientists are different things. I do not profess to know anything about Neuro-Linguistic Programmers - or Neuro-Linguistic anything - but the question will always be what evidence supports the proposition? It's not about opinions of skeptics. I don't have to disprove it (or anything else come to that), you as a proponent of the theory have to prove it, or at least provide the evidence in support of it.

I am at work and so have very limited time but a quick Google cam up with http://www.holisticonline.com/hol_neurolinguistic.htm


"NLP uses self image and attitude towards illness to effect change and to promote healing. Hope is our greatest asset. It is one of the main reason why placebos (sugar pills used in clinical studies) work. We also know how effective prayer can be when it is combined with faith and hope. When a person loses hope and feels helpless in the face of a chronic disease such as AIDS or cancer, it is very easy to lose the hope; the body may just "quit trying." If the patient is made aware of his or her unique abilities and possibilities, he or she may see things differently. Now, the body's natural healing power can be harnessed to do the job".

Not comprehensive, not scientific, not robust and rigious research on my belahlf but all my alarms bells are clanging.

[Graham Lappin]

I just found out that my boss is a fan of NLP and uses it to "assess his staff". Please let me know if I should be worried.

[Pebble]

To have a worthwhile evaluation of the evidence there must first be evidence.

All I can find in the literature are claims of efficacy - no evidence of efficacy.

While until this am I had never heard of Neuro-linguistic programming, the absence of evidence, means that I file this with religion and psychobabble until I am directed toward evidence of effective intervention in reasonably constructed trials.

So rather than worrying about image, why not post some links to reasonably current research output - since pubmed is devoid of these.

[Graham Lappin]

To have a worthwhile evaluation of the evidence there must first be evidence.

All I can find in the literature are claims of efficacy - no evidence of efficacy.

I just found out that my boss is a fan of NLP and uses it to "assess his staff". Please let me know if I should be worried.

It seems I should indeed be worried

[Graham Lappin]

I have just read the Wikipedia entry for NLP and I would now describe myself as "better informed but none the wiser". Perhaps it's because I tend to be a bit mechanistically minded (I ask the question "how does that work then" quite a lot) but I can't seem to find anything concrete in this to hang my hat on. I would actually like to try to understand what this is about - can anyone pin it down for me? From what I have learned so far, I doubt if I am likely to become a proponent of NLP but that doesn't mean I am not curious.

[Pebble]

If skeptics aren't just talking amongst themselves, and if they ever expect to have their criticisms taken seriously by Neuro-Linguistic Programmers, then it is about time they started doing at least a modicum of research into what the field of NLP is about instead of just uncritically recycling 25 year old misinformation.

JMO



Andy Bradbury

As no evidence has been presented, my attention is drawn to this paragraph. It is for the proponents of this technique to provide the evidence, not for scientists or skeptics.

Scientists have better things to do with their time than evaluate every whim of groups of nutters, so those who promote this particular idea should enlist the help of scientist to construct appropriate investigations if they feel that their proposal is worthy of robust investigation. The essential point here is that the responsibility for pushing this agenda lies with the proponents not the scientists. Failure to do so means that your beliefs are irrelevant to science.

Skeptics, analyse the evidence gathered and identify flaws, this helps refine the quality of the evidence and informs future investigation. Again providing an evidence base for your particular creed is not the role of the skeptic.

In the absence of any evidence to analyse, why should anyone bother trying to understand the nuances of the currently prevalent accepted paradigms within your group?

[tolman]

I'm sure if Andy were to write a few paragraphs about what NLP actually is, giving some idea of the range of opinions within NLP (ie does everyone see it the same way, or are there multiple competing interpretations), that might help to inform people a little, and/or make his original posting look less like a drive-by plug.

Given that there is rarely a new or different theory about how people think that is entirely new or completely different, some idea of what makes NLP different from anything else would be good, to head off criticisms along the lines of "Surely, people knew/did that already".

Likewise, if NLP posits the usefulness of some particular viewpoint or technique, some idea of how novel such a viewpoint might be would be interesting - is NLP simply using the technique the way people had done before (though maybe more explicitly), taking it to another level, or making it qualitatively different by combining it with other techniques?

To put it bluntly, not a single critic I've read so far has shown any understanding of the subject matter they are allegedly evaluating.

You don't think any of them had any understanding?

Do you think there is anything that could be criticised about NLP that all these critics have missed, or do you think that any criticism would in itself be proof of a lack of understanding?

[FarSideOfTheMoon]

I've been on NLP 'training'. I have to say it was a few years ago before I became a fully fledged skeptic but I did leave it a bit confused about what (if anything) useful I had just learnt.

That was further confused by the starry eyed nature of my superiors who were also there who seemed to have been converted to some new paradigm of thinking which I had clearly missed out on.

Did things change over the coming weeks and months? Not that I noticed anyway.

It wasn't entirely useless in the scheme of overall corporate uselessness of courses in that realm, but it wasn't far off.

