Noted Psychologist to Give Talk on Free Will in UA’s Dinoff Memorial Lecture

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Dr. Roy F. Baumeister, Eppes Eminent Professor of Psychology at Florida State University, will deliver the lecture “Free Will as the Expensive Control of Action” at 6:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 1 in room 208 in The University of Alabama’s Gordon Palmer Hall.

Baumeister is delivering the annual Michael Dinoff Memorial Lecture of the psychology department, part of UA’s College of Arts and Sciences. The lecture is given in memory of Dr. Michael Dinoff who was a professor and director of the University’s Psychological Clinical from 1963 until his death in 1982.

Baumeister’s research topics include self and identity, self-regulation, interpersonal rejection and the need to belong, self-esteem and self-presentation. He has received grant awards from such agencies as the National Institute of Mental Health and the Templeton Foundation and is the author of more than 350 publications and 20 books. The Institute for Scientific Information lists him among the most influential psychologists in the world. He received his doctorate in social psychology from Princeton University in 1978.

The psychology department is part of the College of Arts and Sciences, the University’s largest division and the largest liberal arts college in the state. Students from the College have won numerous national awards including Rhodes Scholarships, Goldwater Scholarships and memberships on the USA Today Academic All American Team.