Elizabeth Tylden (1 August 1917 – 3 February 2009) was a British psychiatrist who specialized in working with adult survivors of

child abuse Child abuse (also called child endangerment or child maltreatment) is physical abuse, physical, child sexual abuse, sexual, emotional and/or psychological abuse, psychological maltreatment or Child neglect, neglect of a child, especially by a p ...

, and those affected by religious cults and the use of

mind control Mind control may refer to: Psychology and neurology * Brainwashing, the concept that the human mind can be altered or controlled by certain psychological techniques * Brain–computer interface * Hypnosis * Neuroprosthetics, the technology of cont ...

techniques."Elizabeth Tylden," ''British Medical Journal'', October 19, 2009 (BMJ 2009;339:b4147). She became known as a forensic psychiatrist who acted as an expert witness in many such cases from 1948 until her retirement in 2004.

Early life

Tylden was the daughter of Major Geoffrey Tylden, the military historian, and Cicely Abdy, daughter of Brigadier-General Anthony John Abdy. She was born and raised in Appledore in the

Orange Free State The Orange Free State ( ; ) was an independent Boer-ruled sovereign republic under British suzerainty in Southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century, which ceased to exist after it was defeated and surrendered to the British Em ...

, South Africa, where her father was given land after the

Boer War The Second Boer War (, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, Transvaal War, Anglo–Boer War, or South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer republics (the South African Republic an ...

, but moved to England for her education. She attended

Godolphin School Godolphin School is a Private schools in the United Kingdom, private boarding school, boarding and day school for girls in Salisbury, England, which was founded in 1726 and opened in 1784. The school educates girls between the ages of three an ...

, Salisbury, and studied medicine at

Girton College, Cambridge Girton College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was established in 1869 by Emily Davies and Barbara Bodichon as the first women's college at Cambridge. In 1948, it was granted full college status by the un ...

Career

Interest in trauma and cult membership

According to ''The Daily Telegraph'', she first became interested in mental trauma when she worked as a registrar in London during the Second World War under the psychiatrist

William Sargant William Walters Sargant (24 April 1907 – 27 August 1988) was a British psychiatrist who is remembered for the zeal with which he promoted treatments such as psychosurgery, deep sleep treatment, electroconvulsive therapy and insulin shock t ...

. She worked with soldiers who were suffering from what was then known as "battle exhaustion," and people affected by

The Blitz The Blitz (English: "flash") was a Nazi Germany, German bombing campaign against the United Kingdom, for eight months, from 7 September 1940 to 11 May 1941, during the Second World War. Towards the end of the Battle of Britain in 1940, a co ...

, the bombing of British cities by the German airforce. From the 1980s onwards, she worked with former members of cults, including the Children of God and the

International Church of Christ International is an adjective (also used as a noun) meaning "between nations". International may also refer to: Music Albums * ''International'' (Kevin Michael album), 2011 * ''International'' (New Order album), 2002 * ''International'' (The T ...

. She was often called as an expert witnesses in cases involving cults, and their exercise of what lawyers call "undue influence" over the membership using mind-control techniques. Some of these techniques sought to exercise what Tylden called totalitarian control over the members, leading to mental illness which sometimes involved delusions and hallucinations that led to a diagnosis of schizophrenia. Tylden argued that these patients were not psychotic, but were engaged in normal "survival reactions" to trauma. Psychologists now call such a response

complex post-traumatic stress disorder Complex post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD, cPTSD, or hyphenated C-PTSD) is a stress-related mental disorder generally occurring in response to complex traumas (i.e., commonly prolonged (or repetitive) exposure to a traumatic event (or trau ...

(C-PTSD). Tylden argued that

psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek language, Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious mind, unconscious processes and their influence on conscious mind, conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on The Inte ...

and conventional psychotherapy, which seek causes in childhood, were inappropriate as treatment in such cases, and that relaxation therapy or

hypnotic regression Age regression in therapy is a psycho-therapeutic process that aims to facilitate access to childhood memories, thoughts, and feelings. Age regression can be induced by hypnotherapy, which is a process where patients move their focus to memorie ...

might return the patients to the mental state they were in the cult, with its group singing, meditation, or other "group thought-reform patterns of behaviour," as the ''Telegraph'' puts it.Betty Tylden
''The Daily Telegraph'', 25 February 2009.

Child and family psychiatry

She became a child and family psychiatrist at Bromley Hospital in 1949, and a consultant in 1960. She also worked part-time at University College Hospital, establishing England's first drug abuse clinic. She was involved in drafting the ''Guidelines of Good Clinical Practice in the Treatment of Drug Misuse'' published in 1984 by the Department of Health.

St Julian's

Tylden married George Douglas Morgan, also a psychiatrist, on 30 November 1944,Girton College Register 1869-1946, p. 509. and together with other professional couples they bought St Julians in 1951, a large country house near

Sevenoaks, Kent Sevenoaks is a town in Kent with a population of 29,506, situated south-east of London, England. Also classified as a civil parish, Sevenoaks is served by a commuter main line railway into London; the town is from Charing Cross, the traditio ...

— established as a private members' club in 1956—where they created an experimental communal household in which families, including professional women, could live and work while having their children looked after in the house's nursery.St Julians Country Club Website
/ref> Other founder members included

Henry Cornelius Henry Cornelius (born Owen Henry Cornelius 18 August 1913 – 2 May 1958) was a South African-born film director, film producer, producer, screenwriter and film editor. He directed five films between 1949 and 1958. Biography Born into a Ger ...

and John Arnold, film directors and producers, and Ian Gibson-Smith, film producer and writer. Subsequent residents included

Rowland Hilder Rowland Frederick Hilder OBE (28 June 1905 – 21 April 1993) was an English landscape artist and book illustrator. Early life He was born in New York to Roland and Kitty Hilder (née Fissenden). Following the outbreak of the First Worl ...

, artist and

Mai Zetterling Mai Elisabeth Zetterling (; 24 May 1925 – 17 March 1994) was a Swedish film director, novelist and actress. Early life Zetterling was born in Västerås, Sweden to a working class family. She started her career as an actor at the age of 17 at ...

, actress.

References

External links

St Julians Club website
accessed 9 March 2010. {{DEFAULTSORT:Tylden, Elizabeth 1917 births 2009 deaths British psychiatrists People from Sevenoaks South African expatriates in the United Kingdom British women medical doctors British women psychiatrists People from the Free State (province)