NEW LIGHT

ON HUMAN BEHAVIOR

Over that same one hundred years there have been discoveries, new developments and, through research, conflicting new data has accumulated. Response to these new elements has been uniform. While new discoveries in other scientific fields have led to far-reaching advances, new discoveries in behavioral science have been hidden and rejected by people whose mind-set has been unable to grasp these new facts. A consistent element of that mind-set (paradigm) has been that most of these discoveries imply approaches to "psychology" that make the individual, not the gate-keeping professional, the active and effective agent for change.

Tom Sargent conceived the Designed Change Process (DCP) in order to replicate the considerable benefits of this new "psychology" to areas beyond the illnesses for which it evolved. He and Dr. Rick Blum developed the DCP and described the Bimodal Theory, which is its conceptual base. Together with Bernadette Kelley, R.N., the three applied the DCP effectively under that name for a quarter century. It has been practiced for personal use in disrupted relationships and disrupted lives with startling effect. It has been used in complex technology with similar success, and in that context, a Federally funded study was carried out by us and by our colleagues. The result was a challenging surprise. Almost every concept and method we had been using for years had already been studied and documented. These studies go back to the beginning of the twentieth century.

We found that researchers did not publish some of their documented findings because they could not be approved by "psychology" and they would appear foolish. Some were reported and then ignored. We found it astounding that Selye, in his great work on stress, quoted many of the sources which support the DCP, and overlooked significant information in these sources because it seemed to him pointless to present it in any way other than as his "general adaptation syndrome". These suppressed sources were mostly fascinating studies on the ways feelings, stress and emotion constantly and lawfully control how information is processed in the human brain, and how a person can change those feelings, and thus control his thinking. Special References

In order to do the Federally funded study we had to name and describe the Bimodal Theory, an integrated system concerned with information processing in the human brain. This provides a surprisingly simple conceptual framework through which users can easily understand the supposed mysteries of human behavior. As a result, this simple conceptual system is a part of the Designed Change Process. The reader will easily notice how the methods used in the DCP include an already formulated theory about the brain and about the mind, one significantly different from "psychology". Readers familiar with Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon will notice the similarities and roots of this material. When one of us presented the DCP to the European Common Market to people from forty countries, its origins were guessed by one of the participants.

We hereby make this information available to the world, as best we can. We will post it as we prepare it in internet format. You can explore the material from a variety of perspectives. We give you a mass of texts, references and of annotated references. DCP Texts and References

It will take us a long time to get all we have available to us out on the net. We will put it out over the years as we are able to convert it to forms which can be placed on the internet. You can help. E-mail us and let us know what you need to see or know. We will go in your direction as we flesh out the whole body of material. sarge@newpsych.org

During the time we were funded we were able to find only about two thirds of the material that is actually available in support of the DCP. It would be a glorious event if we were to be funded to complete the work. To that end, please communicate to us any other material, studies or sources that we have missed.

Thank you. The staff of the Designed Change Institute.

Page last updated 2 October 1999