After graduating, Festinger worked as a research associate at Iowa from 1941 to 1943, and then as a statistician for the Committee on Selection and Training of Aircraft Pilots at the University of Rochester from 1943 to 1945 during World War II. In 1943, Festinger married Mary Oliver Ballou, a pianist, with whom he had three children, Catherine, Richard, and Kurt. Festinger and Ballou were later divorced, and Festinger married Trudy Bradley, currently a professor of social work at New York University, in 1968.