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According to self-declared experts in this field, exit counseling is a persuasive technique aimed at getting followers of an unorthodox or "spurious" religious group give up their commitment to it. These experts see it as providing followers of a cultic group with additional information, so that they can make an informed decision about whether to stay or leave the group.
Like deprogramming, exit counseling usually takes as its premise that the recruit has been been misled into joining the cult. Exit counselors accordingly press counselees to accept this premise as a prerequisite for successful counseling.
- Unlike deprogramming, which is coercive, exit counseling involves a voluntary agreement between a follower and a "cult specialist" to talk about the follower's involvement with the group. The cult specialist is usually hired by concerned relatives of the follower.
- The same verbal and emotional tactics used during deprogramming are used in exit counseling, such as presenting negative information about the leadership of the group and presenting an unflattering picture of the group's teachings and practices.
- As in deprogramming, the most successful strategy in exit counseling is to persuade counselees that the group they were in had subjected them to "mind control". Once they accept this premise, it becomes much easier to persuade them to cut ties with the group.
Self-declared experts who practice forms of exit counseling as a business are the Americans Steve Hassan and Rick Ross.
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