Many cults start off with high ideals that get corrupted by leaders or their board of advisors who become power-hungry and dominate and control members lives. No group with high ideals starts off as a cult; they become one when their errant ways are exposed.

I was discriminated against because I was Jewish, Italian, black and Puerto Rican. But maybe the worst prejudice I experienced was against the poor. I grew up on welfare and often had to move in the middle of the night because we couldn't pay the rent.

The Stanford prison experiment came out of class exercises in which I encouraged students to understand the dynamics of prison life.

To be a hero you have to learn to be a deviant — because you're always going against the conformity of the group.

After doing psychology for half a century, my passion for all of it is greater than ever.

There are no limits to what I would do to make my classes exciting, interesting, unpredictable.

My early childhood prepared me to be a social psychologist. I grew up in a South Bronx ghetto in a very poor family. From Sicilian origin, I was the first person in my family to complete high school, let alone go to college.