Philip Zimbardo to speak at Cambridge

Professor Zimbardo, who first came to world-wide attention with his Stanford Prison Experiment in the early 1970s in which volunteers simulated a prison environment by playing the roles of detainees and guards, will discuss “How it is possible for ordinary, average, even good people, to become perpetrators of evil?”

Professor Zimbardo has recently written The Lucifer Effect: how good people turn evil. In his new book, he attempts to understand and explain the torture by a small number of American guards of the individuals in their custody at the now infamous Abu Ghraib Jail.

Professor Zimbardo acted as an ‘expert witness' for one of the senior American guards prosecuted and later imprisoned in the aftermath of this tragic scandal. As a result of his involvement in the case, the professor had unlimited access to the photographic evidence as well as the transcripts of the prosecution and defence testimonies.

His new book (published this March by Random House) sensitively explores the psychological and spiritual potential for evil and heroism, that he concludes lives in all of us. Tellingly, his book's last sentence quotes from the Gulag veteran and Nobel laureate, Alexander Solzenitsyn: “The line between good and evil is in the center of every human heart”.

Now age 74, Philip grew up in the economic poverty of an immigrant family in New York's South Bronx ghetto, and rose to be the 2002 Elected President of the American Psychological Association (and its 150,000 members). His current research interests include experimental social psychology, with an emphasis ranging from shyness to torture and evil.

The lecture, hosted by the Institute of Criminology and Dr Nick Baylis, Co-director of The Well-being Institute, University of Cambridge, is scheduled for 5:00-6:30pm, Lecture Theatre LG17, Faculty of Law Building (on the Sidgwick Site). To guarantee a seat, please arrive early.

Please e-mail all inquiries to Cambridge@NickBaylis.com.