It is demonstrated experimentally that the anharmonic property of the quadrupole trap can be exploited to cool trapped atoms by modulating the trap potential anisotropically. This cooling effect arises from the energy-selective removal of the most energetic trapped atoms and the thermal equilibrium of the remaining atoms. The frequency dependences of the temperature and the fraction of the atoms left in the trap after the modulation are explored. It is also demonstrated that the cooling induced by parametric resonance can also increase the phase space density of the trapped atoms.