Philip zimbardo parents as teachers

Philip G. Zimbardo ’59 Ph.D., an internationally recognized psychology educator, researcher, and author who received Yale’s Wilbur Cross Medal for Alumni Achievement in 2004, died on Oct. 14. He was 91.

Zimbardo, who was a professor emeritus at Stanford University, was also a cherished teacher of Peter Salovey, former Yale University president and the Chris Argyris Professor of Psychology at Yale.

Born in 1933 and raised in the Bronx, Zimbardo became the first member of his Sicilian American family to pursue a college degree. He attended Brooklyn College where he earned a B.A. in 1954, triple majoring in psychology, sociology and anthropology, and then went on to Yale, where he earned his M.A. in 1955 and his Ph.D., both in psychology, in 1959.

In the mid-1960s, he held teaching positions at Yale, Columbia University, and New York University. Notably shifting his research from running the rat lab to examining human behavior, his early training spanned hypnosis at the Morton Prince Clinic in New York, co-directing the Children’s Test Anxiety Research Project at Yale University, and creating “A Head Start-Black Pride” summer program in Harlem. He became involved with anti-war demonstrations and co-authored a publication “Canvassing for Peace.”

In the late-1960s, Zimbardo relocated to the Department of Psychology at Stanford University. Over the next four decades he inspired thousands of students and educators to become interested in the field of psychology, many of whom went on to careers in academia and clinical practice. He embraced teaching the large introductory course in psychology. A charismatic speaker, dedicated to making class memorable, the popularity of his course became legendary. For decades he authored numerous editions of classic introductory textbooks “Psychology and Life” and “Psychology: Core Concepts,” along with affiliated teaching resources.

He conducted studies that now appear in every psychology textbook. Perhaps

American social psychologist (1933–2024)

Philip George Zimbardo (; March 23, 1933 – October 14, 2024) was an American psychologist and a professor at Stanford University. He was an internationally known educator, researcher, author and media personality in psychology who authored more than 500 articles, chapters, textbooks, and trade books covering a wide range of topics, including time perspective, cognitive dissonance, the psychology of evil, persuasion, cults, deindividuation, shyness, and heroism. He became known for his 1971 Stanford prison experiment, which was later criticized. He authored various widely-used, introductory psychology textbooks for college students, and other notable works, including Shyness,The Lucifer Effect, and The Time Paradox. He was the founder and president of the Heroic Imagination Project, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting heroism in everyday life by training people how to resist bullying, bystanding, and negative conformity. He pioneered The Stanford Shyness Clinic in the 1970s and offered the earliest comprehensive treatment program for shyness. He was the recipient of numerous