James Dobson - Background

Background

Dobson was born to Myrtle Georgia (née Dillingham) and James C. Dobson, Sr. in Shreveport, Louisiana, and from his earliest childhood, religion was a central part of his life. He once told a reporter that he learned to pray before he learned to talk. In fact, he says he gave his life to Jesus at the age of three, in response to an altar call by his father. He is the son, grandson, and great-grandson of Church of the Nazarene ministers, although he does not speak for the denomination in any capacity.

His father, James Dobson Sr. (1911–1977) never went to college. He was a traveling evangelist, chiefly in the southwest. The parents took their young son along to watch his father preach. Like most Nazarenes, they forbade dancing and going to movies. Young "Jimmie Lee" (as he was called) concentrated on his studies.

Dobson studied academic psychology, which in the 1950s and 1960s was not looked upon favorably by most evangelical Christians. He came to believe that he was being called to become a Christian counselor or perhaps a Christian psychologist. He attended Pasadena College (now Point Loma Nazarene University) as an undergraduate and was captain of the school's tennis team. In 1967, Dobson received his doctorate in psychology from the University of Southern California and served in the faculty of the university's Keck School of Medicine for 14 years. For a time, Dobson worked as an assistant to Paul Popenoe at the Institute of Family Relations, a marriage-counseling center, in Los Angeles.

Dobson first became well-known with the publication of Dare to Discipline (1970), which encouraged parents to use corporal punishment in disciplining their children. Dobson's social and political opinions are widely read among many evangelical church congregations in the United States. Dobson publishes monthly bulletins also called Focus on the Family, which are dispensed as inserts in some Sunday church service bulletins.

Dobson interviewed serial killer Ted Bundy on camera the day before he was executed, in January 1989. The interview was controversial as Bundy was given an opportunity to attempt to explain his actions (the rape and murder of 30 young women). Bundy blamed his crimes on "violent pornography", something he had never mentioned in hundreds of hours of police and psychological interviews. There is also controversy over how much input the relatives of the murder victims had as regards the interview and whether they agreed that it should happen or not. In May 1989, during an interview with John Tanner, a Republican Florida prosecutor, Dobson called for Bundy to be forgiven. The Bundy tapes gave Focus on the Family earnings of over $1 million (the organization donated most of the earnings to anti-pornography groups).

Dobson stepped down as President and CEO of Focus on the Family in 2003, and resigned from the position of chairman of the board in February 2009. Currently, Dobson is the Founder and President of Family Talk, a non-profit organization that produces his radio program, “Dr. James Dobson’s Family Talk.”

Dobson is a frequent guest on Fox News Channel.