In the past, the pseudo-static method used to be the most common for evaluating
the stability of landslides under seismic loads, in which static forces acting on the center of gravity
of a sliding body are used to consider the effects of earthquake. However, seismic loads of rock
and soil differ from time and location to time and location. Obviously, it is irrational for the
pseudo-static approach to be applied to solving dynamic problems. In this paper, a displacement-
pseudo-dynamic model is proposed to assess seismic stability of landslides, in which the sinusoidal-
cosinusoidal wave is applied to simulating earthquake displacement, and an “amplification factor”
of peak seismic displacement is referred to as the amplification of seismic wave when it propagates
fromthe bottomto the top of the landslide. The effects of physico-mechanical behaviors of a sliding
body on seismic stability of soil slopes are taken into account as well as inertia forces and damping
forces. The sensitivity analyses on the permanent displacement and the dynamic factor of safety
of landslides are studied in detail. Moreover, a large-scale Tangjiashan landslide that occurred in
Wenchuan earthquake is investigated to verify the robustness and precision of the present method.
It is found that the results from the present method is in good agreement with those from the
previous method.