Irving Gottesman, Psychologist Who Upended Views on Schizophrenia, Dies at 85

July 11, 2016

(The Washington Post) – Irving Gottesman, a psychologist whose groundbreaking studies of twins in the 1960s helped reveal a genetic link to schizophrenia, a finding that upended the prevailing but deeply flawed view of the disorder as a consequence of bad parenting, died June 29 at his home in Edina, Minn. He was 85. His death was announced by the University of Minnesota, where Dr. Gottesman founded a center for the study of behavioral genetics in 1966. The cause was an apparent stroke, said his wife, Carol Gottesman.