Gary Cziko is an American researcher, and author[1] in the field of educational psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign who has worked on the philosophical model known as perceptual control theory (PCT) – a model whose original developer, William T. Powers, was his mentor.
[2] He has written two introductory books on the subject, and in 1995 he introduced the concept of "universal selectionism" into the PCT model.
[3] Cziko received a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology from Queens College, City University of New York, a Master of Arts degree in psychology from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in 1975, and a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) from McGill University in 1978.
[1] He was a post-doctoral research fellow for the Quebec Ministry of Education at the University of Montreal during 1978–79.
In 1989, Cziko published one of his first academic papers relating to PCT: He has also authored two introductions to PCT, both published by MIT Press: In 2008, Cziko was a Fulbright Scholar in Chile.