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USC College > Faculty > Departments > Department of Psychology > Stephen Read
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Stephen Read
Professor of Psychology

Contact Information
Office: SGM 821
Phone: (213)740-2291
E-mail: read@usc.edu

LINKS
Personal Website


 

Education
B.A. Psychology, Princeton University, 5/1974
Ph.D. Psychology, University of Texas at Austin, 8/1981
 

Postdoctoral Training
Postdoctoral Fellow, Northwestern University, Department of Psychology, 09/1982-08/1984  
Postdoctoral Fellow, Yale University, Department of Psychology, 09/1981-08/1982  
 

Academic Appointment, Affiliation, and Employment History
Professor of Psychology, University of Southern California, 01/01/1998-  
Associate Professor of Psychology, University of Southern California, 01/01/1990-01/01/1998  
Assistant Professor of Psychology, University of Southen California, 01/01/1984-01/01/1990  
 

Description of Research

Summary Statement of Research Interests
Professor Read has five main areas of research.
  • His primary area of interest is in computational models of social reasoning and social behavior. He focuses on neural network models of personality and social behavior, legal and everyday decision making, causal reasoning, and causal learning. He is also interested in models of human motivation.
  • The creation of realistic personality in computer based intelligent agents in virtual reality training systems.
  • Coherence based, constraint satisfaction based models of decision making and impression formation.
  • The structure and dynamics of human personality.
  • The use of interactive media in changing risky sexual behavior.
 

Research Specialties
Neural Network Models of Social Reasoning and Personality. Knowledge structures in causal reasoning and decision making. Narrative models of social explanation. Use of Interactive Media to change risky social behaviors. Structure and function of belief systems. Role of beliefs and attitudes in information processing.
 

Affiliations with Research Centers, Labs, and Other Institutions
Communication Solutions
 

Publications

Book Chapter
Read, S. J., Monroe, B. (2007). Computational Models in Personality and Social Psychology. Handbook on computational cognitive modeling.
Read, S. J., Miller, L. C., Kostygina, A., Chopra, G., Christensen, J. L., Corsbie-Massay, C., Zachary, W., LeMentec, J. C., Iordanov, V., Rosoff, A. (2007). The Personality-enabled architecture for Cognition. Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction 2007. Springer-Verlag.
Miller, L., Read, S. J. (2006). Virtual Sex: Creating environments for reducing risky sex. pp. p. 000-000. Virtual Decisions: Digital simulations for teaching reasoning in the social sciences and humanities/Erlbaum.
Read, S. J., Miller, L., Monroe, B., Brownstein, A., Zachary, W., LeMentec, J., Iordanov, V., Rosoff, A., Eilbert, J. (2006). The PAC Cognitive Architecture. (Vol. NA). Intelligent Virtual Agents/Springer, Berlin, Germany.
Read, S. J., Miller, L., Monroe, B., Brownstein, A., Zachary, W., LeMentec, J., Iordanov, V. (2006). A Neurobiologically Inspired Model of Personality. (Vol. 4133). Intelligent Virtual Agents 2006 (IVA 2006)/Springer, Berlin, Germany.
Read, S. J., Miller, L. (2005). Explanatory coherence and goal-based knowledge structures in making dispositional inferences. pp. p. 000-000. Boston, MA: Other Minds/Guilford Press.
 

