An early onset of arthritis caused him to return to his family in Lebanon.[citation needed] He entered a masters program in Arabic studies,[3] completing it in 1955 at the American University of Beirut. Here he met his wife, Ann Zwicker Kerr, with whom he had four children. He commenced his doctorate work in Washington, D.C., at the School for Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, from where he received his Ph.D. in 1958.