Michael Mascolo Ph.D.

Michael F. Mascolo, Ph.D. is Professor of Psychology at Merrimack College in North Andover, MA. He is the author of 8 Keys to Old School Parenting for Modern-Day Families (Norton Press). Now, what else? He received his Ph.D from… Hmm…. Do you really care? Should you really care? We bloggers tend to put our credentials here as a way of saying, “I’m an expert! Listen to me!” Well, of course I want you to read my blog. But should you listen to me? Why? Because of my credentials? My experience? My expertise? No. None of these are good reasons. The only good reason to use anything that comes from a blog is because you find it useful in some way. The ideas should stand on their own. Either they are useful to you or they’re not. If they are, please use them. If not, let’s enter into a dialogue to find out why. Maybe it’s because we have some basic disagreement about parenting. But probably not. Perhaps if we talk more we can come to some meeting of the minds. Maybe your input can help improve what I write about here. Nonetheless, when all is said and done, I invite you to take what is useful and discard the rest.

If you really need to make sure that I’m not just some joker writing a blog, here are my credentials: PhD from the University at Albany, Post-doctoral work at Harvard University. I’ve written and/or edited four books, including 8 Key to Old School Parenting for Modern Day Families (2015, Norton); Psychotherapy as a Developmental Process (with M. Basseches, 2010, Routledge/Taylor & Francis); Culture and Developing Selves (2004, edited with J. Li, Jossey-Bass) and What Develops in Emotional Development? (edited with S. Griffin, 1998). I’ve written over 100 scholarly articles, book chapters and papers for both scholarly audiences and for the general public. I am founding editor of Pedagogy and the Human Sciences. I am also a parenting and relationship coach.