His published books include U.S. Foreign Policy and the Iran Hostage Crisis and Political Psychology: Situations, Individuals, and Cases. His latest book, The Decision Point, is due to be published in 2011. His area of expertise is political psychology and decision making in international relations, and he has published refereed articles in a variety of top journals. He received his PhD in political science in 1996 from the University of Pittsburgh and has also taught there and at the University of Essex. From 2001 to 2002, he was a visiting scholar at the Mershon Center for International Security Studies at The Ohio State University.