Alfred S. Friedman, 96, longtime family therapist

Alfred S. Friedman, 96, of Haverford, a family therapist and authority on the study of substance abuse among young people, died of pneumonia Sunday at Bryn Mawr Hospital.

Dr. Friedman joined the staff of the Philadelphia Psychiatric Center in 1954. For the next 47 years he was a research psychologist at the center, now known as the Belmont Center for Comprehensive Treatment, and was its first director of research. He retired in 2001.

In the 1980s and '90s, Dr. Friedman did research at the center involving data from 1,000 participants of the National Collaborative Perinatal Project. The project, begun in the early 1960s, tracked children from birth to adulthood. He studied participants to determine the long-term effects of cocaine on the brain, looked at which participants would become drug abusers, and researched the connection between violence and drug abuse.

Dan Gottlieb, a family therapist and former Inquirer columnist, met Dr. Friedman when Gottlieb was interviewed for a position at Philadelphia Psychiatric Center in the early 1970s. Dr. Friedman became a mentor and a father figure and supervised his doctoral dissertation, Gottlieb said.

Recently at lunch, Gottlieb said, Dr. Friedman remembered a conflict they'd had over an abstract theoretical construct that Gottlieb had forgotten. "His body was very frail," Gottlieb said, "but his memory and thought processes were still very sharp."

He was a gentle, kind man, Gottlieb said, and was among three or four "titans" in the field of family therapy.

In the late 1950s, Dr. Friedman and several other psychologists who espoused the belief that human behavior had to be viewed in the context of the family established the Family Institute of Philadelphia. Until 2005, the institute offered treatment to families and trained therapists. It is now a professional clinical society.

Dr. Friedman wrote many professional articles and books and served on the medical school faculties of the University of Pennsylvania and Thomas Jefferson University.

He earned a bachelor's degree from Case Western Reserve University; a master's degree from the University of Iowa; and a doctorate in psychology from the University of Southern California.

During World War II, he served in the Army in the States and in Europe, and he helped evaluate participants in the Nuremberg Trials in Germany.

Dr. Friedman's parents had owned a produce store in his native Cleveland, and he took great pride in selecting quality fruits and vegetables at markets in Philadelphia, his son Robert said. He was devoted to his work and to his family and enjoyed keeping up with current events, his son said.

Dr. Friedman is also survived by his wife of 56 years, Sarah Endy Friedman, and two grandchildren.

A graveside service will be at 2 p.m. today at Haym Salomon Memorial Park, 2000 Moores Rd., Frazer.