Dennis Tay is Professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.  Prior to joining HKUST, he held professorial appointments at Nanyang Technological University and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, where he also served in senior academic leadership roles including Head, Associate Head, and Associate Dean. He is trained in linguistics and computational mathematics.

Dennis is internationally known for his work on cognitive linguistics and the strategic use of metaphor in psychological counseling. He also has a keen interest in data-analytic approaches to the study of language. Bridging artificial intelligence and the humanities, his work applies machine/deep learning algorithms to uncover discourse patterns and their links to sociocultural dynamics, and reciprocally, how discourse analytic domain knowledge can critically inform computational assumptions. He is the author of multiple books including Data Analytics for Discourse Analysis with Python (Routledge), Time Series Analysis of Discourse (Routledge), Navigating the Realities of Metaphor and Psychotherapy Research (Cambridge University Press), and Metaphor in Psychotherapy: A Descriptive and Prescriptive Analysis (John Benjamins). His work has been supported by major competitive grants including the General Research Fund (Hong Kong) and Academic Research Fund (Singapore), and the European Commission (Horizon 2020).  These have contributed to interdisciplinary conversations spanning linguistics, psychology, health communication, and AI-enabled humanities research. He currently serves as Co-Editor-in-Chief of Metaphor and the Social World and Associate Editor of Metaphor and Symbol, among other editorial board memberships. He is a recipient of several institutional and international awards for excellence in research and teaching.

Research Interests

applied cognitive linguistics, metaphor theory, mental healthcare communication, discourse analysis, applications and pedagogy of AI, machine learning, and deep learning

 

Representative Publications

Books

Tay, D. (contracted). Machine Learning Meets Discourse: Algorithms Performance and Interpretation. New York: Routledge.

Tay, D. (2024). Data analytics for discourse analysis. New York: Routledge.

Tay, D. (2022). Navigating the realities of metaphor in psychotherapy research. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.

Tay, D. (2019). Time Series Analysis of Discourse. Method and Case Studies. New York: Routledge.

Tay, D. (2013). Metaphor in Psychotherapy. A Descriptive and Prescriptive Analysis. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Tay, D. & Pan, X. (Eds.). (2022). Data Analytics in Cognitive Linguistics. Method and Case Studies. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter

Lin, K. L., Mwinlaaru, I. N., & Tay, D. (Eds.). (2020). Approaches to Specialized Genres. New York: Routledge.

Yamaguchi, M., Tay, D. & Blount, B. (Eds.). (2014). Towards an Integration of Language, Culture, and Cognition. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Selected Recent Articles and Chapters

Tay. D. (2026). Affective engagement with metaphor in introductory statistics education. Journal of Experimental Education, 94(1), 105-119.

Tay, D. & D. Xie (2025). Fingerprints of EFL writing: An AI Deep Learning Approach. Asian-Pacific Journal of Second and Foreign Language Education, 10:43

Tay, D., & Qiu, H. (2024). Source Domain Associations as Conceptual Assemblages in Trauma Talk – an Association Rule Mining Approach. Metaphor and Symbol, 39(2). 96-109.

Gao, F., & Tay, D. (2023). Metaphor Use in Describing English Public Speaking Anxiety by Chinese University EFL Learners. System, 103091.

McMullen, L., & Tay, D. (2023). Psychotherapists’ use of metaphors. Psychotherapy. Online ahead of press.

Tay, D. (2022). Metaphor types as strategies for teaching regression to novice learners. Journal of  Statistics and Data Science Education, 30(1), 3-14.

Tay, D. (2021). Modelability across time as a signature of identity construction on YouTube. Journal of Pragmatics, 182, 1–15.

Tay, D. (2021). Automated lexical and time series modeling for critical discourse research: a case study of Hong Kong protest editorials. Lingua, 255, 103056.

Tay, D. (2020). Affective Engagement in Metaphorical versus Literal Communication Styles in Counseling. Discourse Processes, 57(4), 360–375.

 

Liu, Y., Tay, D., & Mellow, D. (2025). Time Series. In C. A. Chapelle, R. Suvorov, & Z. Li (Eds.), The Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics (Quantitative Methods) (2nd ed.). Wiley

Xie Pan, M., & Tay, D. (2025). Communicating socio-psychological meanings. Metaphors in Hong Kong press conferences on measures against COVID-19. In X. Wen, W. Lu, J. Lennon, & Z. Kövecses (Eds.), COVID-19: Metaphor and metonymy across languages and cultures (pp. 192–218). Amsterdam: John Benjamins

Tay, D., & Jin, Y. (2024). The construction and survivability of “blaming” metaphors on Chinese social media. In M. Romano (Ed.), Metaphor in Socio-Political Contexts (pp. 207–226). Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.

Tay, D. (2022). Time Series Analysis with Python. In D. Tay and X. Pan (Eds.), Data Analytics in Cognitive Linguistics. Method and Case Studies. (pp. 49-74). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter

Tay, D. (2021). COVID-19 Press Conferences Across Time: World Health Organization vs. Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In A. Musolff, R. Breeze & K. Kondo (Eds.), Pandemic and Crisis Discourse. Communicating COVID-19 and Public Health Strategy. (pp. 13-30). London: Bloomsbury

Tay, D. (2021). Image schemas. In X, Wen & J. Taylor (Eds.), Routledge Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics. (pp. 161-172). New York: Routledge