Bunny, I wouldn't say you should be too worried. Just work out what your manager 'expects' of you against this particular evaluation criteria, as opposed to any other irrational evaluation criteria you have experienced from other bosses in the past

[Graham Lappin]

Bunny, I wouldn't say you should be too worried. Just work out what your manager 'expects' of you against this particular evaluation criteria, as opposed to any other irrational evaluation criteria you have experienced from other bosses in the past

It's actually not that bad to be fair. I joke about my boss but I have had a lot worse (.... a lot, lot worse...). I am in a small high-tech company, responsible for the sceince. Sounds great except it has Venture Capital funding and so the sales and money people tend to dominate. So long as I maintain a good sense of humor however, then it seems to work out OK. I am also an academic on the side (visiting professor in Vienna - nice place to visit) and so that also keeps me sane.

Perhaps this might make another thread of interest but I find myself almost daily thinking (and sometimes saying): it does not matter what you believe is right, the sceince will go do it's own thing anyway.

I hope I can keep my anonymity, come to think of it because for all I know anyone on these boards could be my boss. Even you!!! FarSideOfTheMoon you're not American are you?

[saoir]

If skeptics aren't just talking amongst themselves, and if they ever expect to have their criticisms taken seriously by Neuro-Linguistic Programmers, then it is about time they started doing at least a modicum of research into what the field of NLP is about instead of just uncritically recycling 25 year old misinformation.

I was very close friends with a major figure in NLP for the last ten years up until 2008 and learned a lot about it. NLP is a system of interpreting how it is we think and how we behave and a collection of techniques developed to interpret it and modify it. This is only my own description of it. I have seen it work a lot and in my experience it is very very successful and powerful and well worth learning something about for every single person. The first book written by the developers of NLP was "Frogs into Princes" which I found to be a fascinating read.

So do we know how it works ? scientifically ? No. But then psychology and all facets of human behaviour related to it are generally well beyond our capabilities to analyse in a scientific way, at this time . So not being able to prove how it works or that it works consistently in a scientific fashion is not really here nor there in a way.
It is one of those areas dealing with human behaviour that is in it's infancy and is simply not ready for scientific/chemical/physical analysis and won't be for a long time to come.

[Ian McKendal]

The reason neurolinguistic programers ignore science and skeptics is the same reason any proponent of of any other new age development ignores them.

They want to ride on the coattails of neuroscience and neurolinguistics and psychology, yet they dismiss or downplay failure of any sort. Neurolinguistic programing sets up a particularly unconstructive postmodern or relativist agenda and a proclivity towards confirmation bias.

The beliefs of neurolinguistic programing are about as new age as you can get. They sound a little scientific, but they are really just about confirming the notion that you can create your own reality, therefore NLP's failure to pass scientific tests is dismissed as just another point of view.

Independent evidence is dismissed in order to boost the religion of neurolinguistic programing.

There are plenty of studies on neurolinguistic programing. Of course neurolinguistic programing was always going to be dubious. Its name is a wild pretense in itself.

The concepts in neurolinguistic programing (submodalities, generalizations, nominalizations, sense preferences, representational systems etc) are fancy sounding, and there is a glaring disconnect from the reliable versions from science and neuroscience. I.e. the concepts are wrong and misleading. Teaching people misinformation is bad enough, but doing it to feed insecurities and set up bias forming rituals is bad news. Gullible managers are prone to making life decisions based upon such nonsense.

The methods themself have failed testing. From the mid 80s onwards they were discredited.

More recently there are studies on discredited therapies that place neurolinguistic programing as among the most discredited. It is more discredited than TFT, EFT, and other qi energy therapies, and is about as discredited as equine therapy, scared straight programmes, and dolphin assisted therapy.

John C. Norcross, Thomas P. Hogan, Gerald P. Koocher (2008) Clinician's Guide to Evidence-based Practices. Oxford University Press, USA

Norcross, JC, Garofalo.A, Koocher.G. (2006) Discredited Psychological Treatments and Tests; A Delphi Poll. Professional Psychology; Research and Practice. vol37. No 5. 515-522

URLs are tricky on this site, so google:

"Neurolinguistic programming and other nonsense"

"NLP : Research on Effectiveness of Neuro Linguistic Programming"

and read the Wikipedia entry on Scientolgy. You will see the connection with neurolinguistic programing.

Neurolinguistic programing sounds like a pseudoscientific new age religion. The actual evidence points to that impression being quite accurate.

Ian

[Ian McKendal]

Oh, I nearly forgot.

Neurolinguistic programing is used as an example of pseudoscience by many, including those who teach students at undergrad level how not to sound like a pseudoscientist in their term papers.

Ian

[Geograph]

NLP really is very fishy. Phew!

Derren Brown fakes NLP. He also says he uses photoreading on his shows. Not a chance! Whatever he says, he's using something else. Thats the nature of performance magic. Turn up, tell people you are going to fool them, and then fool them.

It was nice to read how much he slams NLP in his book; Tricks of the Mind.

One of the funniest bits was the photoreading course he went on. The instructor was an NLPer, and really displayed the nature of NLP style thinking. Its such a scam and it makes people attempt the most awful fraudulence.

Good to know its being exposed for what it is.

Cheers
George