About

Reihane Boghrati is an Assistant Professor of Information Systems at the W. P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University. She completed her Ph.D. in Computer Science at the University of Southern California in 2018. Before joining ASU, she was a post-doctoral researcher at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Her research focuses on designing and applying machine learning and natural language processing methods to investigate psychological phenomena expressed in written and spoken language.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Computer Science
• Political Science
• Artificial Intelligence
• Psychology
• Social psychology
• Linguistics
• Mathematics
• Cognitive psychology
• Data science
• Business
• Marketing

Selected publications

• Examining the Impact of EmpathicAI among Vulnerable Communities

  Proceedings of the ... Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences/Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences · 2026-01-01

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  This research examines how empathetic AI influences emotional support exchanges within trauma recovery communities, specifically the “raised by narcissists” (RBN) subreddit. Drawing on IT-Enabled Public Goods Theory, we investigate how three empathy modalities, cognitive empathy (understanding perspectives), emotional empathy (sharing emotions), and motivational empathy (driving prosocial behaviors), impact connectivity in online communities. We present findings from a controlled survey experiment (N=736) testing AI-generated comments with different empathy modalities on user engagement likelihood. Results demonstrate that participants who read empathetic AI comments showed significantly higher engagement intentions compared to neutral responses, with cognitive empathy (β = 0.49, p < 0.05) and motivational empathy (β = 0.40, p < 0.05) showing stronger effects than emotional empathy (β = 0.34, p < 0.1). Notably, neutral AI responses performed worse than no comment at all, suggesting that emotionally flat interactions may actually discourage engagement in sensitive contexts. Our findings extend IT-enabled public goods theory by demonstrating how different empathy modalities contribute unequally to connectivity outcomes in vulnerable populations. This research advances understanding of AI’s role in trauma recovery communities by examining empathetic AI in emotionally complex, peer-support environments rather than dyadic interactions, informing development of more compassionate and contextually appropriate AI technologies for vulnerable online communities.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• "We Pay Living Wages": Operational and Welfare Implications of Social Responsibility Pledges in a Supply Chain

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2026-01-01

  preprintOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Effectively communicating uncertainty: The persuasive impact of different types of hedges

  Journal of Consumer Psychology · 2026-05-11

  articleSenior author

  Abstract Communicators often hedge. Consumers say a restaurant might have good mimosas or that a product is probably the best while Amazon suggests movies they think you'll like. But might these different hedges have different effects on persuasion? We suggest that (1) whether a hedge takes a personal (vs. general) perspective and (2) the likelihood suggested by a hedge both play important roles in determining hedging's persuasive impact. A multi‐method investigation combining experiments with machine learning of millions of online reviews supports these hypotheses. Together, they demonstrate that the effects of both hedge perspective and hedge likelihood are driven by a common mechanism: perceived confidence. Hedges that involve personal perspective or higher likelihood increase persuasion because they suggest communicators are more confident. Moreover, we demonstrate that hedging can protect communicators from backlash without sacrificing persuasive impact and highlight that brands can leverage hedging's persuasive impact when speaking through anthropomorphized agents. This work contributes to the literature on language in marketing, showcases how subtle linguistic features impact perceived confidence, and has clear implications for anyone trying to be more persuasive.

  PublisherDOI

• Author response for "Public Speakers with Non-Native Accents Garner Less Engagement"

  2025-08-01

  peer-review
  PublisherDOI

• Navigating Consumer Complaints: The Impact of Firm Resolution Strategy on Complaint Escalation

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Public Speakers With Nonnative Accents Garner Less Engagement

  Psychological Science · 2025-12-01

  article

  Can nonnative English accents become barriers to garnering attention in public discourse? The current study examined this question. Analyzing 5,367 TED Talks through computational methodologies such as voice recognition, natural language processing, and vision models, we investigated the relationship between speakers’ accents and online engagement. After adjusting for various control variables with a series of robustness checks, we found a sizeable disparity in public discourse: Speakers with nonnative accents received less engagement than speakers with native accents. To complement our findings, we conducted a controlled social-psychological experiment among English-speaking American adults ( N = 462) and a direct replication ( N = 916) that corroborated our computational analyses and highlighted stereotyping and processing disfluency as key factors driving reduced engagement in accented speakers. Our research highlights the pervasive impact of accent discrimination in global communication and emphasizes the need for strategies to mitigate its detrimental effects on knowledge exchange across cultural and linguistic boundaries.

  PublisherDOI

• Author response for "Public Speakers with Non-Native Accents Garner Less Engagement"

  2025-10-17

  peer-review
  PublisherDOI

• The Impact of Social Movements on Gender Leadership Dynamics

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Author response for "Public Speakers with Non-Native Accents Garner Less Engagement"

  2025-06-03

  peer-review
  PublisherDOI

• The Trajectory of Confidence: Experience, Certainty, and Consumer Choice

  Journal of Marketing Research · 2025-08-18 · 1 citations

  articleSenior author

  Confidence has an important influence on consumer behavior. Beyond what consumers know or believe, the confidence with which they hold such knowledge or beliefs (i.e., how certain they feel) shapes their judgments, decisions, and actions. But how does confidence shift as consumers gain experience? And what are the consequences for consumer choice? A multimethod investigation combines computational linguistics, machine learning, and experiments to examine these questions. Analysis of 3.7 million reviews from almost 100,000 consumers spanning nearly 30 years reveals a common confidence trajectory. Across diverse product categories (e.g., wine, beer, cosmetics) there is a U-shaped relationship between experience and confidence. While gaining initial experience decreases confidence, eventually, with more experience, confidence rebounds. Further, feeling less confident leads consumers to avoid options associated with uncertainty and choose something different. This includes picking different products, avoiding brands associated with the uncertainty, and waiting longer to choose from those brands again. Taken together, these findings shed light on the evolution of confidence, how uncertainty shapes choice, and drivers of product switching and brand loyalty more generally.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Morteza Dehghani

  19 shared

• Joe Hoover

  11 shared

• Roohallah Alizadehsani

  Deakin University

  9 shared

• Jonah Berger

  University of Pennsylvania

  9 shared

• Asma Ghandeharioun

  8 shared

• Zahra Alizadeh Sani

  Flinders Medical Centre

  7 shared

• KATE JOHNSON

  University of British Columbia

  7 shared

• Behdad Bahadorian

  Shaheed Rajaei Cardiovascular Medical and Research Center

  7 shared

Education

• Ph.D.

  University of Southern California