About Cliff

Clifford Nass is currently the Thomas M. Storke Professor at Stanford University; he has been a professor at Stanford since 1986. His primary appointment is in Communication, but he also has appointments by courtesy in Computer Science; Education; Science, Technology, and Society; Sociology; and Symbolic Systems (cognitive science).

Nass's research focuses on (laboratory and field) experimental studies of social-psychological aspects of human-interactive media interaction. Specifically, Nass discovered that people use the same rules and heuristics when interacting with technology as they do when interacting with other people. This approach is called the "Computers are Social Actors" (CASA) paradigm or "The Media Equation" (media equals real life).

Nass founded and directs the Communication between Humans and Interactive Media (CHIMe) Lab. The specific domains CHIMe focuses on are:

• Automobile Interfaces
• Mobile Interfaces
• Human-Robot Interaction
• Cognitive and Social Effects of Multitasking
• Adaptive and Personalized Systems
• Voice Interfaces

Nass is also co-director of the Kozmetsky Global Collaboratory and Auto-X at Stanford University.

He is also the author of over 125 papers on the psychology of technology and statistical methodology.

As a consultant, Nass has applied his research to over 250 media products and services forcompanies including Microsoft, Toyota, Nissan, BMW, Philips, Sony, Time-Warner, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Charles Schwab, and Fidelity.

Bibliography of Publications

The Man Who Lied to His Laptop: How Computers Can Teach Us About Human Relationships. (coming Fall 2010)
By Clifford Nass with Corina Yen

The Man Who Lied to His Laptop will appear in Fall, 2010

Wired for Speech: How Voice Activates and Advances the Human-Computer Relationship
By Clifford Nass and Scott Brave (2005)

Winner, 2007 International Communication Association Outstanding Book Award for 2005-2006.

Interfaces that talk and listen are populating computers, cars, call centers, and even home appliances and toys, but voice interfaces invariably frustrate rather than help. In Wired for Speech, Clifford Nass and Scott Brave reveal how interactive voice technologies can readily and effectively tap into the automatic responses all speech--whether from human or machine--evokes. Wired for Speech demonstrates that people are "voice-activated": we respond to voice technologies as we respond to actual people and behave as we would in any social situation. By leveraging this powerful finding, voice interfaces can truly emerge as the next frontier for efficient, user-friendly technology. Wired for Speech presents new theories and experiments and applies them to critical issues concerning how people interact with technology-based voices.

The Media Equation: How People Treat Computers, Television, and New Media Like Real People and Places.
By Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass (1996)

In an extraordinary revision of received wisdom, Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass demonstrate convincingly in The Media Equation that interactions with computers, television and new communication technologies are identical to real social relationships and to the navigation of real physical spaces. The authors present the results of numerous psychological studies showing: that people are polite to computers; that they treat computers with female voices differently than male-voiced computers; that large faces on a screen can invade a person's body space; and that motion on a screen affects physical responses in the same way that real life motion does. One of their startling conclusions is that the human brain has not evolved quikly enough to assimilate twentieth century technology. The authors detail how this knowledge can help us better design and evaluate media technologies, including computer and internet software, television entertainment, advertising, and multimedia.