Journal Article
Read, S. J. Modeling Cognitive Dissonance using A Recurrent Neural Network Model with Learning. Personality and Social Psychology Review.
Read, S. J., Monroe, B. M., Brownstein, A. L., Yang, Y., Chopra, G., Miller, L. C. (2007). Virtual Personalities II: A Neural Network Model of the Structure and Dynamics of Human Personality. Psychological Review.
Monroe, B. M., Read, S. J. (2007). A General Connectionist Model of Attitudes and Attitude Change: The ACS (Attitudes as Constraint Satisfaction) Model. Psychological Review.
Roseman, I., Read, S. J. (2007). Psychologist at Play: Robert P. Abelson's Life and Contributions to Psychological Science. Perspectives in Psychological Science. Vol. NA
Read, S. J., Monroe, B. M. (2007). Gaps in the Mapping between Simulations and Self: Concerns with the Proposed Neural Network Model: Commentary on the Target Article by Kashima et al. Psychological Inquiry.
Brownstein, A., Read, S. J. (2007). Situation models and memory: The effects of temporal and causal information in recall sequence. Memory.
Read, S. J., Miller, L., Appleby, P. R., Nwosu, M., Reynaldo, S. E., Lauren, A., Putcha, A. (2006). Socially Optimized Learning in a Virtual Environment: Reducing Risky Sexual Behavior Among Men Who Have Sex With Men. . Human Communication Research/International Communication Association. Vol. 32 (1), pp. 1-34.
Yang, Y., Read, S. J., Miller, L. (2006). A taxonomy of situations from Chinese idioms: Goal processes as a central organizing principle. Journal of Research in Personality/NA. Vol. 40, pp. pp. 750-778.
Jones, D., Read, S. J. (2005). Expert versus Novice differences in the representation of political knowledge. Discourse Processes/NA. Vol. 39, pp. 45-80.
Van Osselaer, S. M., Ramanathan, S., Campbell, M. C., Cohen, J. B., Dale, J. K., Herr, P. M., Janiszewski, C., Kruglanski, A. W., Lee, A. Y., Read, S. J. (2005). Choice based on goals. Marketing Letters/Springer. Vol. 16, pp. 335-346.
Simon, D., Snow, C. J., Read, S. J. (2004). The Redux of Cognitive Consistency Theories: Evidence Judgments by Constraint Satisfaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology/American Psychological Association. Vol. 86, pp. 814-837.
Brownstein, A., Read, S. J., Simon, D. (2004). Effects of Individual Expertise and Task Importance on Pre-decision Reevaluation of Alternatives. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin/NA. Vol. 30, pp. 891-904.
Read, S. J., Urada, D. (2003). A neural network model of the outgroup homogeneity effect. Personality and Social Psychology Review/Erlbaum. Vol. 7, pp. 146-169.
Read, S. J., Miller, L. (2002). Virtual Personalities: A Neural Network Model of Personality. Personality and Social Psychology Review/Erlbaum. Vol. 6, pp. 357-369.
Chulef, A., Read, S. J., Walsh, D. A. (2001). A Hierarchical Taxonomy of Human Goals. Motivation and Emotion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology/American Psychological Association. Vol. 25, pp. 191-232.
Read, S. J. (1999). An autoassociative model of causal learning and causal reasoning. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology/American Psychological Association. Vol. 76, pp. 728-742.
Read, S. J., Vanman, E. J., Miller, L. (1997). Connectionism, Parallel Constraint Satisfaction Processes and Gestalt Principles: (Re) Introducing Cognitive Dynamics to Social Psychology. Personality and Social Psychology Review/Erlbaum. Vol. 1, pp. 26-53.
 

Other
Read, S. J. Vallacher, R. R., Read, S. J., & Nowak, A. (Eds.)(2002). The Dynamical Perspective in Personality and Social Psychology. Special issue of Personality and Social Psychology Review. .
 

Proceedings
Zachary, W., LeMentec, J., Miller, L., Read, S. J., Thomas Meyers, G. (2005). Human behavioral representations with realistic personality and cultural characteristics. pp. p. 000-000. proceedings of the Tenth International Command and Control Research and Technology Symposium, McLean, VA./NA.
Zachary, W., LeMentec, J., Read, S. J., Miller, L. (2005). Steps toward a Personality-based Architecture for Cognition. pp. p. 000-000. Proceedings of the Annual Conference on Behavioral Representation in Modeling and Simulation, Los Angeles, CA./NA.
Marsella, S., Pynadath, D., Read, S. J. (2004). PsychSim: Agent-based modeling of social interactions and influence. pp. p. 000-000. PsychSim: Agent-based modeling of social interactions and influence./NA.
Kim, D., Read, S. J. (2004). Asymmetries in the Bidirectional Associative Strengths Between Events in Cue Competition for Causes and Effects. pp. p. 690-695. In K. Forbus, D. Gentner & T. Regier (Eds). Twenty-Sixth Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society August 4-7, 2004 Chicago, Illinois/Erlbaum.
Brownstein, A., Read, S. J., Simon, D. (2004). Coherence in Perceptions of a Romantic Relationship. pp. p. 162-167. In K. Forbus, D. Gentner & T. Regier (Eds). Twenty-Sixth Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society August 4-7, 2004 Chicago, Illinois./Erlbaum.
 

Honors and Awards
Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, 2005-2006  
USC Center for Interdisciplinary Faculty Fellowship, 2004-2005  
 

Service to the Profession

Professional Memberships
Society for Text and Discourse, 1988-2006  
Cognitive Science Society, 1986-2006  
American Psychological Society, 1985-2006  
Society for Experimental Social Psychology, 1985-2006  
Society for Judgement and Decision Making, 1985-2006  
Society for Personality and Social Psychology, 1985-2006  
 
 
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