@inproceedings{qi-etal-2026-beyond,
title = "Beyond Static Persona Consistency: Dynamic Persona Coherence in {LLM} Role-Playing",
author = "QI, Yirui and
Zhang, Xiaoming and
Zeng, Ruilin and
Liu, Mengyao and
Zhou, Ziyi and
Miao, Dezhuang and
Yan, Bingyu and
Guan, Zhenyu",
editor = "Liakata, Maria and
Moreira, Viviane P. and
Zhang, Jiajun and
Jurgens, David",
booktitle = "Proceedings of the 64th Annual Meeting of the {A}ssociation for {C}omputational {L}inguistics (Volume 1: Long Papers)",
month = jul,
year = "2026",
address = "San Diego, California, United States",
publisher = "Association for Computational Linguistics",
url = "https://aclanthology.org/2026.acl-long.1336/",
pages = "28942--28956",
ISBN = "979-8-89176-390-6",
abstract = "Current LLM role-playing systems model persona as a monolithic, static attribute, conflating identity consistency with emotional rigidity. This leads to either robotic repetition or catastrophic persona drift under sustained interaction. We introduce Dynamic Persona Coherence, a framework that decouples Identity-Layer Stability (time-invariant traits) from Adaptive-Layer Appropriateness (history-dependent psychological evolution). We operationalize this through the L/M/S Psychological State Model, which represents persona dynamics across long-term identity, mid-term meaning/stress accumulation, and short-term affect. On top of this state representation, a closed-loop alignment system comprising an automated evaluator (Persona Consistency Critic, PCC), a selective repository (Persona Case Repository, PCR), and a trajectory-adjusting corrector (Persona Drift Suppressor, PDS) enables autonomous coherence repair. Experiments on GPT-4o, Claude-3.5-Sonnet, and DeepSeek-V3.2 demonstrate consistent improvements (+16{--}84{\%} PCC gains)."
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<abstract>Current LLM role-playing systems model persona as a monolithic, static attribute, conflating identity consistency with emotional rigidity. This leads to either robotic repetition or catastrophic persona drift under sustained interaction. We introduce Dynamic Persona Coherence, a framework that decouples Identity-Layer Stability (time-invariant traits) from Adaptive-Layer Appropriateness (history-dependent psychological evolution). We operationalize this through the L/M/S Psychological State Model, which represents persona dynamics across long-term identity, mid-term meaning/stress accumulation, and short-term affect. On top of this state representation, a closed-loop alignment system comprising an automated evaluator (Persona Consistency Critic, PCC), a selective repository (Persona Case Repository, PCR), and a trajectory-adjusting corrector (Persona Drift Suppressor, PDS) enables autonomous coherence repair. Experiments on GPT-4o, Claude-3.5-Sonnet, and DeepSeek-V3.2 demonstrate consistent improvements (+16–84% PCC gains).</abstract>
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%0 Conference Proceedings
%T Beyond Static Persona Consistency: Dynamic Persona Coherence in LLM Role-Playing
%A QI, Yirui
%A Zhang, Xiaoming
%A Zeng, Ruilin
%A Liu, Mengyao
%A Zhou, Ziyi
%A Miao, Dezhuang
%A Yan, Bingyu
%A Guan, Zhenyu
%Y Liakata, Maria
%Y Moreira, Viviane P.
%Y Zhang, Jiajun
%Y Jurgens, David
%S Proceedings of the 64th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (Volume 1: Long Papers)
%D 2026
%8 July
%I Association for Computational Linguistics
%C San Diego, California, United States
%@ 979-8-89176-390-6
%F qi-etal-2026-beyond
%X Current LLM role-playing systems model persona as a monolithic, static attribute, conflating identity consistency with emotional rigidity. This leads to either robotic repetition or catastrophic persona drift under sustained interaction. We introduce Dynamic Persona Coherence, a framework that decouples Identity-Layer Stability (time-invariant traits) from Adaptive-Layer Appropriateness (history-dependent psychological evolution). We operationalize this through the L/M/S Psychological State Model, which represents persona dynamics across long-term identity, mid-term meaning/stress accumulation, and short-term affect. On top of this state representation, a closed-loop alignment system comprising an automated evaluator (Persona Consistency Critic, PCC), a selective repository (Persona Case Repository, PCR), and a trajectory-adjusting corrector (Persona Drift Suppressor, PDS) enables autonomous coherence repair. Experiments on GPT-4o, Claude-3.5-Sonnet, and DeepSeek-V3.2 demonstrate consistent improvements (+16–84% PCC gains).
%U https://aclanthology.org/2026.acl-long.1336/
%P 28942-28956
Markdown (Informal)
[Beyond Static Persona Consistency: Dynamic Persona Coherence in LLM Role-Playing](https://aclanthology.org/2026.acl-long.1336/) (QI et al., ACL 2026)
ACL
- Yirui QI, Xiaoming Zhang, Ruilin Zeng, Mengyao Liu, Ziyi Zhou, Dezhuang Miao, Bingyu Yan, and Zhenyu Guan. 2026. Beyond Static Persona Consistency: Dynamic Persona Coherence in LLM Role-Playing. In Proceedings of the 64th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (Volume 1: Long Papers), pages 28942–28956, San Diego, California, United States. Association for Computational Linguistics.