Muzafer Sherif

Muzafer Sherif
Born	July 29, 1906 Ödemiş, Aidin Vilayet, Ottoman Empire
Died	October 16, 1988 (aged 82) Fairbanks, Alaska, USA
Residence	Turkey (1906–1945) United States (1945–1988)
Nationality	Turkish-American
Fields	Psychology (social)
Institutions	Princeton University, Yale University, University of Oklahoma, Pennsylvania State University
Alma mater	İstanbul University, Columbia University
Known for	Social psychology (Group conformity, Robbers Cave Experiment)
Notable awards	Honored by Division 8 of the American Psychological Association in 1966. He received both a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship and the Kurt Lewin Memorial Award from Division 9 in 1967.

Muzafer Sherif (born Muzaffer Şerif Başoğlu; July 29, 1906 – October 16, 1988) was a Turkish-American social psychologist. He helped develop social judgment theory and realistic conflict theory.

Sherif was a founder of modern social psychology who developed several unique and powerful techniques for understanding social processes, particularly social norms and social conflict. Many of his original contributions to social psychology have been absorbed into the field so fully that his role in the development and discovery has disappeared. Other reformulations of social psychology have taken his contributions for granted, and re-presented his ideas as new.

Muzafer Sherif grew up in a fairly wealthy family that included five children, of whom he was the second born.

Sherif received a BA at the Izmir American College in Turkey in 1926, and an MA at the University of Istanbul in 1928. Sherif then went to America, earning an MA from Harvard University. He enrolled at Columbia University, and in 1935 earned a PhD with Gardner Murphy.

In 1945, he married Carolyn Wood, and they collaborated productively on subsequent projects for many years, on scholarly books (e.g., Sherif & Sherif, 1953) and a still-useful textbook (Sherif & Sherif, 1969). They had three daughters: Ann, Sue and Joan.

Although mostly recognized as a psychologist, Muzafer was the first to obtain the Cooley-Mead Award for Contributions to Social Psychology from the American Sociological Association. His academic appointments included Yale University, the University of Oklahoma, and Pennsylvania State University.

According to his daughter, Sue, whom Sherif was living with at that time, Sherif was in good spirits when he was stricken with a fatal heart attack. He died on October 16, 1988, at Fairbanks Alaska at the age of 82.

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