Chien-fei Chen Ph.D.

Director of Education and Diversity & Research Assistant Professor NSF-DOE Engineering Research Center, Center for Ultra-wide-area Resilient Electrical Energy Transmission Networks (CURENT) Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science University of Tennessee, Knoxville Adjunct Research Assistant Professor Department of Sociology University of Tennessee, Knoxville cchen26@utk.edu Curriculum Vitae, pdf

Dr. Chien-fei Chen serves as the Director of Education and Diversity Programs and Research Professor for CURENT. She is also an adjunct faculty member in the department of sociology. Dr. Chen received her Ph.D. in Sociology from Washington State University.

Her research in social psychology focuses on how the content and structure of social relations are mediated through social norms, networks, interpersonal communication and related psychological factors at both individual and group levels. Dr. Chen’s work is especially concerned with the mechanism, transmission and enforcement of social norms; and emphasizes the roles that social networks, norms and psychological factors have in the influencing of individual decision-making. Her research facilitates the investigation of the social and structural processes that motivate behavioral and psychological changes in relation to issues of energy and technology.

More specifically, her research focuses are Social Psychology, Environmental Sociology, Quantitative Research Methods, Interdisciplinary Research on Energy Behaviors, and Engineering Education.