James Kennedy (born November 5, 1950) is an American

social psychologist Social psychology is the scientific study of how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the real or imagined presence of other people or by social norms. Social psychologists typically explain human behavior as a result of the rela ...

, best known as an originator and researcher of particle swarm optimization. The first papers on the topic, by Kennedy and

Russell C. Eberhart Russell C. Eberhart, an American electrical engineer, best known as the co-developer of particle swarm optimization concept (with James Kennedy (social psychologist)). He is professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and adjunct professor ...

, were presented in 1995; since the
tens of thousands
of papers have been published on particle swarms. The Academic Press / Morgan Kaufmann book, '' Swarm Intelligence'', by Kennedy and Eberhart with Yuhui Shi, was published in 2001. The particle swarm paradigm draws on social-psychological

simulation A simulation is the imitation of the operation of a real-world process or system over time. Simulations require the use of models; the model represents the key characteristics or behaviors of the selected system or process, whereas the s ...

research in which Kennedy had participated at the

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the multi-campus public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the NC School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referred to as the UNC Sy ...

, integrated with evolutionary computation methods that Eberhart had been working with in the 1990s. The result was a problem-solving or

optimization algorithm Mathematical optimization (alternatively spelled ''optimisation'') or mathematical programming is the selection of a best element, with regard to some criterion, from some set of available alternatives. It is generally divided into two subfi ...

based on the principles of human social interaction. Individuals begin the program with random guesses at the problem solution. As the program runs, the "particles" share their successes with their topological neighbors; each particle is both teacher and learner. Over time, the population converges reliably on optimal vectors. While there has been a trend in the research literature toward a "Gbest" or centralized particle network
Blackwell and Kennedy (2018)
demonstrated the importance of a distributed population topology in solving more complex problems.
A recent paper
discusses the possible contribution of human female orgasm to the species' prosociality. Kennedy has been an active combatant in the controversy over

sex education Sex education, also known as sexual education, sexuality education or sex ed, is the instruction of issues relating to human sexuality, including emotional relations and responsibilities, human sexual anatomy, sexual activity, sexual reproduc ...

in Montgomery County, Maryland, supporting the public schools' efforts to develop a comprehensive and inclusive program. He also worked to support a

gender identity Gender identity is the personal sense of one's own gender. Gender identity can correlate with a person's assigned sex or can differ from it. In most individuals, the various biological determinants of sex are congruent, and consistent with the ...

nondiscrimination law in Montgomery County that came under attack from conservatives, and has maintained an online progressive presence. He also worked as a professional musician for fifty years and currently plays in a

rockabilly Rockabilly is one of the earliest styles of rock and roll music. It dates back to the early 1950s in the United States, especially the South. As a genre it blends the sound of Western musical styles such as country with that of rhythm and blu ...

band called The Colliders, which released albums in 2011 and 2015. In 2018 Kennedy released a DIY album
The Life of Mischief
and is currently organizing live performance of that material. Kennedy worked in survey methods for the US government, and has conducted basic and applied

research Research is " creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular attentiveness ...

into social effects on cognition and attitude. He served as Director of the Office of Analysis and Research Services at the US International Trade Commission until his retirement in 2017. He has worked with particle swarms since 1994, with research publications in fields related and unrelated to swarms and surveys.

* Kennedy, J., Eberhart, R. C., with Shi, Y. (2001
Intelligence''
Morgan Kaufmann / Academic Press. * Jim Kennedy

''Washington Post'', August 24, 2005.
''The Colliders''
* Kennedy, J. (2004). "Particle swarms: optimization based on sociocognition". In L. N. de Castro and F. J. Von Zuben (Eds.
''Recent Developments in Biologically Inspired Computing''
Hershey, PA: The Idea Group, Inc. * Kennedy, J. (2004) "Swarm intelligence". In A. Zomaya (Ed.)
''Handbook of Innovative Computational Paradigms: Biological and Adaptive Computing''
187-220. New York: Springer-Verlag. * Kennedy, J. (2002)
don’t think the way we think we think. Review of Wegner’s The Illusion of Conscious Will"
''Science'', 296, 1973. * Kennedy, J., and Eberhart, R. C. (1999). "The particle swarm: Social adaptation in information-processing systems", in D. Corne, M. Dorigo, and F. Glover (eds.)
''New Ideas in Optimization''
London: McGraw-Hill. * Kennedy, J., and Mendes, R. (2006).
"Neighborhood topologies in fully informed and best-of-neighborhood particle swarms"
''IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, Part C: Applications and Reviews'', 36 (4), 515-519. * Clerc, M., and Kennedy, J. (2002)
"The particle swarm: Explosion, stability, and convergence in a multi-dimensional complex space"
''IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation'', 6, 58-73. * Kennedy, J. (1999)
"Minds and cultures: Particle swarm implications for beings in sociocognitive space"
''Adaptive Behavior Journal'', 7, 269-288. * Kennedy, J., and Pavličev, M. (2018)
"Female orgasm and the emergence of prosocial empathy: An evo-devo perspective."
''Journal of Experimental Zoology Part B: Molecular and Developmental Evolution.'' doi:10.1002/jez.b.22795 * Blackwell, T., and Kennedy, J. (2018)
"Impact of communication topology in particle swarm optimization."
''IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation.'' DOI: 10.1109/TEVC.2018.2880894 {{DEFAULTSORT:Kennedy, James Social psychologists American psychology writers American male non-fiction writers 1950 births Living people

See also

Further reading