Robert Crowley was born January 28, 1929 in South Boston, Massachusetts to Robert J. and Theresa Crowley. He married Elizabeth VanTol, with whom he had two sons.

Crowley received his A.B. from Boston College in 1950, after which he joined the U.S. Army and served in the Korean War. After being honorably discharged in 1953, Crowley received his M.A. in Teaching form Harvard University Graduate School in 1955 and moved to Jackson, Michigan, where he worked as a teacher and principal in elementary schools. He received his PhD in 1966 from the University of Michigan and from 1967-1070 worked at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York.

Crowley was a founding faculty member of Sangamon State University (later University of Illinois-Springfield), where he taught from 1970 to 2000 as a professor in the Human Development Counseling program. For three semesters circa 1989, he served as an exchange professor at Shanghai Normal University.

Robert Crowley passed away on March 17, 2018.