page_title: James Dobson
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: James Dobson / Background
caption_attribution_description: Focus on the Family's James Dobson Christmas Jacket displayed in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA.
context_page_description: James Clayton Dobson, Jr., also known as Jim Dobson, is an American evangelical Christian author, psychologist, and founder in 1977 of Focus on the Family, which he led until 2010. In the 1980s he was ranked as one of the most influential spokesmen for conservative social positions in American public life. Although never an ordained minister, he was called "the nation's most influential evangelical leader" by The New York Times while Slate portrayed him as a successor to evangelical leaders Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson.
  As part of his former role in the organization, he produced the daily radio program Focus on the Family, which the organization has said was broadcast in more than a dozen languages and on over 7,000 stations worldwide, and reportedly heard daily by more than 220 million people in 164 countries. Focus on the Family was also carried by about sixty U.S. television stations daily. Dobson founded the Family Research Council in 1981. He is no longer affiliated with Focus on the Family. Dobson founded Family Talk as a non-profit organization in 2010 and launched a new radio broadcast, Family Talk with Dr.
context_section_description: James Dobson was born to Myrtle Georgia (née Dillingham) and James C. Dobson, Sr., on April 21, 1936, in Shreveport, Louisiana. From his earliest childhood, religion played a central part in his life. He once told a reporter that he learned to pray before he learned to talk, and 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 attended 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 most evangelical Christians in the 1950s and 1960s did not look upon favorably. 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 served as captain of the school's tennis team. In 1967, Dobson received his doctorate in psychology from the University of Southern California; he served on 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 arguably 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 published monthly bulletins, also called Focus on the Family, which were dispensed as inserts in some Sunday church-service bulletins.
  Dobson interviewed serial killer Ted Bundy on-camera the day before Bundy's execution on January 24, 1989. The interview became controversial because Bundy was given an opportunity to attempt to explain his actions (the rape and murder of 30 young women). Bundy claimed in the interview (in a reversal of his previous stance) that violent pornography played a significant role in molding and crystallizing his fantasies. 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 revenues of over $1 million, $600,000 of which it donated to anti-pornography groups and to anti-abortion 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. Dobson explained his departure as a result of "significant philosophical differences" with successor Jim Daly.
  In 2010 Dobson founded Family Talk, a non-profit organization that produces his radio program, Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk.
  Dobson frequently appears as a guest on the Fox News Channel.
caption: Dobson's Christmas jacket displayed in Colorado Springs, Colorado
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