Thomas Blass (December 25, 1941 – December 29, 2021) was an American social psychologist,

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

survivor, and professor emeritus of psychology at the

University of Maryland, Baltimore County The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) is a public research university in Baltimore County, Maryland. It has a fall 2022 enrollment of 13,991 students, 61 undergraduate majors, over 92 graduate programs (38 master, 25 doctoral, ...

. He is known for his work regarding

Stanley Milgram Stanley Milgram (August 15, 1933 – December 20, 1984) was an American social psychologist, best known for his controversial experiments on obedience conducted in the 1960s during his professorship at Yale.Blass, T. (2004). ''The Man Who Shock ...

and the Milgram experiment.

Early life and education

Blass was born in

Budapest Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population o ...

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Cr ...

, during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. In 1944, when he was a child, Nazis invaded Hungary and murdered over 550,000 of Blass's fellow Jews there. After the war ended, he left Hungary with his mother, originally settling at a displaced persons camp in Hallein,

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

. They remained there for a number of years before moving to

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...

, where Blass spent part of his childhood. He went on to receive his B.A. in mathematics from

Yeshiva University Yeshiva University is a private Orthodox Jewish university with four campuses in New York City."About YU
on the Yeshiva Universi ...

, where he received his Ph.D. in social psychology in 1969.

Career

After graduating from university, Blass worked at the

University of Maryland Psychiatric Institute A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, the ...

, Sheppard-Pratt Hospital, and

Downstate Medical Center SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University (Downstate) is a public medical school and hospital in Brooklyn, New York. It is the southernmost member of the State University of New York (SUNY) system and the only academic medical center for health ...

. He spent most of his career at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

Writings

Blass is the author of the 2004 book ''The Man Who Shocked the World: The Life and Legacy of Stanley Milgram'', the first biography of Milgram ever published. He has also written numerous journal articles about Milgram and his experiment.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Blass, Thomas Living people American social psychologists Hungarian emigrants to the United States University of Maryland, Baltimore County faculty Yeshiva University alumni 1941 births